cp: target ... is not a directory - why does this happen?

Question

alan:~/LIME_SRC/soapySDR$ mkdir mybuild
alan:~/LIME_SRC/soapySDR$ cd mybuild
alan:~/LIME_SRC/soapySDR/mybuild$ cp /LIME_SRC/soapySDR/name "CMakeLists.txt" /LIME_SRC/soapySDR/mybuild
cp: target '/LIME_SRC/soapySDR/mybuild' is not a directory

Solution

you must use

cp LIME_SRC/soapySDR/name "CMakeLists.txt" LIME_SRC/soapySDR/mybuild

or

cp ~/LIME_SRC/soapySDR/name "CMakeLists.txt" ~/LIME_SRC/soapySDR/mybuild

instead of

cp /LIME_SRC/soapySDR/name "CMakeLists.txt" /LIME_SRC/soapySDR/mybuild

because your repertory mybuild is located in /home/alan/LIME_SRC/soapySDR/mybuild and not in /LIME_SRC/soapySDR/mybuild

Comments

[muru]

You're working in ~/LIME_SRC/soapySDR but copying to /LIME_SRC/soapySDR/....

[Melebius]

~/LIME_SRC does not equal /LIME_SRC. What are you trying to achieve? Please elaborate.

[Byte Commander]

I think you should explicitly mention that ~ stands for the home directory, i.e. /home/alan probably...

[damadam]

i deduct it with the information of his question, we see the user name