@node lstat
@section @code{lstat}
@findex lstat

POSIX specification:@* @url{http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/functions/lstat.html}

Gnulib module: lstat

Portability problems fixed by Gnulib:
@itemize
@item
For symlinks, when the argument ends in a slash, some platforms don't
dereference the argument:
Solaris 9.
@item
On some platforms, @code{lstat("file/",buf)} succeeds instead of
failing with @code{ENOTDIR}.
Solaris 9.
@item
On Windows platforms (excluding Cygwin), symlinks are not supported, so
@code{lstat} does not exist.
@end itemize

Portability problems not fixed by Gnulib:
@itemize
@item
On platforms where @code{off_t} is a 32-bit type, @code{lstat} may not
correctly report the size of files or block devices larger than 2 GB.  The fix
is to use the @code{AC_SYS_LARGEFILE} macro.
@item
On Windows platforms (excluding Cygwin), @code{st_ino} is always 0.
@item
Because of the definition of @code{struct stat}, it is not possible to
portably replace @code{stat} via an object-like macro.  Therefore,
expressions such as @code{(islnk ? lstat : stat) (name, buf)} are not
portable, and should instead be written @code{islnk ? lstat (name,
buf) : stat (name, buf)}.
@item
On some file systems, @code{st_size} contains bogus information for
symlinks; use the gnulib module areadlink-with-size for a better way
to get symlink contents.
@end itemize