In computing, a hard link is a directory entry (in a directory-based file system) that associates a name with a file. Thus, each file must have at least one hard link. Creating additional hard links for a file makes the contents of that file accessible via additional paths (i.e., via different names or in different directories). This causes an alias effect: a process can open the file by any one of its paths and change its content. By contrast, a soft link or “shortcut” to a file is not a direct link to the data itself, but rather a reference to a hard link or another soft link.