correction: hard links are not allowed on directory's, ...

that being said, comparing inodes seems the best solution
only, don't give an error but copy once

maybe if I have time this weekend I'll try code that behaviour
Anyway, it has worked like that since years, and I guess nobody has had

a problem with it before. I don't think it should be changed just

because some bored guy playing with it noticed strange output ;-p
Regards,
Tom
Richard Toohey wrote:

quoted text
> On 19/10/2007, at 8:12 PM, Raimo Niskanen wrote:

>

>> On Thu, Oct 18, 2007 at 10:06:42PM +1300, Richard Toohey wrote:

>>> JUST FOR FUN I have tried to "fix" this.  What I know about C code

>>> can be written on the back of a postage stamp

>

> Did I mention the SIZE of the postage stamp?  It's rather small ... 8-)

>

>> I am afraid solving the general case is harder.

>

>> The path length limit actually works as a crude, cheep and effective

>> cycle detection.

>>

>> While Windows Finder solves the simple case of copying into

>> yourself, I do not think it has solved the general case.

>> Anyone curious to try?

>

> Runs screaming into the night ... A lot more man reading for me, first!

>

>>

>> --

>> / Raimo Niskanen, Erlang/OTP, Ericsson AB

>

> I might try a Linux install (got some Slackware 12.0 CDs) and look at

> what it does (and its source code) - sure someone will beat me to it.

>

> Looks like OpenBSD, FreeBSD, and Mac OS X BSD bits have the same

> sort of outcome.

>

> I got this from Tom Van Looy (thanks, Tom):

>

> Copy foo to foo only once and quit, I think that's the correct

> behaviour. I even think that posix more or less describes that.

>

> $ mkdir foo

> $ cp -R foo foo

> $ ls -R foo

> foo/:

> foo

>

> foo/foo:

>

> That's what it should be doing I guess. But it's tricky, if you start

> doing symlinks etc, you'll end up looping sooner or later. What if the

> directoy's are not named the same (eg: hard links)?

>

> (please reply cc to the list)

>

> And another email from Tom Van Looy:

>

> Oh and yes, it doesn't go boom, the copy just stops when the max

> filename length is reached (logically). And " name too long

> (not copied)" is an error, you can just redirect it to dev null, cp -R

> foo foo 2>/dev/null, if you don't like it on your screen.

>

> Try fixing it so that it doesn't copy a directory into itself when it is

> allready copied (so allow it only once). GNU cp does something like that:

>

> $ mkdir foo

> $ cp -R foo foo

> cp: cannot copy a directory, `foo', into itself, `foo/foo'

> $ ls -R foo

> foo:

> foo

>

> foo/foo:

>

> Only, I think the warning is not needed (and I didn't further test it,

> so it's possibly doing something else after all).