From: Kent Dahl <kentda@...>
Date: 2005-01-10T06:01:23+09:00
Subject: Re: Fileutils::copy_entry() won't copy symlinks without dereferencing

Andrew Walrond wrote:
> "copy_entry(src, dest, preserve = false, dereference = false)
> 
[...]
> 
> But I cannot get a symlink to copy as a symlink. Example:

Same problem here on ruby 1.8.2 (2004-12-25) [x86_64-linux].

FileUtils appeared to be correct at first glance, the problem was due to
File.stat(filename).symlink? not returning true for symlinks.

But then I saw this tidbit in file.c:

 *  call-seq:
 *     stat.symlink?    => true or false
 *  
 *  Returns <code>true</code> if <i>stat</i> is a symbolic link,
 *  <code>false</code> if it isn't or if the operating system doesn't
 *  support this feature. As <code>File::stat</code> automatically
 *  follows symbolic links, <code>symlink?</code> will always be
 *  <code>false</code> for an object returned by
 *  <code>File::stat</code>.
 *     
 *     File.symlink("testfile", "alink")   #=> 0
 *     File.stat("alink").symlink?         #=> false
 *     File.lstat("alink").symlink?        #=> true

Should FileUtils use lstat everywhere? (It does for the most part.)

As for a quick hack/workaround, just change one method after fetching the
FileUtils module:

require 'fileutils'
class FileUtils::CopyContext_
  def stat(path)
    @stat ||= ::File.lstat(path)
  end
end
FileUtils.copy_entry( 'link', 'link2' )

This script makes another symlink to whatever 'link' pointed to, on my
system. 

HTH

-- 
Kent Dahl