MySQL Bugs: #38019: Symbolic links do not work with mapped drives

Bug #38019	Symbolic links do not work with mapped drives
Submitted:	10 Jul 2008 14:50	Modified:	30 Jul 2008 23:08
Reporter:	Scott Noyes	Email Updates:
Status:	Closed	Impact on me:	None
Category:	MySQL Server: Documentation	Severity:	S3 (Non-critical)
Version:	5.0.62	OS:	Windows
Assigned to:	Paul DuBois	CPU Architecture:	Any

Description:
Creating a symbolic link to a mapped network drive fails with "Can't create database t1 (error 2)"

How to repeat:
- Map a folder to drive Z:
- Create the folder Z:\t1
- In the data directory, create a file 't1.sym' that contains the line 'Z:\t1\'
- Login to mysql and issue SHOW DATABASES. t1 should appear; it does not.
- issue CREATE DATABASE t1; - get the error 'Can't create database t1 (error 2)'

If the same procedure is repeated with any location other than a mapped drive (to a USB key, to a path on the C: drive, to a network drive referenced with \\serverName\path) then it behaves correctly.

Suggested fix:
Using \\serverName\path should suffice as a workaround.

Stefan - I think we need a note in the documentation that when running MySQL as a service, you cannot use a mapped drive to a remote server as the destination of the symbolic link, but you can use the full path (\\servername\path\).

http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/windows-symbolic-links.html

If you think it's too technical a detail to mention in the docs, I can just add a user comment instead.

Thank you for your bug report. This issue has been addressed in the documentation. The updated documentation will appear on our website shortly, and will be included in the next release of the relevant products.