H5L_CREATE_SOFT creates a new soft link to an object in an HDF5 file. The new link may be one of many that point to that object. target_path specifies the path to the target object, i.e., the object that the new soft link points to. target_path can be anything and is interpreted at lookup time. This path may be absolute in the file or relative to link_loc_id .
link_loc_id is the location identifier.
link_loc_id and link_name specify the location and name, respectively, of the new soft link. link_name is interpreted relative to link_loc_id and must contain only the name of the soft link; link_name may not contain any additional path elements.
If link_loc_id is a group identifier, the object pointed to by link_name will be accessed as a member of that group. If link_loc_id is a file identifier, the object will be accessed as a member of the file’s root group. lcpl_id and lapl_id are the link creation and access property lists associated with the new link.
For instance, if target_path is ./foo , link_loc_id specifies ./x/y/bar , and the name of the new link is new_link , then a subsequent request for ./x/y/bar/new_link will return same the object as would be found at ./foo . H5L_CREATE_SOFT is for use only if the target object is in the current file. If the desired target object is in a different file from the new link, use H5L_CREATE_EXTERNAL to create an external link. Soft links and external links are also known as symbolic links as they use a name to point to an object; hard links employ an object’s address in the file. Unlike hard links, a soft link in an HDF5 file is allowed to dangle, meaning that the target object need not exist at the time that the link is created. The HDF5 library does not keep a count of soft links as it does of hard links. |