it is a reference to the object underlying the original filename.
(To be precise: each of the hard links to a file is a reference to
the same
-.IR "i-node number" ,
-where an i-node number is an index into the i-node table,
+.IR "inode number" ,
+where an inode number is an index into the inode table,
which contains metadata about all files on a filesystem.
See
.BR stat (2).)
(to prevent the possibility of loops within the filesystem tree,
which would confuse many programs)
and may not refer to files on different filesystems
-(because i-node numbers are not unique across filesystems).
+(because inode numbers are not unique across filesystems).
A symbolic link is a special type of file whose contents are a string
that is the pathname of another file, the file to which the link refers.
.BR lutimes (3),
.BR path_resolution (7)
.SH COLOPHON
-This page is part of release 3.67 of the Linux
+This page is part of release 3.79 of the Linux
.I man-pages
project.
A description of the project,