I'm looking for a way to create two paths on the file system (NTFS, if you were wondering) that reference the same block of data. Example:

D:\Drivers\Windows 7 x64\NVIDIA\Forceware.exe

D:\Drivers\Windows Vista x64\NVIDIA\Forceware.exe

Both are seen and run as executables, so that they don't effect permissions for network users and the like, but only 130MB is taken up on the drive instead of 260MB.

I could probably get away with the following but it will make things longer for the scripts I'm going to write to make everything nice and cohesive

D:\Drivers\BIN\NVIDIA\FW266.58.exe

D:\Drivers\Windows 7 x64\NVIDIA\ForceWare.lnk --> D:\Drivers\BIN\NVIDIA\FW266.58.exe

D:\Drivers\Windows 7 x64\NVIDIA\ForceWare.lnk --> D:\Drivers\BIN\NVIDIA\FW266.58.exe

Suggestions? Links? Solutions?

Thanks,

Overkill

Edited March 30, 201115 yr by Over.Kill

Put the file in a central location you can remember (i.e. this is the real file) and then create hard links for the other spots. either mklink (Vista and above) or fsutil will be useful to look into for this purpose.

Edited March 30, 201115 yr by Glenn9999

Thanks Glenn, that's what I was looking for. It's been a while since I had to do this and totally forgot what they were called. mklink was what I needed!

Here's how I am going to do the setup:

Originals:

D:\Drivers\BIN\NVIIDA\GT8600\Forceware (X).exe

D:\Drivers\BIN\NVIDIA\GT8600\Forceware (V7x64).exe

D:\Drivers\BIN\NVIDIA\GT8600\Forceware (V7x86).exe

Hard Links:

D:\Drivers\XP\NVIDIA\GT8600\Forceware.exe

D:\Drivers\Vx64\...\Forceware.exe

D:\Drivers\7x64\...\Forceware.exe

etc

If I update the file at the original path, will the hard link automatically be refreshed or do I have to re-link (IE: does the link point to the original path or to the block of data itself?)

Edited March 30, 201115 yr by Over.Kill