python shutil.copytree - ignore permissions

Question

Python's shutil.copytree is not very flexible; what is the simplest way to add support for ignoring permissions while copying in copytree (without having to re-write its implementation)?

Otherwise, copytree fails like this:

(…)”[Errno 45] Operation not supported: ‘/path/foo/bar’”

Training

none of the solutions work for me, so i use shutil.copytree and make_writeable_recursive – Australoid

Answer 1

You have shutil.py in your standard Python distribution (on Ubuntu, mine is under /usr/lib/python2.6 for instance; Windows might be C:\Python26\lib?). The copytree function is only 38 lines long (34 if you don't count comments), and the end of the docstring explicitly states:

XXX Consider this example code rather than the ultimate tool.

So the simplest way really would be to change/add a couple lines to copytree, or find another library, to be honest.

Abrego

That's what I did before posting this question. – Training

source: def copytree in shutil.py – Australoid

Answer 2

Not thread-safe (or advisable in general) but OK for a throwaway script:

import shutil

_orig_copystat = shutil.copystat
shutil.copystat = lambda x, y: x

shutil.copytree(src, dst)

shutil.copystat = _orig_copystat

Solander

fix: shutil.copystat = lambda *a, **k: None because the original function signature is copystat(src, dst, follow_symlinks=follow_symlinks) – Australoid

Answer 3

In Python 3.2 and higher, there's now a built-in way to do this. shutil.copytree accepts a custom file copy function as an argument. You can use that to change it from the default file copy function (shutil.copy2) to one that doesn't copy permissions like shutil.copy:

shutil.copytree(src, dst, copy_function=shutil.copy)

Acre

This will only work for files since directory permissions are not copied with the copy_function. They are mirrored explicitly with shutil.copystat() instead. – Deckert

shutil.copy does copy file permissions (but not other metadata such as file creation time). To avoid copying file permissions, use shutil.copyfile as the copy function. – Supertax

Answer 4

Use subprocess to avoid permission issues. This worked for me:

import subprocess
command = f"cp -r {src_dir} {dst_dir}"
subprocess.run(command, shell=True)

Regeneration

Why does this help? What would happen if src_dir = '; rm -rf'? – Engstrom