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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-15T08:22:44+00:00

Is it possible to copy directory contents using the Java I/O and File-related APIs

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Is it possible to copy directory contents using the Java I/O and File-related APIs while preserving existing symlinks? I am working on a tool that needs to perform “directory copy” operations on a variety of UNIX flavours while preserving existing symlinks.

I’d prefer to attempt this using the core Java SE libraries without resorting Runtime.exec/ProcessBuilder to invoke the platform’s “/bin/cp” binary. Apache Commons’ IOUtils doesn’t appear to support this either.

My last resort will be to use Runtime.exec/ProcessBuilder!

UPDATE:
I guess I’ll be using Runtime.exec/ProcessBuilder to call out to the native “cp” executable since this doesn’t seem to be possible using the core Java APIs nor any of the Apache Commons libraries.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Are you restricted to Java versions <= 6?

    Otherwise you may want to look at http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/essential/io/links.html, specifically the sections Detecting a Symbolic Link and Finding the Target of a Link.

    From The Java NIO.2 File System in JDK 7:

    The java.nio.file API has full support for symbolic links based on the long-standing semantics of UNIX symbolic links — something that Java developers have long requested.

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