I was surprised that `cp --preserve=all file.xattr /dev/shm` produced no warnings In any case, this makes the docs match the behaviour.
cheers, Pádraig. >From 67d915612c56f8a33f24305ed84eda2a8918080a Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: =?utf-8?q?P=C3=A1draig=20Brady?= <[email protected]> Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 11:19:16 +0000 Subject: [PATCH] doc: fix info to say cp -a does _not_ diagnose xattr failures The info docs have been inaccurate since 2009-04-17, commit 941bd482, "mv: ignore xattr-preservation failure when not supported by filesystem" * doc/coreutils.texi (cp invocation): Say that cp --preserve=all does _not_ output errors when failing to copy xattrs. --- doc/coreutils.texi | 5 ++--- 1 files changed, 2 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-) diff --git a/doc/coreutils.texi b/doc/coreutils.texi index e7c09c5..2a5f4d4 100644 --- a/doc/coreutils.texi +++ b/doc/coreutils.texi @@ -7344,7 +7344,7 @@ directory structure; i.e., @samp{ls -U} may list the entries in a copied directory in a different order). Try to preserve SELinux security context and extended attributes (xattr), but ignore any failure to do that and print no corresponding diagnostic. -Equivalent to @option{-dR --preserve=all} with the reduced diagnostics. +Equivalent to @option{-dR --preserve=all}. @item -b @itemx @w...@kbd{--backup}[=@var{method}]} @@ -7518,8 +7518,7 @@ they are preserved by this option as well. Preserve all file attributes. Equivalent to specifying all of the above, but with the difference that failure to preserve SELinux security context or extended attributes -does not change @command{cp}'s exit status. -...@command{cp} does diagnose such failures. +does not change @command{cp}'s exit status, or produce error messages. @end table Using @option{--preserve} with no @var{attribute_list} is equivalent -- 1.6.2.5
