can't create symlink to a file that does not exist

[srenatus]

Now, for reasons (see the bottom) I had liked to create a symlink to a nonexistent file.

With a snippet like this,

paths:
  - path: /bin/xyz
    type: symlink
    source: /ko-app/abc

I ended up getting

Error: failed to build layer image for "arm64": failed to mutate paths: symlink mutation on /bin/xyz: chmod "/bin/xyz": file does not exist

A workaround (suggested by @mattmoor, thanks!) is to add an empty-file, too:

paths:
  - path: /ko-app/abc
    type: empty-file
  - path: /bin/xyz
    type: symlink
    source: /ko-app/abc

Why?! 😮

I wanted to use apko to build a base image for use with ko. But we also needed the ko-built binary to have a (few) different name(s), so symlinks had to be added. In a unix-y system, you would use ln -sf to create a symlink to some target, which may or may not exist. I thus expected apko to work the same.

This workaround works nicely, though -- when using ko with the apko-built base image, the target (empty) file is replaced, and everything falls into place ✨