Question

36

How do I copy a folder keeping owners and permissions intact?

rated 0 times [ 36] [ 0] / answers: 1 / hits: 67355 / 3 Years ago, fri, november 19, 2021, 4:48:07

So I was going to back up my home folder by copying it to an external drive as follows:

sudo cp -r /home/my_home /media/backup/my_home

With the result that all folders on the external drives are now owned by root:root. How can I have cp keep the ownership and permissions from the original?

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memorrappin

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4 Years ago

answered 3 Years ago antorchestr · Accepted Answer

Use the -p flag.

-p     same as --preserve=mode,ownership,timestamps



--preserve[=ATTR_LIST]

       preserve the specified attributes (default: mode,ownership,timestamps), if possible additional attributes: context, links, xattr, all

Note that for the permissions to be correctly replicated, the destination file system should be the same as the source file system. In other words, your external drive should be formatted as ext4 if, as is usually the case, your home folder is stored on a partition of that type.