COPYSTD — Copy files and directories

Synopsis

COPYSTD [/?] [/A[+|-]drash] [/S[+|-]drash] [/NEW] [/UPDATE] [/FRESHEN] [/OLDSRCDIR[+|-]] [/OLDDESTDIR[+|-]] [/E/N/Q/U/V[+|-]] Filespecs… Filespec

Options

/?

Display command syntax information.

/A

Select files by attribute.

The traditional alternative meaning for the /A option in the COPY command is not required and thus its consequent syntactic oddities are not implemented.

/S

Recurse into subdirectories.

/E

Do not display non-fatal error messages.

/N

Simulate execution.

/U

Do not display summary information.

/Q

Operate quietly.

/V

Force verify to be on.

/NEW

Only copy if the target does not exist

/UPDATE

Copy if the target is older than the source or the target does not exist

/FRESHEN

Copy if the target exists and is older than the source

/OLDSRCDIR

Duplicate quirks of the 16-bit CMD supplied with IBM OS/2 with respect to source names.

/OLDDESTDIR

Duplicate quirks of the 16-bit CMD supplied with IBM OS/2 with respect to the target name.

Description

The COPYSTD command is a simplified form of the "traditional" COPY command. It supports that subset of the latter's syntax that is most often used in practice. It is simple and efficient, and does not treat the '+' or ',' characters as special, meaning that its command line syntax is not idiosyncratic like that of the "traditional" COPY command, but rather matches the syntax of MOVE and RENAME.

The COPYSTD command first processes the contents of the CMD_COPY_INIT environment variable, if it has inherited one, as if it were a command tail, before processing any of the command tails that have been passed to it. This allows one to modify default options globally. (One can use command aliases or wrapper scripts to achieve the same effect.)

The non-option arguments to COPYSTD comprise a series of source wildcard search specifications, the first to the penultimate arguments, followed by a destination wildcard substutition specificiation. Where there is only the one non-option argument, it is taken to be a source wildcard search specification, and the destination wildcard substitution specification defaults to "*".

The COPYSTD command copies all files and directories that match the the source wildcard search specifications, to new names determined by applying the destination wildcard substutition specifications.

Each source file is copied to the directory given in the target filespec (or a subdirectory thereof if the /S option is used). Remember that a filename without a directory prefix is in the current directory.

Copying a file copies the data in the file, the file's last modification time, and any extended attributes attached to the file. Copying a directory copies the directory's last modification time and any extended attributes attached to the directory.

The /S option does not cause directories to be created if they are not present. Subdirectories are only created by being copied as part of the normal copy operation. Subdirectories will thus not be created if they do not already exist and they do not match the source search wildcard.

Examples

To copy the entire contents of one drive to another, including all hidden and system files use the command:

  [c:\]copystd /a/s c:\ d:\

To copy *.TXT files in the SUBDIR1 directory to *.BAK files in the same directory:

[c:\]copystd subdir1\*.txt subdir1\*.bak

To copy *.TXT files in the SUBDIR1 directory to *.BAK files in the current directory:

[c:\]copystd subdir1\*.txt *.bak

Related commands

COPYPLUS MORE MOVE RENAME DEL DESCRIBE TRUENAME TYPE