bug#31675: Existing directories and files permissions are not being kept intact

[Paul Eggert]

Pádraig Brady wrote:
> This is a little surprising as cp didn't create /destination/dir in this case.
> However if it did create that dir, then the mode would be expected.
> So cp is keeping the destination consistent whether it previously existed or 
> not.

Sorry, but I am not following this analysis. The --no-preserve=mode option says 
"do not copy the mode of the source to the destination", and yet cp is copying 
the mode of the source to the destination. How is that not a bug?

A longer analysis: the documentation for --preserve says what should happen in 
the absence of the --preserve option (namely, that permissions of existing 
destinations are unchanged), and --no-preserve=mode is pretty clearly equivalent 
to the absence of --preserve=mode.

So I don't see how the current behavior can be considered to match the 
documentation. I don't see how it'd be that useful, either.