I am wanting to see if my file is a link without having to rerun the stat operator. I saw an note in O'Reilly Perl book that stated that when returning info on a link, stat would return the filetype of the actual file (- , d, etc...). So maybe I should re-phrase my question to: Is there a way to have an algorithm that will tell me what type of file it is without having to check each specific bit. The following code returns a - for the file which is a link in both the $filelink and the $filetype variables. 

# hard code a test link file to check
$source_file = "/temp/test/source/dir1/hello1_link.txt";

# define filetype array with potential first bits of mode
@ftypes  = qw(. p c ? d ? b ? - ? l ? s ? ? ?);
$ftypes0 = '';

# Get File Statistics Using Scalar context

($dev,$inode,$mode,$nlink,$uid,$gid,$rdev,$size,
 $atime,$mtime,$ctime,$blksize,$blocks) = stat($source_file);

$perms    = $mode & 07777;
$octperms = sprintf("%lo", $perms);
$filetype = $ftypes[($mode & 0170000)>>12];
$filelink = $ftypes[($mode & 0120000)>>12];

[download]
And while I am admitting how much I don't know, what does the >>12 do in the array reference? Thanks.

In reply to Re: Unix File Type with stat by Anonymous Monk
in thread Unix File Type with stat by cxbast

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.