Re: perl's stat and symlinks
On Sun, 15 Dec 2002, Colin Watson wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 15, 2002 at 05:31:15PM +0100, Michael Naumann wrote:
> > when I do from perl
> > @f = stat "f";
> > @sl2f = stat "sl2f";
> > I always get the same contents in @sl2f as in @f, i.e stat follows the link.
> > Thus I cannot decide via stat,
> > whether the file in question is a symlink or a not.
>
> Use lstat().
>
Alternatively, use the file test operators. From man perlfunc:
-X FILEHANDLE
-X EXPR
-X A file test, where X is one of the letters listed
below. This unary operator takes one argument,
either a filename or a filehandle, and tests the
associated file to see if something is true about
it. If the argument is omitted, tests "$_",
except for "-t", which tests STDIN. Unless other
wise documented, it returns "1" for true and "''"
for false, or the undefined value if the file
doesn't exist. Despite the funny names, prece
dence is the same as any other named unary opera
tor, and the argument may be parenthesized like
any other unary operator. The operator may be any
of:
-r File is readable by effective uid/gid.
-w File is writable by effective uid/gid.
-x File is executable by effective uid/gid.
-o File is owned by effective uid.
-R File is readable by real uid/gid.
-W File is writable by real uid/gid.
-X File is executable by real uid/gid.
-O File is owned by real uid.
-e File exists.
-z File has zero size (is empty).
-s File has nonzero size (returns size in bytes).
-f File is a plain file.
-d File is a directory.
-l File is a symbolic link.
-p File is a named pipe (FIFO), or Filehandle is a
pipe.
-S File is a socket.
-b File is a block special file.
-c File is a character special file.
-t Filehandle is opened to a tty.
-u File has setuid bit set.
-g File has setgid bit set.
-k File has sticky bit set.
-T File is an ASCII text file.
-B File is a "binary" file (opposite of -T).
-M Age of file in days when script started.
-A Same for access time.
-C Same for inode change time.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Andrew J Perrin - http://www.unc.edu/~aperrin
Assistant Professor of Sociology, U of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
clists@perrin.socsci.unc.edu * andrew_perrin (at) unc.edu
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