linkMaker

While creating regular shortcuts can be easily done using the dedicated option in the right-click menu, this is not the way to do it for the other categories of shortcuts, such as symbolic links, NTFS hard links or junction points. That is where linkMaker comes in.

A regular shortcut is a type of file that points to a file or folder on your system, facilitating the access to the target without having to navigate to its location manually.

On the other hand, a symbolic link (.symlink) is mostly used for directories and makes it seem like the object it is pointing to is right there, even though it isn't, rather than being just a shortcut to it. For instance, if you want a folder to be uploaded to the cloud without moving it to the sync folder, you can create a symbolic link for it within the sync folder. This way, you manage to trick the file sharing application into thinking that the folder is right there.

NTFS hard links or junction points are more complex forms of file and directory pointing. The main difference between the two is that the first cannot be used over multiple partitions, while the latter can. It is advisable you work with regular shortcuts and at most symbolic links if you are not familiar with hard links and junction points.

linkMaker can create all of the above pointing shortcuts, either for a file or a folder on your hard disk. To use it, you just have to select the source and choose the link type. Drag and drop actions are allowed as well.

linkMaker automatically generates the name of the resulting shortcut, but you can change both the name and the location where you want the shortcut to be saved.

To make your job easier, the application can add new items to create advanced shortcuts to the context menu, which comes in handy if you plan on working with linkMaker often.

You might not need linkMaker to generate regular shortcuts, but the utility does make it more comfortable to create advanced shortcuts for files and directories. Otherwise, you would have to use specific commands in the command prompt to do so, at least for symbolic links.