MV man page on 4.4BSD

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MV(1)			  BSD General Commands Manual			 MV(1)

NAME
     mv — move files

SYNOPSIS
     mv [-f | -i] source target
     mv [-f | -i] source ... source directory

DESCRIPTION
     In its first form, the mv utility renames the file named by the source
     operand to the destination path named by the target operand.  This form
     is assumed when the last operand does not name an already existing direc‐
     tory.

     In its second form, mv moves each file named by a source operand to a
     destination file in the existing directory named by the directory oper‐
     and.  The destination path for each operand is the pathname produced by
     the concatenation of the last operand, a slash, and the final pathname
     component of the named file.

     The following options are available:

     -f	   Do not prompt for confirmation before overwriting the destination
	   path.  (The -i option is ignored if the -f option is specified.)

     -i	   Causes mv to write a prompt to standard error before moving a file
	   that would overwrite an existing file.  If the response from the
	   standard input begins with the character ``y'', the move is
	   attempted.

     It is an error for either the source operand or the destination path to
     specify a directory unless both do.

     If the destination path does not have a mode which permits writing, mv
     prompts the user for confirmation as specified for the -i option.

     As the rename(2) call does not work across file systems, mv uses cp(1)
     and rm(1) to accomplish the move.	The effect is equivalent to:

	   rm -f destination_path && \
	   cp -pr source_file destination && \
	   rm -rf source_file

     The mv utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.

SEE ALSO
     cp(1), symlink(7)

STANDARDS
     The mv utility is expected to be IEEE Std 1003.2 (“POSIX.2”) compatible.

BSD				 May 31, 1993				   BSD
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