How to check if a symlink exists

Question

I m trying to check if a symlink exists in bash  Here s what I ve tried   mda  usr mda if     -L  mda    then   echo    gt  File doesn t exist  fi   mda   usr mda  if     -L  mda    then   echo    gt  File doesn t exist  fi   However  that doesn t work   If     is left out  it never triggers  And if     is there  it triggers every time

User · Answer

-L is the test for file exists and is also a symbolic link  If you do not want to test for the file being a symbolic link  but just test to see if it exists regardless of type  file  directory  socket etc  then use -e  So if file is really file and not just a symbolic link you can do all these tests and get an exit status whose value indicates the error condition   if        -e    file        then      echo   ERROR  file   file  does not exist    gt  amp 2      exit 1 elif        -f    file        then      echo   ERROR    file  is not a file    gt  amp 2      exit 2 elif        -r    file        then      echo   ERROR  file   file  is not readable    gt  amp 2      exit 3 elif        -s    file        then      echo   ERROR  file   file  is empty    gt  amp 2      exit 4 fi

User · Answer

How about using readlink     if symlink  readlink returns not empty string  the symlink target    if string is not empty  test exits w  0  normal      if non symlink  readlink returns empty string   if string is empty  test exits w  1  error  simlink         test    readlink    1         FILE  usr mda  if simlink     FILE    then   echo  FILE is a symlink else   echo  FILE is not a symlink fi

User · Answer

first you can do with this style   mda   usr mda  if     -L    mda      then   echo    gt  File doesn t exist  fi  if you want to do it in more advanced style you can write it like below      bin bash mda   1  if   -e   1     then     if     -L   1        then         echo  you entry is not symlink      else         echo  your entry is symlink      fi else   echo    gt  File doesn t exist  fi    the result of above is like   root linux      sym sh  etc passwd you entry is not symlink root linux      sym sh  usr mda  your entry is symlink root linux      sym sh    gt  File doesn t exist

User · Answer

-L returns true if the  file  exists and is a symbolic link  the linked file may or may not exist   You want -f  returns true if file exists and is a regular file  or maybe just -e  returns true if file exists regardless of type    According to the GNU manpage  -h is identical to -L  but according to the BSD manpage  it should not be used      -h file       True if file exists and is a symbolic link   This operator is retained for compatibility with previous versions of this program  Do not rely on its existence  use -L instead

User · Answer

Is the file really a symbolic link   If not  the usual test for existence is -r or -e   See man test

User · Answer

If you are testing for file existence you want -e not -L  -L tests for a symlink

User · Answer

Maybe this is what you are looking for  To check if a file exist and is not a link    Try this command   file   usr mda     -f  file    amp  amp      -L  file    amp  amp  echo   file exists and is not a symlink

User · Answer

You can check the existence of a symlink and that it is not broken with    -L   my link     amp  amp    -e   my link     So  the complete solution is  if   -L   my link      then    if   -e   my link      then       echo  quot Good link quot     else       echo  quot Broken link quot     fi elif   -e   my link      then    echo  quot Not a link quot  else    echo  quot Missing quot  fi  -L tests whether there is a symlink  broken or not  By combining with -e you can test whether the link is valid  links to a directory or file   not just whether it exists

[bash] How to check if a symlink exists

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