GNU bug report logs - #79060
ln documentation 2nd form does not work

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Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Mason Wong <masonwong1999 <at> gmail.com>
To: bug-coreutils <at> gnu.org
Subject: ln documentation 2nd form does not work
Date: Sun, 20 Jul 2025 23:21:09 +1000

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

According to the ln documentation ( ln(1) - Linux manual page
<https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/ln.1.html>)

[image: image.png]
The documentation states that you should be able to do something like *ln
a.txt* (where a.txt is just some arbitrary file). However, this is
misleading because something like this cannot be done:
[image: image.png]
From experience, you *must* always give the ln command two arguments
(either a directory with the -t option or as the second argument as in the
3rd and 4th form *or *the
*link_name). *Essentially, I don't think the documentation is accurate and
that the second form does not make sense and it is misleading at best. It
would be helpful to correct this for future documentation man pages to not
have this ambiguity.

Best wishes,
Mason

[Message part 2 (text/html, inline)]

[image.png (image/png, inline)]

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Message #8 received at 79060 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Martin Schulte <gnu <at> schrader-schulte.de>
To: Mason Wong <masonwong1999 <at> gmail.com>
Cc: 79060 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#79060: ln documentation 2nd form does not work
Date: Sun, 20 Jul 2025 17:07:39 +0200

Hello Mason,

as the manual says "In the 2nd form, create a link to TARGET in the current directory.":

mkdir x
touch y
cd x
ln ../y

Works!

Best regards,

Martin

Message #11 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Davide Brini <dave_br <at> gmx.com>
To: bug-coreutils <at> gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#79060: ln documentation 2nd form does not work
Date: Sun, 20 Jul 2025 17:19:13 +0200

On Sun, 20 Jul 2025 23:21:09 +1000, Mason Wong <masonwong1999 <at> gmail.com>
wrote:

> According to the ln documentation ( ln(1) - Linux manual page
> <https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/ln.1.html>)
> 
> [image: image.png]
> The documentation states that you should be able to do something like *ln
> a.txt* (where a.txt is just some arbitrary file). However, this is
> misleading because something like this cannot be done:

The problem is that you're running the command in the same directory as the
source, so it correctly cannot create a link to it since an object with the
same name already exists (ie, the file itself). This is the same that would
happen even with the two-argument form of ln, if an object with the same
name already exists;

$ touch b
$ ln -s /bin/ls b
ln: failed to create symbolic link 'b': File exists

Try linking to an object that doesn't live in the same directory.

$ rm b
$ ln -s /bin/ls
$ ls -l
lrwxrwxrwx 1 davide davide       7 Jul 20 17:18 ls -> /bin/ls

-- 
D.

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