How can I detect whether a symlink is broken in Bash?

bash symlink
zoltanctoth picture zoltanctoth · Nov 8, 2011 · Viewed 32.1k times · Source

I run find and iterate through the results with [ \( -L $F \) ] to collect certain symbolic links.

I am wondering if there is an easy way to determine if the link is broken (points to a non-existent file) in this scenario.

Here is my code:

FILES=`find /target/ | grep -v '\.disabled$' | sort`

for F in $FILES; do
    if [ -L $F ]; then
        DO THINGS
    fi
done

Answer

Roger picture Roger · Nov 8, 2011 
# test if symlink is broken (by seeing if it links to an existing file)
if [ ! -e "$F" ] ; then
    # code if the symlink is broken
fi

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