NAME

rcp, rcp0 − remote file copy

SYNOPSIS

rcp file1 file2
rcp [−r] [−p] file ... directory

DESCRIPTION

rcp copies files between machines.  Each file or directory argument is either a remote file name of the form “rhost:path”, or a local file name (containing no ‘:’ characters, or a ‘/’ before any ‘:’s.) 

If the −r is specified and any of the source files are directories, rcp copies each subtree rooted at that name; in this case the destination must be a directory. 

The −p option causes rcp to attempt to preserve (duplicate) in its copies the modified and accessed times of the source files. 

If path is not a full path name, it is interpreted relative to your login directory on rhost. A path on a remote host may be quoted (using \, ", or ´) so that the metacharacters are interpreted remotely. 

rcp does not prompt for passwords; your current local user name must exist on rhost and allow remote command execution via rsh(1C).

rcp handles third party copies, where neither source nor target files are on the current machine.  Hostnames may also take the form “rname@rhost” to use rname rather than the current user name on the remote host. 

Please note:  rcp is meant to copy from one host to another; if by some chance you try to copy a file on top of itself, you will end up with a severely corrupted file (for example, if you executed the following command from host george: ‘george% rcp testfile george:/usr/me/testfile’).  Remember where you are at all times (putting your hostname in your prompt helps with this)! 

SEE ALSO

ftp(1C), rsh(1C), rlogin(1C)

BUGS

Doesn’t detect all cases where the target of a copy might be a file in cases where only a directory should be legal. 

Is confused by any output generated by commands in a .login, .profile, or .cshrc file on the remote host. 

rcp doesn’t copy ownership, mode, and timestamps to the new files. 

rcp requires that the source host have permission to execute commands on the remote host when doing third-party copies. 

If you forget to quote metacharacters intended for the remote host you get an incomprehesible error message. 

rcp will create ‘holes’ in the output file for completely zero disc blocks, this saves considerable disc space on R140 systems. Some NFS fileservers (eg those running 4.2BSD) have a bug which cause them to add a zero byte to files copied in this manner.  This can be avoided by using rcp0 which is identical to rcp except that it copies the file byte for byte. 

rcp does not support the host.user syntax for destination addressing. 

7th Edition  —  Revision 1.9 of 03/12/88