[vtk-developers] A single ExternalData folder for multiple variants of VTK. Is it possible?

[Ben Boeckel]

On Fri, Jul 15, 2016 at 13:41:34 +0000, Andras Lasso wrote:
> You can create symlinks in Windows (the feature was added a 10+ years
> ago):
> https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc753194(v=ws.11).aspx

Hard links are probably more useful on Windows since (I believe), they
do not require elevated privs:

    https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa365006(v=vs.85).aspx

I belive symlinks require privs because there ~all Windows programs do
not guard against symlink redirection attacks (usually TOCTOU). And
since Windows doesn't really have atomic filesystem operations, there's
~no way avoid TOCTOU.

--Ben