'cp -rv .*' recurses into the parent directory???

stefanlasiewski · 02-02-2005, 12:30 AM

Hey all,

I'm testing out SuSE Pro 9.1 , and noticed some very odd behavior with 'cp'.

If I try to copy dotfiles, 'cp' recurses into '..' , which seems completely wrong. I can't replicate it on other Unixes (Trying on Solaris 8 with GNU ls, Redhat 9, etc).

Anyone else see this? I'm not quite sure how I can copy multiple dotfiles with this bug.

Here's an example:

linux:/tmp # cp -rv /etc/skel/.* /tmp/

##### First, it does the correct thing, and copies the dotfiles:
`/etc/skel/./Documents/.directory' -> `/tmp/./Documents/.directory'
`/etc/skel/./.exrc' -> `/tmp/./.exrc'

##### But then it starts to go into /etc/skel/../ , which it shouldn't do.
`/etc/skel/../X11/fs/config' -> `/tmp/X11/fs/config'
`/etc/skel/../X11/twm/system.twmrc' -> `/tmp/X11/twm/system.twmrc'
`/etc/skel/../X11/xdm/Xresources' -> `/tmp/X11/xdm/Xresources'
`/etc/skel/../X11/xdm/README.security' -> `/tmp/X11/xdm/README.security'
`/etc/skel/../X11/xdm/Xaccess' -> `/tmp/X11/xdm/Xaccess'

##### Needless to say, my drive fills up within a matter of minutes.

This is with the folllowing version of cp:
linux:/tmp # cp --version
cp (coreutils) 5.2.1

Thanks all,

-= Stefan

jtshaw · 02-02-2005, 02:14 AM

Well, unfortunately .* includes .. which means it will and should recurse into the parent directory. The "." and ".." are actually just like any named directory. That is why we should always take care in doing anything like chmod -R .* or rm -rf .* or anything else of that nature because the system is going to do exactly what you asked it to do, for better or worse.

stefanlasiewski · 02-02-2005, 03:36 PM

I'll have to disagree with you there. This only seems to be a problem on SuSe, or with a newer version of cp. There needs to be some way of copying multiple dotfiles, and you when creating a new user there needs to be a way to populate the home directory with the appropriate dotfiles.

Here's the behavior on Solaris 8, with the default cp

# cp --version
cp (GNU fileutils) 3.16
# cp -rv /etc/skel/.* /tmp/
/etc/skel/.profile -> /tmp/.profile
/etc/skel/.zprofile -> /tmp/.zprofile
/etc/skel/.zshenv -> /tmp/.zshenv
/etc/skel/.zshrc -> /tmp/.zshrc
#

Here's the behavior on RedHat Enterprise 3 (WS):

# cp --version
cp (coreutils) 4.5.3
# cp -rv /etc/skel/.* /tmp/
`/etc/skel/.bash_logout' -> `/tmp/.bash_logout'
`/etc/skel/.bash_profile' -> `/tmp/.bash_profile'
`/etc/skel/.bashrc' -> `/tmp/.bashrc'
`/etc/skel/.emacs' -> `/tmp/.emacs'
`/etc/skel/.gtkrc' -> `/tmp/.gtkrc'
`/etc/skel/.kde' -> `/tmp/.kde'
`/etc/skel/.kde/Autostart' -> `/tmp/.kde/Autostart'
`/etc/skel/.kde/Autostart/.directory' -> `/tmp/.kde/Autostart/.directory'
`/etc/skel/.zshrc' -> `/tmp/.zshrc'
#

SuSE is the only flavor where I have seen this behavior.

stefanlasiewski · 02-02-2005, 04:08 PM

Oh! This is a shell issue.

With bash and ksh, .* recurses into '..'. With zsh, the default behavior is to NOT recurse into '..'.

It's a trick with the globbing of wildcards...

God, how confusing. But zsh saves the day again.

jtshaw · 02-02-2005, 04:12 PM

Glad you figured it out, I was just about to say that I see that behavior on all my systems, but I'm a bash user and am quite used to that at this point.

stefanlasiewski · 02-02-2005, 05:36 PM

Now I remember a time in 1997 when I ran 'rm -r ~/.*' and it erased a huge chunk of my system. GNU utils weren't very common, and Solaris cp didn't have a '--verbose' option-- the rm job just took a long time. I always thought that was a nasty bug in 'cp', but
now I'm more clear on what happened way back then...

I think it's time to revise my habits with using '.*'.

Dang...