shell built in pwd versus /bin/pwd

Question

Hi,

I would like to know the code implementation of built-in pwd and /bin/pwd especially when the directory path is a symbolic link.

Example:

hita@hita-laptop:/home$ ls -l
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root   31 2010-06-13 15:35 my_shell -> /home/hita/shell_new/hita_shell

hita@hita-laptop:/home$ cd my_shell

hita@hita-laptop:/home/my_shell$ pwd <SHELL BUILT-IN PWD>  
/home/my_shell

hita@hita-laptop:/home/my_shell$ /bin/pwd  
/home/hita/shell_new/hita_shell

The output is different in both the cases. Any clue?

thanks

Answer 1

The shell's builtin pwd has the advantage of being able to remember how you accessed the symlinked directory, so it shows you that information. The standalone utility just knows what your actual working directory is, not how you changed to that directory, so it reports the real path.

Personally, I dislike shells that do what you're describing because it shows a reality different than that which standalone tools will see. For example, how a builtin tool parses a relative path will differ from how a standalone tool parses a relative path.

Answer 2

The shell keeps track in its own memory what your currenct directory is by concatenating it with whatever you cd to (and eliminating . and .. entries). It does this so that symbolic links don't mess up cd ... The /bin/pwd implementation walks the directory tree upwards trying to find inodes with the right names.

Answer 3

The built-in pwd shows symbolic links by default, but won't do if you give it the -P option.

In contrast, the pwd command doesn't show symbolic links by default, but will do if given the -L option.