# Backlink - not working

**URL:** <https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/backlink-not-working/483>\
**Category:** Troubleshooting\
**Created:** [July 5, 2020, 3:09pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/backlink-not-working/483 "2020-07-05T15:09:16Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![kannan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/7ba0ec/32.png) [@kannan](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/kannan)\
**Post date:** [July 5, 2020, 3:09pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/backlink-not-working/483/1 "2020-07-05T15:09:16Z")

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Hi All, I am new to Org-roam, and I have been trying to make it work for a couple of days. (I am new to emacs/orgmode too).

I have couple of issues, the hyperlinks in the org-roam buffer doesn’t seem to work.  
This is the text I get instead of actual link

[[file:/Dropbox/org-mode/org-roam-files/2020-07-05.org][Sunday, 05 July 2020]]

I also cannot find the variable - org-roam-backlink. I installed the latest org-roam version as of today.

Some additional info- I use emacs in Mac

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**Author:** ![mshevchuk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/35a633/32.png) [@mshevchuk](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/mshevchuk)\
**Post date:** [July 5, 2020, 9:05pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/backlink-not-working/483/2 "2020-07-05T21:05:12Z")

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I’m not sure if it’s a typo, but your link will most probably lead to nowhere because `/Dropbox/org-mode/...` is an absolute path with your `Dropbox` directory in the root directory, which is strange. Did you mean `~/Dropbox/...`?

Otherwise, it looks like a valid Org-mode link. You can familiarise yourself with Org-mode hyperlinks here: [https://orgmode.org/manual/Hyperlinks.html#Hyperlinks](https://orgmode.org/manual/Hyperlinks.html#Hyperlinks)

I assume you are familiar with Emacs basics like how to run an interactive command.

- You can toggle a nicer link appearance with `org-toggle-link-display`.
- To follow a link, move the point onto the link text and run `org-open-at-point` or press `C-c C-o` or click with mouse on it.

There is no such variable `org-roam-backlink`. To view the backlinks that point to the current note, run `org-roam`.

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**Author:** ![kannan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/7ba0ec/32.png) [@kannan](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/kannan)\
**Post date:** [July 6, 2020, 1:46pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/backlink-not-working/483/3 "2020-07-06T13:46:57Z")

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Hi, thanks for your detailed response.

Yes, it was a typo (the link is in my user /users//Dropbox…  
Thanks for the clarification on backlink (I was probably confused by this article, I found - [https://org-roam.readthedocs.io/en/master/configuration/](https://org-roam.readthedocs.io/en/master/configuration/))

On the hyperlink, I am able to see the hyperlink without “[[file:/Dropbox/org-mode/org-roam-files/2020-07-05.org][Sunday, 05 July 2020]]” in the journal files, its the org-roam file that doesn’t have a clean link. I will explore further. Thanks again