From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 42295 invoked by alias); 28 Apr 2016 22:13:09 -0000 Mailing-List: contact cygwin-help@cygwin.com; run by ezmlm Precedence: bulk List-Id: List-Subscribe: List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: , Sender: cygwin-owner@cygwin.com Mail-Followup-To: cygwin@cygwin.com Received: (qmail 42286 invoked by uid 89); 28 Apr 2016 22:13:09 -0000 Authentication-Results: sourceware.org; auth=none X-Virus-Found: No X-Spam-SWARE-Status: No, score=-1.2 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_05,FREEMAIL_FROM,RCVD_IN_DNSWL_LOW,SPF_PASS autolearn=ham version=3.3.2 spammy=Russia, everybody, admittedly, possibility X-HELO: mail-ig0-f196.google.com Received: from mail-ig0-f196.google.com (HELO mail-ig0-f196.google.com) (209.85.213.196) by sourceware.org (qpsmtpd/0.93/v0.84-503-g423c35a) with (AES128-GCM-SHA256 encrypted) ESMTPS; Thu, 28 Apr 2016 22:13:07 +0000 Received: by mail-ig0-f196.google.com with SMTP id rc4so539821igc.0 for ; Thu, 28 Apr 2016 15:13:07 -0700 (PDT) X-Google-DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=1e100.net; s=20130820; h=x-gm-message-state:mime-version:date:message-id:subject:from:to; bh=XEh42uzEg/aKA4bZgprzfI2SgG5SkGsC/WxI4xCuaZE=; b=YAYDOnopRmDDkdKEnLfp9UEtHZH+6tpvAABNAnun+1LGMh4cIgMPMiInST1k25xS2e R3EckzQo7OfnEVqnBXdBeZAVfL+QtsRy/TKF5lJIoCdbyUXllKMCS9vOUiz9ZEcvSTNy SDpzLdNV0prX3IpyZZyiLA0BMT92bRph52PVtD7PUzhwxVxrNkGFfpuHsds5mLT2Kvyu JzbAFoRqKI9OCQlK4LYjVJqL/koJm/8S19RgYBi1J0Nc0HcTH+H52aVQm/JAZk5desiT O3GLSE3XTr3YJh6SUVE9FOVLHzrDWwcREdvD9IeeU+Qf6Ueuk4LIqX0eAE4RbZ6tomyr gfWw== X-Gm-Message-State: AOPr4FVTSX8vRDC354+IXqHlkXqCtggUWyuZ8APFasL+EXRhb4R4W41TeN1s9rVJgJ76gLhvtv9iKEJbYbTUVg== MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Received: by 10.50.189.233 with SMTP id gl9mr267486igc.73.1461881585931; Thu, 28 Apr 2016 15:13:05 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.79.22.134 with HTTP; Thu, 28 Apr 2016 15:13:05 -0700 (PDT) Date: Thu, 28 Apr 2016 22:18:00 -0000 Message-ID: Subject: `CYGWIN=winsymlinks:nativestrict`, `ln -s target link` fails if target doesn't exist From: Gene Pavlovsky To: cygwin@cygwin.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 X-SW-Source: 2016-04/txt/msg00629.txt.bz2 Hello everybody! First post on this mailing list, my name is Gene, I'm from Russia, long-time Linux user, but had to use Windows as desktop for the last 8 years. Cygwin really helps me to keep my sanity! Thanks :) I have an issue to report: Introduction: On a UNIX system, `ln -s target link` creates a link regardless of target's existence. This is used in some scripts, e.g. Gentoo's `run-crons` (which I also use on Cygwin) uses a symlink pointing to the running process PID as lockfile. Issue: if `CYGWIN=winsymlinks:nativestrict` env var is set, running `ln -s target link` completely fails (even though running `mklink link target` in `cmd.exe` succeeds, same as `ln -s` does on UNIX). If `CYGWIN=winsymlinks:native`, a non-native link is created. So, `nativestrict` might break some (admittedly unorthodox) scripts. With `native` these script work, but still a native link would be preferrable and it is possible to create, but a non-native link is created instead. Bottom line, I think the native symlink creation code should be checked and a possibility should be added to create links to non-existent targets, rather than the current behavior of failing. Thanks! --Gene -- Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html FAQ: http://cygwin.com/faq/ Documentation: http://cygwin.com/docs.html Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple