We have a repository with simple static content (no build necessary). The static content includes symlinks. The symlinks are not being included in the Netlify deploy. For example, the following fails:
Compare to GitHub pages:
Also, the Deploy file browser does not show any of the symlinks.
As I would expect.
If you need/want to rewrite one path to another path you’ll need to use rewrites.
I believe your expectations are biased by familiarity with the idiosyncrasies of the Netlify platform. The only reason I need to rewrite one path to another is because Netlify apparently does not support symlinks.
Symlinks are the simpler and more elegant solution. What 1,922 symlinks provide requires 3,201 lines of _redirects.
Correct.
Looks like Netlify isn’t the best fit for your project. Might I suggest a self-managed server (take your pick) that does support symlinks. If you’d like to have CDN capabilities, use Cloudflare in front of it.
I’m excited about the possibilities that Netlify opens up! (and I’ll do what I can to help improve their documentation for others)
A small script can do all of the heavy lifting: Add script to convert symlinks into a Netlify _redirects file by TimidRobot · Pull Request #204 · creativecommons/cc-legal-tools-data · GitHub
You’ve sorted your own issue it seems.