The file(s) are copied
to the target file or directory.
If the destination is a directory, then the
file
is copied into
directory
with its original filename.
If the target file already exists, it is
either renamed to
file .old
if the
-b
option is given
or overwritten
if permissions allow.
An alternate backup suffix may be specified via the
-B
option's argument.
The options are as follows:
-b
Back up any existing files before overwriting them by renaming
them to
file .old
See
-B
for specifying a different backup suffix.
-B suffix
Use
suffix
as the backup suffix if
-b
is given.
-C
Copy the file.
If the target file already exists and the files are the same,
then do not change the modification time of the target.
If the target's file flags and mode need not to be changed,
the target's inode change time is also unchanged.
-c
Copy the file.
This is actually the default.
The
-c
option is only included for backwards compatibility.
-d
Create directories.
Missing parent directories are created as required.
-f
Specify the target's file flags; see
chflags(1)
for a list of possible flags and their meanings.
Specify an alternate mode.
The default mode is set to rwxr-xr-x (0755).
The specified mode may be either an octal or symbolic value; see
chmod(1)
for a description of possible mode values.
-o
Specify an owner.
A numeric UID is allowed.
-p
Preserve the access and modification times.
Copy the file, as if the
-C
(compare and copy) option is specified,
except if the target file does not already exist or is different,
then preserve the access and modification times of the source file.
-S
Safe copy.
Normally,
unlinks an existing target before installing the new file.
With the
-S
flag a temporary file is used and then renamed to be
the target.
The reason this is safer is that if the copy or
rename fails, the existing target is left untouched.
-s
exec's the command
strip(1)
to strip binaries so that
can be portable over a large
number of systems and binary types.
See below for how
can be instructed to use another program to strip binaries.
-v
Cause
to be verbose,
showing files as they are installed or backed up.
By default,
preserves all file flags, with the exception of the
``nodump''
flag.
The
utility attempts to prevent moving a file onto itself.
Installing
/dev/null
creates an empty file.
ENVIRONMENT
The
utility checks for the presence of the
STRIPBIN
environment variable and if present,
uses the assigned value as the program to run if and when the
-s
option has been specified.
If the
DONTSTRIP
environment variable is present,
will ignore any specification of the
-s
option.
This is mainly for use in debugging the
Fx Ports Collection.
If either
-S
option is specified, or the
-C
or
-p
option is used in conjunction with the
-s
option, temporary files named
INS@XXXX
where
XXXX
is decided by
mkstemp(3),
are created in the target directory.
EXIT STATUS
Ex -std
COMPATIBILITY
Historically
moved files by default.
The default was changed to copy in
Fx 4.4 .
Temporary files may be left in the target directory if
exits abnormally.
File flags cannot be set by
fchflags(2)
over a NFS file system.
Other file systems do not have a concept of flags.
The
utility will only warn when flags could not be set on a file system
that does not support them.
The
utility with
-v
falsely says a file is copied when
-C
snaps hard links.
