this post was submitted on 09 Apr 2024
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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A symlink works more closely to the first way you described it. The software opening a symlink has to actually follow it. It's possible for a software to not follow the symlink (either intentionally or not).
So your sync software has to actually be able to follow symlinks. I'm not familiar with how gdrive and similar solutions work, but I know this is possible with something like rsync
An application can know that a file represents a soft link, but they don't need to do anything differently to follow it. If the program just opens it, reads it, writes to it, etc, as though it were the original file, it will just work^tm^ without them needing to do anything differently.
It is possible for the software to not follow a soft symlink intentionally, yes (if they don't follow it unintentionally, that might be a bug).
As for hard links, I'm not as certain, but I think these need to be supported at the filesystem level (which is why they often have specific restrictions), and the application can't tell the difference.
So I guess it's something like pressing ctrl+c: most software doesn't specifically handle this hotkey so in general it will interrupt a running process, but software can choose to handle it differently (like in vim ctrl+C does not interrupt it).
Thanks.
Fun fact: pressing X (close button) on a window does not make it that your app is closed, it just sends a signal that you wish to close it, your app can choose what to do with this signal.