cp | Alison's LLM Skills Marketplace | Alison's LLM Skills Marketplace

Files

SKILL.mdagentsreferences

Install

Install only this skill with npx skills

npx skills add alisonaquinas/llm-shared-skills --skill 'cp' -g -y

Install the containing skill bundle

/plugin install shared-skills@llm-skills

Download cp-skill.zip

This skill is bundled inside shared-skills. Use npx skills when you only want this skill, or install the bundle once to make every included skill available through the plugin marketplace flow. Browse the full skill bundle repository at github.com/alisonaquinas/llm-shared-skills.

Invoke

Invoke this skill after installation

/shared-skills:cp

SKILL.md

name: cp description: > Copy files and directories with cp for duplicating, backing up, and distributing content. Use when the agent needs to copy a single file, recursively copy a directory tree, preserve metadata and permissions, avoid overwriting newer files, or create a backup before modifying the original.

cp

Copy files and directories with control over overwrite behaviour, metadata preservation, and backup creation.

Quick Start

Verify availability: cp --version (GNU) or man cp
Copy a file: cp source.txt destination.txt
Recursively copy a directory: cp -r src/ dest/

Intent Router

references/cheatsheet.md — Common flags, recursive copy, metadata preservation, overwrite control
references/advanced-usage.md — Archive mode, backup suffixes, sparse files, reflinks, progress reporting
references/troubleshooting.md — Permission errors, cross-filesystem issues, symlink handling, silent overwrites

Core Workflow

Confirm source path and destination intent before running
Use -i (interactive) or -n (no-clobber) to protect against silent overwrites
Use -r for directories; add -a (archive) to also preserve permissions, timestamps, and symlinks
Verify the copy with diff or ls -l on both sides
Clean up the original only after confirming the copy is intact

Quick Command Reference

cp source.txt dest.txt              # Copy a single file
cp -r src/ dest/                    # Recursively copy directory
cp -a src/ dest/                    # Archive: preserves permissions, times, symlinks
cp -i source.txt dest.txt           # Prompt before overwriting
cp -n source.txt dest.txt           # Never overwrite existing files
cp -u source.txt dest.txt           # Copy only when source is newer
cp -v source.txt dest.txt           # Verbose: print each file copied
cp -p source.txt dest.txt           # Preserve mode, ownership, timestamps
cp --backup=numbered source.txt d/  # Create numbered backups of overwritten files
cp -r --preserve=all src/ dest/     # Copy tree preserving all metadata (GNU)
man cp                              # Full manual

Safety Notes

Area	Guardrail
Silent overwrite	By default `cp` overwrites the destination without warning. Use `-i` interactively or `-n` in scripts to prevent data loss.
Directory trailing slash	`cp -r src dest` behaves differently depending on whether `dest` exists. If `dest` exists, `src` is copied inside it. If not, `dest` is created as the copy. Verify intent before running.
Permissions	Without `-p` or `-a`, copied files inherit the umask of the current process. Use `-a` or `--preserve` when permissions must match the source.
Symlinks	By default `cp` follows symlinks and copies the referenced file. Use `-P` (or `-d`) to copy the symlink itself.
Cross-filesystem	Hardlinks are silently converted to copies. Use `rsync -aH` to preserve hardlinks across filesystems.
Disk space	Verify available space before copying large trees. `df -h` and `du -sh src/` are useful pre-flight checks.

Source Policy

Treat man cp and cp --help as runtime truth. GNU and BSD cp differ in some flags.
For large or critical copies, prefer rsync — it supports resuming, checksums, and dry-run.
Always verify the result with diff -r or md5sum for integrity-sensitive copies.

cp