Linux issues with cp: -r not specified; omitting directory
9,682
cp: -r not specified; omitting directory '/home/administrator/Documents/myfile.10'
This means myfile.10
is a directory. cp
won't copy it, unless you explicitly use -r
(or equivalent) flag.
For cp
in my Debian these are equivalent: -r
, -R
, --recursive
. POSIX, however defines -R
only (-r
is mentioned as obsolescent). It says:
If source_file is of type directory, the following steps shall be taken:
- If the
-R
option was not specified,cp
shall write a diagnostic message to standard error, do nothing more with source_file, and go on to any remaining files.[...]
The conclusion is your cp
does exactly what it's supposed to do. If you want to copy the whole directory, use -R
. If you expected myfile.10
to be a non-directory then you need to investigate why the discrepancy.
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Author by
James Collis
Updated on September 18, 2022Comments
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James Collis almost 2 years
Can someone help me understand what that means?
cp: -r not specified; omitting directory
I am trying to use this command
sudo cp /home/$USER/Documents/myfile.10 /home
Error:
cp: -r not specified; omitting directory '/home/administrator/Documents/myfile.10'
What does it mean? Why did it happen? What can I do about it?
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Kamil Maciorowski about 5 yearsWelcome to Super User. Please restrict to one question per question: either
cp
issue or the other. Asking for a test script without showing your research effort is not a good question; we are not a script writing service. If I were you I would get rid of this "Also ..." part (edit the question). -
Kamil Maciorowski about 5 yearsI went ahead and edited the question to meet our standards. If you need help with LDAP (which is a separate issue) then please ask a new question. Your original question is archived here, in case you want to copy from it. You should take our tour and see How to Ask first. Good luck.
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