NAME    [Toc]    [Back]

     readlink -- display target of symbolic link on standard output

SYNOPSIS    [Toc]    [Back]

     readlink [-fn] file

DESCRIPTION    [Toc]    [Back]

     The readlink utility when invoked with the pathname of a symbolic link as
     its argument dereferences the symbolic link and prints the name of target
     on standard output.  If readlink is invoked with an argument other than
     the pathname of a symbolic link, it exits with a non-zero exit code without
 printing anything.

     The following options are available:

     -f    Using realpath(3), canonicalize by following every symlink in every
	   component of the given path recursively.  Note that the resultant
	   pathname might not exist,

     -n    Do not print a trailing newline character.

     The readlink utility exits 0 on success or >0 if an error occurred.

NOTE    [Toc]    [Back]

     Debian packages using readlink in maintainer scripts must depend on
     debianutils >= 1.13.1.

SEE ALSO    [Toc]    [Back]

     readlink(2) realpath(3)

HISTORY    [Toc]    [Back]

     The readlink utility first appeared in OpenBSD.


FreeBSD 5.2.1			August 18, 1997 		 FreeBSD 5.2.1