On 16/11/17 03:36, kalle wrote: > hello, > here some mistakes/improvement proposals to `info cp' from me: > > -sentence "If the `--target": take away "failing that"?
It's better as is, to document that these are separate modes > -sentence "descending into source directories": shouldn't it be rather > "descending into SOURCE's directories"? That could be interpreted as only descending one level > And since `-r' and `-R' is the > same: write "-r/-R" instead. That would be less standard/searchable > -option `-f': why is it written about _opening_ a file, e.g. "opened for > writing" and not simply "writeable"? There can be differing restrictions on various operations, so we're being explicit about the truncation permission. > What is meant by "removes it and > tries to open it again"? It creates a new file rather than rewriting an existing one. I suppose that could be clarified. Patch attached. > It is said "`cp' then removes it". It should be > added ", if the user has write-permission in the containing directory." There are other permissions that may block the unlink also. It's better not to partially list potential issues, and just state what cp does. > -part "-i": shouldn't be written "When copying to a file" instead? Subtly no, because we prompt if overwriting a dir with a file. So the prompt depends on the source, not the dest. cheers, Pádraig.
>From f17c1df3919d66fd1e71057070604f9af6d4bcc5 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: =?UTF-8?q?P=C3=A1draig=20Brady?= <[email protected]> Date: Sat, 9 Dec 2017 16:18:00 -0800 Subject: [PATCH] doc: clarify that cp --force may recreate files * doc/coreutils.texi (cp invocation): The language used to describe recreating the file was a little confusing as it mentioned opening a removed file. Fixes https://bugs.gnu.org/29315 --- doc/coreutils.texi | 5 +++-- 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-) diff --git a/doc/coreutils.texi b/doc/coreutils.texi index 09730f6..ed3a633 100644 --- a/doc/coreutils.texi +++ b/doc/coreutils.texi @@ -8520,8 +8520,9 @@ Equivalent to @option{--no-dereference --preserve=links}. @opindex --force When copying without this option and an existing destination file cannot be opened for writing, the copy fails. However, with @option{--force}, -when a destination file cannot be opened, @command{cp} then removes it and -tries to open it again. When this option is combined with +when a destination file cannot be opened, @command{cp} then +tries to recreate the file by first removing it. +When this option is combined with @option{--link} (@option{-l}) or @option{--symbolic-link} (@option{-s}), the destination link is replaced, and unless @option{--backup} (@option{-b}) is also given there is no brief -- 2.9.3
