Some Mac customers who additionally work with Home windows, or who’ve drives, community shares, or different volumes which can be from the Home windows world, might sometimes come throughout LNK information with a .lnk file extension.
In case you’re questioning what these information are and how one can open them on the Mac, it is best to proceed studying so that you just higher perceive what an LNK file is, and it’s relevance to the Mac.
What’s an LNK File?
An LNK or .lnk file is a Home windows Shortcut file. A shortcut serves as a pointer to a different utility, file, folder, or location within the Home windows ecosystem.
LNK information are a binary file format, and within the Home windows world, they’ll function a shortcut. There are additionally some malicious makes use of of LNK information and shortcuts that may be discovered within the Home windows world, and LNK malware is a factor that Home windows customers should be cautious of. Outdoors of the Home windows world, an LNK file has no actual function or perform, as a result of it’s one thing utilized by Home windows, and is relative to the Home windows listing construction and site of information.
In case you’re a longtime Mac person, you’ll be able to consider an .lnk or LNK file as much like an alias. It merely factors to a different file, app, folder, or location. Think about for those who took an alias on a Mac to the Home windows world… it gained’t work, nor would it not have any utility, as a result of not solely is the file kind not acknowledged, however the relative paths to directories and constructions are completely different too. That’s principally like bringing a Home windows LNK file to the Mac.
In case you’re a Linux or UNIX person, you’ll be able to consider an .lnk or LNK file form of like a smooth hyperlink, in that it’s a reference from one place to a different. Equally, a smooth hyperlink created in Unix goes to be largely irrelevant within the Home windows world.
How can I open an LNK file on Mac?
Within the Mac realm, an LNK or .lnk file is ineffective as a result of MacOS will not be Home windows, and regardless of the LNK file is linking to is not going to be related on the Mac or the Mac file system.
With that stated, you’ll be able to forcibly open a .lnk file on a Mac by dragging the .lnk file right into a textual content editor, like TextEdit, or BBEdit, or by opening with one thing like vim or nano from the command line.
You will notice nearly all gibberish, however you might be able to establish an Home windows listing path someplace amongst the gibberish as properly, which is what the Home windows shortcut LNK file is pointing to on regardless of the supply laptop was.
What occurs for those who I attempt to open an LNK or .lnk file on Mac?
In case you come throughout a .lnk or LNK file on a Mac and also you try to open it, you’ll get a message that claims one thing like the next:
There isn’t any utility set to open the doc “Explorer.lnk”.
Search the App Retailer for an utility that may open this doc, or select an present utility in your laptop.
In case you try to look the App Retailer for an app to open an LNK file, nothing of serious goes to be discovered, as a result of, now that we perceive what LNK information are, we perceive they’re of no use on the Mac.
What ought to I do if somebody sends me an .lnk or LNK file and I’m on a Mac?
If somebody you belief has despatched you an LNK file or .lnk file to you and also you’re on a Mac, it is best to ask that particular person to ship you the precise supply file (or listing), somewhat than the shortcut to that file or listing.
It’s doable that somebody despatched you the lnk file in error, or that you’ve come throughout a disk or storage drive that has a bunch of .lnk information on it as properly, during which case you will be unable to utilize these lnk information if you’re on a Mac.
Can I convert LNK information to be Mac suitable?
Not precisely. As a result of Home windows Shortcuts aren’t usable on a Mac, and since the listing construction of Home windows is completely different from macOS (as is the complete working system, basically), you cannot straight convert an LNK file to a Mac alias.
The closest factor to changing a LNK file to a Mac alias could be in a state of affairs for an exterior drive, or community quantity, the place you may create an alias on the Mac to a vacation spot.
For instance, if you understand you will have a Home windows LNK shortcut file that factors to path on an exterior drive named “ExternalStorage” on the following location on a Home windows PC:
e:ExternalStoragePhotos
In case you connect that very same exterior storage drive to the Mac, the equal drive path and listing path could be as follows:
/Volumes/ExternalStorage/Pictures/
Due to this fact, you may create an alias to the ExternalStorage volumes Pictures listing on the Mac, and it will carry out the identical perform because the LNK shortcut file when that very same drive is linked to the Home windows PC.
Can I delete LNK or .lnk information that I discover when utilizing my Mac?
In case you encounter .lnk information when utilizing an exterior drive in your Mac, or when utilizing a community drive out of your Mac, it’s in all probability greatest to go away them alone. Likelihood is that whoever used the identical drive or quantity in Home windows created these lnk shortcut information for his or her functions, and they also is probably not helpful to you, however they could be utilized by them.
Technically, you may delete the lnk information, however once more, you could be inflicting a difficulty or inconveniencing the Home windows PC person who generated these information, in the event that they plan on utilizing the shortcuts once more in Home windows.
–
Do you ever encounter .lnk or LNK information from Home windows throughout your Mac computing? What do you sometimes do with them? Tell us what your ideas and experiences are with lnk information on the Mac.