Soft Link and Hard Link in Linux

ln -s : Soft link

Let’s make soft link to the test as test2

morty@c137:~$ ln -s test test2
morty@c137:~$ ls -i
 2759545 test2        2759449 test   

1. Does depend on original file

2. Soft link has a different inode from inode of original

3. Linking existing file to new file

4. Linking between different file system

5. Linking a directory to another directory

ln : Hard link

Let’s make hard link to the test as test3

morty@c137:~$ ln test test3
morty@c137:~$ ls -i
2759545 test2   2759449 test3   2759449 test                 

1. Doesn’t depend on original file

2. Hard link has a same inode to the inode of original

3. Linking existing file to new file

4. Linking in same file system

5. Hard link can’t link directory