symlink is used when adding local plugin in windows

When we add local plugin as

cordova plugin add /path/to/local_plugin/

in windows environment, a symlink is created.

I feel that a junction should be created. Becuase npm command creates a junction in windows.

My question is that symlink in windows is ok?

I checked this by using cordova-cli 8.1.x in github with cordova-lib@9.0.0-nightly.2018.9.20.63b26e63 in npm.

> ..\cordova-cli\bin\cordova.cmd -v
8.0.1-dev (cordova-lib@9.0.0-nightly.2018.9.20.63b26e63)
>  ..\cordova-cli\bin\cordova.cmd plugin add ..\..\plugins\cordova-plugin-camera

The result is following. (Here I add cordova-plugin-camera downloaded to my local PC)

> dir node_modules
2018/09/20  18:36    <DIR>          .
2018/09/20  18:36    <DIR>          ..
2018/09/20  18:36    <JUNCTION>     cordova-plugin-camera [C:\Users\knaito\Documents\work\cordova\plugins\cordova-plugin-camera]

The node_module is junction pointing to the original directory. (This is ok)

> dir plugins
2018/09/20  18:36    <DIR>          .
2018/09/20  18:36    <DIR>          ..
2018/09/20  18:36    <SYMLINK>      cordova-plugin-camera [C:\Users\knaito\Documents\work\cordova\plugins\cordova-plugin-camera\]
2018/09/20  18:36               241 fetch.json

The plugin is symlink pointing to the original directory. (Is this ok?)

[knight9999]

Anyway, the basic function like a CreateFileW does not work. I conclude that a symlink pointing to a directory should not be used. We should use a junction, a symlinkd or copied directory instead.

[knight9999]

I found one thing about this issue. I tried to debug following commands

node -e "console.log(fs.statSync('C:\\Users\\knaito\\Documents\\work\\cordova-develop\\test001\\foo'));"

by using VisualStudio 2017 where foo is a symlink pointing to other directory.

Then I found the error becomes from

INLINE static void fs__stat_impl(uv_fs_t* req, int do_lstat) {
  HANDLE handle;
  DWORD flags;

  flags = FILE_FLAG_BACKUP_SEMANTICS;
  if (do_lstat) {
    flags |= FILE_FLAG_OPEN_REPARSE_POINT;
  }

  handle = CreateFileW(req->file.pathw,
                       FILE_READ_ATTRIBUTES,
                       FILE_SHARE_READ | FILE_SHARE_WRITE | FILE_SHARE_DELETE,
                       NULL,
                       OPEN_EXISTING,
                       flags,
                       NULL);
  if (handle == INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE) {
    SET_REQ_WIN32_ERROR(req, GetLastError());
    return;
  }
  ...

in deps/uv/src/win/fs.c . See https://github.com/nodejs/node/blob/9b292272ff3d71a0ebabe46d040346dbd34585db/deps/uv/src/win/fs.c#L1252

CreateFileW returns INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE for a symlink pointing to other directory.

Because CreateFileW is a Win32API function, I could not investigate it more detailed.