Subject: bug#8370: RFC: cp --no-preserve=contents

From: Pádraig Brady <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2011 22:56:53 +0100

On 28/03/11 21:55, Eric Blake wrote:
> cp --attributes-only is great for preserving all metadata attributes
> without corrupting contents, but what if I want to preserve only some of
> the metadata (for example, copying SELinux context but _not_ timestamps
> or content)?  It seems like --attributes-only would be a great synonym
> for '--preserve=all  --no-preserve=contents', and that by adding the
> 'contents' category to --preserve (and defaulting it to on unless turned
> off explicitly), that you expose finer-grained tuning to what metadata
> gets copied.

--attr and --preserve can be combined already. Is that enough?
Here are the info docs:

`--attributes-only'
     Preserve the specified attributes of the original files in the
     copy, but do not copy any data.  See the `--preserve' option for
     controlling which attributes to copy.

cheers,
Pádraig.