Maybe simpler: -m --missing Only copy non existing files.
On Sat, 1 Apr 2023 at 17:44, Pádraig Brady <p...@draigbrady.com> wrote: > On 01/04/2023 00:29, Paul Eggert wrote: > > On 2023-03-31 14:32, Pádraig Brady wrote: > > > >> Perhaps we should support: > >> --no-clobber[={skip, fail (default)}] > >> > >> so then users can at least easily change -n to --no-clobber=skip > >> to get the old behavior? > >> > >> An alternative would be to augment the --update option to support: > >> --update[={none, older (default)}] > >> where --update=none would be the equivalent of the old -n behavior. > > > > The latter sounds a bit better but I suppose either would work. We could > > generalize it a bit further, e.g.: > > > > --skip-diagnose[={yes,no}] > > Whether to diagnose a copying action being skipped. > > --skip-fail[={yes,no}] > > Whether exit status should be 1 when skipping a copying action. > > > > Presumably similar options would apply to ln and mv. > > > > All these extra options might be overkill, though. > > > > > >> Perhaps we should also diagnose files skipped in the -n fail case, > >> to make it easier for users to see what the issue is. > > > > FreeBSD cp -n doesn't diagnose, and GNU cp -n has never diagnosed, so > > it's probably better to leave sleeping dogs lie. > > OK first stab at --update=none support is attached. > > cheers, > Pádraig >