How use Java FileChannel to copy preserving timestamps

Question

How use Java FileChannel to copy preserving timestamps for files and directories? Looks like the files are not preserving timestamps while copying to another location. How is that possible using FileChannel in Java?

score 2 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 24 '14 at 17:20

2

This is not the role of FileChannel. A FileChannel is just a wrapper over a byte channel.

What you want instead is to use the "new" Java 7 file API for that. If you want to copy a file to a location while preserving attributes you can do it:

Files.copy(src, dst, StandardCopyOption.COPY_ATTRIBUTES);

answered Mar 24 '14 at 17:20

fge

119,121
33
254
329

It should be noted that, as specified by its javadoc, `COPY_ATTRIBUTES` is only 'best effort basis'. Except 'modified timestamp', nothing else is guaranteed. – Manu Manjunath Mar 15 '20 at 15:24

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 24 '14 at 17:20

1

You can not do it by FileChannel, you can use apache commons io :

IOUtils.copy(new FileInputStream(file), new FileOutputStream(file2));
// copy file and preserve the time stamp. the sourceFile and destFile are of type java.io.File
FileUtils.copyFile(sourceFile,destFile);

Reference : http://www.studytrails.com/java-io/file-copying-and-moving-deleting.jsp

answered Mar 24 '14 at 17:20

Shreyos Adikari

12,348
19
73
82

Nope... Won't copy attributes... Timestamps yes, but only timestamps – fge Mar 24 '14 at 17:20

How use Java FileChannel to copy preserving timestamps

2 Answers2