{"version":"2.1.317","anchor":"plugin-and-skill-directory-detection-skips-symlinks","canonical_anchor":"plugin-and-skill-directory-detection-skips-symlinks","heading":"Plugin and skill folder scanning no longer follows symlinks or junctions","tier":"notice","area":"Plugins","scope":"individual","heads_up":true,"url":"https:\/\/changelogs.core-directive.com\/v\/2.1.317\/e\/plugin-and-skill-directory-detection-skips-symlinks","release_url":"https:\/\/changelogs.core-directive.com\/v\/2.1.317","markdown":"### Plugin and skill folder scanning no longer follows symlinks or junctions\n\nClaude Code now skips plugin, skill and command folders that are symlinks or Windows junctions instead of following them, and logs a warning\n\n**What**\n\nWhen Claude Code looks through folders for plugins, skills and commands, it now checks whether each folder is a link before reading it. A link here means a symlink, a shortcut-like entry that points to a folder somewhere else, or a Windows junction, which works in a similar way. Before this release, folders were read without that check and links were followed.\n\n- The check that decides whether a folder is a skills-only plugin now skips `.claude-plugin`, `skills` and each individual skill folder (the folder holding a `SKILL.md` file) when any of them is a symlink.\n\n- The general directory scan logs a warning and skips any folder that is a link, or whose link status cannot be checked, instead of following it.\n\n- The walk through skill and command folders skips symlinked subfolders and keeps a count of them in `skippedSymlinks`.\n\n- The warning message says that links are not followed, and that you should replace the link with a real folder if you want its files to load.\n\n- Separately, the path-traversal error for `mcp-servers` and `lsp-servers` now says that server paths must be relative to the plugin folder. A path-traversal error is the one shown when a path points outside the folder it is supposed to stay in.\n\n**Why**\n\nIf you keep skills, commands, agents or plugin parts in a symlinked or junctioned folder, for example to share one copy between projects, those files may stop loading after this release. To keep them working, replace the link with a real folder that holds the files.\n\n- Area: Plugins\n- Tier: You'll notice\n- Useful: 2\/5\n- Signal: 1\/5\n- Scope: individual\n- Heads-up: yes"}