Thanks for the reply. Originally, I thought it was strange that "mv x y" and "mv x/ y" would behave differently, and reported this as a bug to you. Now I understand that they are in fact supposed to behave differently.
However, it now seems to me there may be another bug. My interpretation of what you've written is that "mv x/ y" should move the dereferenced directory, when in fact (as described in my original mail) it *copies* the dereferenced directory, and all its contents, leaving the original intact. Isn't this wrong, given the spec you provided below ? -mike On Wed, 18 Sep 2002, Jim Meyering wrote: > Michael McGuffin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > I may have found a bug with mv. When x is a symlink to > > a directory, the behaviour of > > > > mv x y > > and > > mv x/ y > > > > is not the same. Please read the below description > > I wrote, and the response I got from Derrick Moser. > > Thanks for the report, but that is the documented (and required, as I > understand the POSIX standard) behavior. From the documentation > (e.g., run `info mv'): > > _Warning_: If you try to move a symlink that points to a directory, > and you specify the symlink with a trailing slash, then `mv' doesn't > move the symlink but instead moves the directory referenced by the > symlink. *Note Trailing slashes::. > > And here's the above-referenced section on Trailing slashes: > > Trailing slashes > ================ > > Some GNU programs (at least `cp' and `mv') allow you to remove any > trailing slashes from each SOURCE argument before operating on it. The > `--strip-trailing-slashes' option enables this behavior. > > This is useful when a SOURCE argument may have a trailing slash and > specify a symbolic link to a directory. This scenario is in fact rather > common because some shells can automatically append a trailing slash > when performing file name completion on such symbolic links. Without > this option, `mv', for example, (via the system's rename function) must > interpret a trailing slash as a request to dereference the symbolic link > and so must rename the indirectly referenced _directory_ and not the > symbolic link. Although it may seem surprising that such behavior be > the default, it is required by POSIX and is consistent with other parts > of that standard. > _______________________________________________ Bug-fileutils mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-fileutils
