It's been one of my pet peeves for a long time that many/most file copying applications are too stupid to copy the date modified across. This is especially true for GUI apps.
On Linux, copying the modified-date with a file copied onto an msdos or vfat partition isn't even possible - you'll get a permission denied. You have to be root to do this (never mind that setting the date on a file is fine on the reall M$). Dunno how this idiocy came about. In your case, suddenly having time in the middle of the night is indicative for a time zone mismatch. Keep in mind that Billyware(TM) expects to go on local time whereever your are, resulting in a big screwup when you go international. A lot of software is then unable to handle this properly. You may need to configure samba to use the correct timezone. I have also observed that Billyware with about version 2000 shifted from local time to UTC when file servers are concerned, causing yet more chaos. On the positive, this might eentually fix the problem where the times on all the files in the other half of the year are out by one hour (as Billy isn't able to take of the daylight saving difference properly). Also keep in mind that Billy has always been utterly unable to set the time on directories, so you'll never be able to copy directory dates anywhere. In your case it looks like you're having a time zone problem as well as a problem with timestamps not being copied. A time zone problem shows up as times being wrong by about 12 hours. Timestamps not being copied shows up as all files having the same time stamp (that of when they were copied). Volker -- Volker Kuhlmann is possibly list0570 with the domain in header http://volker.dnsalias.net/ Please do not CC list postings to me.
