Symbolic links problem with cygwin 1.7.1 in 64-bit Win7 Command Prompt

[Larry Hall (Cygwin)]

On 12/30/2009 08:30 AM, tuli tanssi wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I've been using gcc and other tools in older versions of cygwin with
> 32-bit Windows XP and Vista from windows command prompt (cmd.exe)
> without problems. But now I'm using 64-bit Windows 7, and some command
> line tools like gcc.exe do not work anymore (from cmd.exe). They do
> work ok from Cygwin's bash.
>
> The message I get when trying to run gcc in cmd.exe is: "Access is denied."
>
> Anyway, only some tools don't work, e.g. 'ls' works ok from cmd.exe.
>
> I noticed that all cygwin tools that are actually symbolic links to
> somehere else (just like /bin/gcc.exe and some others) are the
> problematic tools.
> Also /bin/gcc.exe has System rights (as seen by Attrib command of
> windows), while tools that do work have only Archive rights.
>
> So the I guess the problem is related to how symbolic links are
> created and with what rights.
>
> Anyone else tried this? Any solutions?

This is a known limitation of the symbolic links in Cygwin 1.7.  The solution
is to invoke the command directly ('gcc-3.exe' or 'gcc-4.exe' in this case) or
create your own batch file wrappers or DOS aliases to point to the proper
alternative.  Another might be to set "winsymlinks" in the CYGWIN environment
variable <http://cygwin.com/cygwin-ug-net/using-cygwinenv.html> and recreate
the symlinks you want that way.  The clear downside to this approach is that
it won't handle international characters in file names/paths properly.  As a 
result
one might guess this is not the recommended solution.  And one would be
right! ;-)

-- 
Larry Hall                              http://www.rfk.com
RFK Partners, Inc.                      (508) 893-9779 - RFK Office
216 Dalton Rd.                          (508) 893-9889 - FAX
Holliston, MA 01746

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