Is there a way to edit a symlink without deleting it first?

Question

So I created a symlink:

ln -s /location/to/link linkname

Now I want to change the location that the symlink links to. How do I do that? is there a way to do it without deleting it first?

Answer 1

No. The symlink system call will return EEXIST if newpath already exists. You can only link from a new node in the filesystem. What's the requirement here? If you're worried about a race due to the non-atomicity of the unlink/symlink calls, then you might want to rethink the architecture a little to provide synchronization elsewhere. There have been some scary security bugs introduced by this kind of thing.

Answer 2

Try ln -sf new_destination linkname.

Answer 3

You could create the new link with a different name, then move it to replace the old link.

ln -s /location/to/link linkname

Later

ln -s /location/to/link2 newlink
mv newlink linkname

If newlink and linkname are on the same physical device the mv should be atomic.