Re: mv (fileutils) 4.1 overwrites readonly file

[Jim Meyering]

Thanks a lot for the report!
That is indeed a bug: POSIX requires that mv prompt the user in that case.
I've just fixed it for the next release.

Vin Shelton <address@hidden> wrote:
> Try the following:
>
>   touch foo bar
>   chmod 444 foo bar
>   mv --version  ==> mv (fileutils) 4.1
>   mv foo bar
>
> Under fileutils 4.1 this overwrites bar without any question.  Under
> older versions of fileutils (4.0p, for example), this generated a
> query:
>
>   touch foo bar
>   chmod 444 foo bar
>   /bin/mv --version ==> mv (GNU fileutils) 4.0p
>   /bin/mv foo bar ==> /bin/mv: overwrite `bar', overriding mode 0444?
>
> This is similar to a bug I reported on 4.0.40 where rm would not
> prompt before erasing a readonly file.
>
> If this new behavior is intentional, is there any way to get the old
> behavior back?