[CentOS] Re: Opposite of cp -u

[Robert Moskowitz]

Scott Silva wrote:
> Robert Moskowitz spake the following on 8/6/2007 2:40 PM:
>   
>> I had at one point copied a large number of files between drives and did
>> not use the -p and thus the timestamps were all set to the date of the
>> copy.
>>
>> I did not catch this, and deleted the source.  So I 'lived' with it and
>> have since changed many files.
>>
>> Well, yesterday I found a good backup of many of those files and I want
>> to restore them to their proper dates.
>>
>> cp -p -u is exactly the opposite of what I want.  I want to copy only if
>> the source files have an earlier date than the destination files.
>>
>> The source files are just an old copy on another drive that I found when
>> cleaning up things...
>>     
> Can you restore the backups, and then cp -u from the existing directory over
> the restored copy?
No.  Because all the files, changed or not since that date, are newer 
than what is on the backup.  So it would overwrite everything.