Unix - copy contents of one directory to another

Question

Folder1/
    -fileA.txt
    -fileB.txt
    -fileC.txt

> mkdir Folder2/

> [copy command]

And now Folder2/ looks like:

Folder2/
    -fileA.txt
    -fileB.txt
    -fileC.txt

How to make this happen? I have tried cp -r Folder1/ Folder2/ but I ended up with:

Folder2/
    Folder1/
        -fileA.txt
        -fileB.txt
        -fileC.txt

Which is close but not exactly what I wanted.

Thanks!

score 129 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 22 '12 at 21:07

129

Try this:

cp Folder1/* Folder2/

answered Oct 22 '12 at 21:07

Geoff

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3

but this won't copy hidden files, right? – Fabrizio Regini Jan 29 '14 at 10:35
9

Correct. `cp -R` will, but that'll recursively copy, so you may or may not want to use that. You could do `cp Folder1/.* Folder2/` to copy only the hidden files. – Geoff Jan 30 '14 at 00:12
2

Note that this will fail if you are using "sudo" or an equivalent and the directory contains a lot of files. I get `sudo: unable to execute /bin/cp: Argument list too long` – Nathan Osman Sep 15 '14 at 19:49
note that SCP has a slightly different syntax, see here: http://stackoverflow.com/a/26346339/1984636 – sivi Feb 04 '16 at 08:35
Don't do this. Do "cp -rT src dest" on Linux, or "cp -R src/ dest" on BSD. – xpusostomos Aug 05 '20 at 10:56
@xpusostomos why? – tonitone120 Nov 05 '20 at 16:57
@tonitone because using shell glob, aka "*" does not match hidden files, i.e. files starting with dot. Also, a very large directory could exceed the glob memory space, although that's rare. – xpusostomos Nov 08 '20 at 07:48

score 50 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 22 '12 at 21:07

50

Quite simple, with a * wildcard.

cp -r Folder1/* Folder2/

But according to your example recursion is not needed so the following will suffice:

cp Folder1/* Folder2/

EDIT:

Or skip the mkdir Folder2 part and just run:

cp -r Folder1 Folder2

answered Oct 22 '12 at 21:07

Koen.

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If `ls | sort -k1.5 | head -8 > folder1` then how to do that ? – Pooja Apr 04 '13 at 04:49
You just lost all your hidden files. Don't do this. Do "cp -rT src dest" on Linux, or "cp -R src/ dest" on BSD. – xpusostomos Aug 05 '20 at 10:57

Brian White · Answer 3 · 2015-04-21T12:12:23.180

23

To make an exact copy, permissions, ownership, and all use "-a" with "cp". "-r" will copy the contents of the files but not necessarily keep other things the same.

cp -av Source/* Dest/

(make sure Dest/ exists first)

If you want to repeatedly update from one to the other or make sure you also copy all dotfiles, rsync is a great help:

rsync -av --delete Source/ Dest/

This is also "recoverable" in that you can restart it if you abort it while copying. I like "-v" because it lets you watch what is going on but you can omit it.

edited Apr 21 '15 at 12:12

answered Oct 22 '12 at 21:23

Brian White

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what is the `-v` for? – HattrickNZ Jun 23 '14 at 00:53
verbose, just to watch what is going on. – Brian White Jun 23 '14 at 01:05
1

If you have a lot of files the `-v` option can take some time. If you don't need the output use `-a` only. – Eyal Levin Nov 24 '16 at 13:32
1

You'd have to be running over pretty slow network connection for the copy to be slowed by text output. And even then, it would likely just be the return of the command prompt, not the copy itself. – Brian White Nov 26 '16 at 02:10
You lost your hidden files. Do "cp -rT src dest" on Linux, or "cp -R src/ dest" on BSD. – xpusostomos Aug 05 '20 at 10:57

Unix - copy contents of one directory to another

3 Answers3