copying a symlink to a target file using cp -t

Question

I have a symlink to a file on my Ubuntu system, and I need to copy the original file to a different directory and have a new name there. I am able to copy it to a different directory using

readlink -ne my_symlink | xargs -0 cp -t /tmp/

But I am not able to give a new name in the destination directory. Basically, I am looking for a command that could look like:

readlink -ne base.txt | xargs -0 cp -t /tmp/newnametofile

When I try the exact same command above, it gives me file or directory not found error.

Anyway to achieve this?

for me `cp` follows symlinks in SOURCE, you can try `-L` option if it is not the case for you. — pLumo, Nov 08 '19 at 09:36
Thanks.. It worked.. I had been trying '-l' .. Simple cp with '-L' Did the job.. — Akash Sundaresh, Nov 08 '19 at 10:46

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Nov 08 '19 at 12:40

3

cp will dereference symlinks with -L option.

This should work:

cp -L my_symlink /tmp/newnametofile

Regarding your xargs, -t, --target-directory option of cp only takes DIRECTORY as input. You could make it work using xargs -I{} cp {} /tmp/newnametofile (but I'd use cp -L anyways...

answered Nov 08 '19 at 12:40

pLumo

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Great! I managed to copy a directory full of symlinks with `cp -r -L` – Maf Jul 19 '23 at 10:25

copying a symlink to a target file using cp -t

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