Creating and using Symlinks in VBA?

[SixSigmaGuy]

Has anyone had any success working with Symlinks in VBA code? I've figured out how to create them, but that's about it. Now I need to be able to find out what a symlink points to and that's eluded me. I've searched just about everything with no luck. Anyone know how to do that? I've found a Windows API (GetFinalPathNameByHandle) that supposedly does that, but I can't get it to work.

I found this code in another forum, but it always fails on "CreateFile" when the path is to a symlink. I am "running as administrator" and my same program will create a symlink ok, so I don't think it's a privilege problem.

Public Function GetFileFinalPath(ByVal FilePath As String) As String    
    Dim hFile As LongPtr
    Dim FinalPath As String
    Dim PathLength As Long
    ' Open the file handle
    hFile = CreateFile(StrPtr(FilePath), GENERIC_READ, FILE_SHARE_READ, 0, OPEN_EXISTING, FILE_FLAG_BACKUP_SEMANTICS, 0)
    If hFile = -1 Then
        GetFileFinalPath = "Error: Unable to open file handle."
        Exit Function
    End If
    ' Prepare buffer for the final path
    FinalPath = String$(260, vbNullChar) ' MAX_PATH is 260
    PathLength = GetFinalPathNameByHandle(hFile, FinalPath, Len(FinalPath), FILE_NAME_NORMALIZED)
    ' Close the file handle
    CloseHandle hFile
    ' Check if the function succeeded
    If PathLength > 0 Then
        GetFileFinalPath = Left$(FinalPath, PathLength)
    Else
        GetFileFinalPath = "Error: Unable to retrieve final path."
    End If
End Function

[arnelgp]

Chatgpt has some answer:

' from Chatgpt
Sub CreateSymlink(ByVal Target As String, ByVal Link As String)
    Dim cmd As String
    ' Ensure paths are wrapped in quotes
    ' cmd = "cmd /c mklink /D """ & Link & """ """ & Target & """"
    cmd = "cmd /c mklink """ & Link & """ """ & Target & """"
    ' Create the symbolic link
    Shell cmd, vbHide   'vbNormalFocus
End Sub

example (will create test.lnk of Document folder)

Private Sub test()
    Dim path As String
    path = Environ("userprofile") & "\documents\"
    Call CreateSymlink(path & "fileNameHere.xlsx", path & "test.lnk")
End Sub