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cp — Video Man Page

By April 11, 2013September 12th, 2022No Comments

The cp, the copy command from the Linux command line, is probably well known to those comfortable using Linux. However, here we will take a look at some of the options available to you with cp, some well known but not fully understood and some more obscure. Firstly we will start with -a option:

  • -a : Is probably well known as the archive option, maintaining ownership of the files, but did you know it also turned on the recursion option so that sub-directories are included.
  • -b : If a target file is overwritten then back that file up and append a ~ to the end of the name.
  • -n : No-clobber, do not overwrite target file
  • -u : Update the target file if source file is newer
  • -s : Create sym-links as targets

The above is by no means an exhaustive list of all the options, but a selection of some of the useful tools available to you, so have a play today with those you don’t know.