Re: Bug#389432: mv: cannot move directory into an already populated directory

[Eric Blake]

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According to Jim Meyering on 9/25/2006 3:51 PM:
>>      $ mkdir -p 1/a/b 2/a/c
>>      $ mv 1/a 2/
>>      mv: cannot move `1/a' to a subdirectory of itself, `2/a'
>>      $ rmdir 2/a/c
>>      $ mv 1/a 2/
>>      $
>>
> Thanks for the report, but mv can't do that -- at least not by default.
> 
> It might make sense to add an option to make mv work this way,
> if you can make a good enough case for it.

This capability is present in Windows.  When you move one subtree into
another folder that contains a similar subtree, the gui prompts whether
the move should proceed to update all contents by the same name.  Being
able to do this from a command line would be rather nice.  I would suggest
the name --merge for both cp and mv.  Semantics would be that directories
encountered during the traversal of the subtrees are handled specially,
such that destination directory ends up as the merge of the two subtrees
(any relative name present in both source and destination trees comes from
the source, all other relative file names in the destination remain
unchanged).  But of course, without an actual patch, this is just wishful
thinking for now...

- --
Life is short - so eat dessert first!

Eric Blake             address@hidden
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