How can I preserve file modification times when copying to a NAS?












7















I recently installed a Synology DiskStation on my network. I mounted it from an Ubuntu 12.04.1 computer with the Browse Network button in Nautilus 3.4.2. It shows up as afp://randall@DiskStation.local/photo/ in Nautilus.



So far, so good. I then uploaded a lot of photos to it, all with modifications times covering several months. When I looked at the directory of photos on the DiskStation, they all had modification times for the moment they were copied, not the modification times on the source computer. So much for sorting them by date on the DiskStation.



Is there a way to re-copy the files but have their modification date be preserved? Perhaps I mounted the DiskStation the wrong way. Perhaps Nautilus was the wrong tool to use. Any suggestions?



BTW, I have moved gigabytes of photos to a different NAS (Plextor PX-EH) over SMB/CIFS from Ubuntu 10.04, 10.10, 11.04, and 11.10 with modification times fully preserved. The problem must be with the Synology or some Ubuntu 12.04 software.










share|improve this question

























  • Does that NAS support SSH access? If yes you can use rsync or one of its GUI frontends to sync photos. Also, it should support SMB/CIFS too, which you can directly mount in Ubuntu and copy data with cp, rsync or any other tool.

    – Sergey
    Dec 6 '12 at 8:02











  • rsync is the best copying/syncing tool to use. The -a (-rlptgoD) preserves modification time. See man rsync for more details. However, this requires SSH + rsync on both hosts.

    – Terry Wang
    Dec 6 '12 at 10:38
















7















I recently installed a Synology DiskStation on my network. I mounted it from an Ubuntu 12.04.1 computer with the Browse Network button in Nautilus 3.4.2. It shows up as afp://randall@DiskStation.local/photo/ in Nautilus.



So far, so good. I then uploaded a lot of photos to it, all with modifications times covering several months. When I looked at the directory of photos on the DiskStation, they all had modification times for the moment they were copied, not the modification times on the source computer. So much for sorting them by date on the DiskStation.



Is there a way to re-copy the files but have their modification date be preserved? Perhaps I mounted the DiskStation the wrong way. Perhaps Nautilus was the wrong tool to use. Any suggestions?



BTW, I have moved gigabytes of photos to a different NAS (Plextor PX-EH) over SMB/CIFS from Ubuntu 10.04, 10.10, 11.04, and 11.10 with modification times fully preserved. The problem must be with the Synology or some Ubuntu 12.04 software.










share|improve this question

























  • Does that NAS support SSH access? If yes you can use rsync or one of its GUI frontends to sync photos. Also, it should support SMB/CIFS too, which you can directly mount in Ubuntu and copy data with cp, rsync or any other tool.

    – Sergey
    Dec 6 '12 at 8:02











  • rsync is the best copying/syncing tool to use. The -a (-rlptgoD) preserves modification time. See man rsync for more details. However, this requires SSH + rsync on both hosts.

    – Terry Wang
    Dec 6 '12 at 10:38














7












7








7








I recently installed a Synology DiskStation on my network. I mounted it from an Ubuntu 12.04.1 computer with the Browse Network button in Nautilus 3.4.2. It shows up as afp://randall@DiskStation.local/photo/ in Nautilus.



So far, so good. I then uploaded a lot of photos to it, all with modifications times covering several months. When I looked at the directory of photos on the DiskStation, they all had modification times for the moment they were copied, not the modification times on the source computer. So much for sorting them by date on the DiskStation.



Is there a way to re-copy the files but have their modification date be preserved? Perhaps I mounted the DiskStation the wrong way. Perhaps Nautilus was the wrong tool to use. Any suggestions?



BTW, I have moved gigabytes of photos to a different NAS (Plextor PX-EH) over SMB/CIFS from Ubuntu 10.04, 10.10, 11.04, and 11.10 with modification times fully preserved. The problem must be with the Synology or some Ubuntu 12.04 software.










share|improve this question
















I recently installed a Synology DiskStation on my network. I mounted it from an Ubuntu 12.04.1 computer with the Browse Network button in Nautilus 3.4.2. It shows up as afp://randall@DiskStation.local/photo/ in Nautilus.



So far, so good. I then uploaded a lot of photos to it, all with modifications times covering several months. When I looked at the directory of photos on the DiskStation, they all had modification times for the moment they were copied, not the modification times on the source computer. So much for sorting them by date on the DiskStation.



Is there a way to re-copy the files but have their modification date be preserved? Perhaps I mounted the DiskStation the wrong way. Perhaps Nautilus was the wrong tool to use. Any suggestions?



BTW, I have moved gigabytes of photos to a different NAS (Plextor PX-EH) over SMB/CIFS from Ubuntu 10.04, 10.10, 11.04, and 11.10 with modification times fully preserved. The problem must be with the Synology or some Ubuntu 12.04 software.







nautilus photo-management nas timestamp






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edited Dec 8 '12 at 19:43









Jorge Castro

36.2k105422617




36.2k105422617










asked Dec 6 '12 at 7:27









Randall CookRandall Cook

2,16541220




2,16541220













  • Does that NAS support SSH access? If yes you can use rsync or one of its GUI frontends to sync photos. Also, it should support SMB/CIFS too, which you can directly mount in Ubuntu and copy data with cp, rsync or any other tool.

    – Sergey
    Dec 6 '12 at 8:02











  • rsync is the best copying/syncing tool to use. The -a (-rlptgoD) preserves modification time. See man rsync for more details. However, this requires SSH + rsync on both hosts.

    – Terry Wang
    Dec 6 '12 at 10:38



















  • Does that NAS support SSH access? If yes you can use rsync or one of its GUI frontends to sync photos. Also, it should support SMB/CIFS too, which you can directly mount in Ubuntu and copy data with cp, rsync or any other tool.

    – Sergey
    Dec 6 '12 at 8:02











  • rsync is the best copying/syncing tool to use. The -a (-rlptgoD) preserves modification time. See man rsync for more details. However, this requires SSH + rsync on both hosts.

    – Terry Wang
    Dec 6 '12 at 10:38

















Does that NAS support SSH access? If yes you can use rsync or one of its GUI frontends to sync photos. Also, it should support SMB/CIFS too, which you can directly mount in Ubuntu and copy data with cp, rsync or any other tool.

– Sergey
Dec 6 '12 at 8:02





Does that NAS support SSH access? If yes you can use rsync or one of its GUI frontends to sync photos. Also, it should support SMB/CIFS too, which you can directly mount in Ubuntu and copy data with cp, rsync or any other tool.

– Sergey
Dec 6 '12 at 8:02













rsync is the best copying/syncing tool to use. The -a (-rlptgoD) preserves modification time. See man rsync for more details. However, this requires SSH + rsync on both hosts.

– Terry Wang
Dec 6 '12 at 10:38





rsync is the best copying/syncing tool to use. The -a (-rlptgoD) preserves modification time. See man rsync for more details. However, this requires SSH + rsync on both hosts.

– Terry Wang
Dec 6 '12 at 10:38










4 Answers
4






active

oldest

votes


















3














I believe I have solved the problem. In Ubuntu 12.04, in Nautilus there are two ways to connect to the remote DiskStation NAS. One preserves modification times, one does not.



In the menu on the left-hand side of a Nautilus window, the Browse Network... button eventually leads to an AFP (Apple Filing Protocol) connection to the DiskStation, through which neither Nautilus nor cp -p copies preserve modification time. I tried disabling Apple support in the DiskStation, but in that mode the DiskStation wasn't even visible in Browse Network.



In Nautilus's File menu there is a Connect to Server... option that offers a host of protocols. I chose Windows, entered my credentials, and connected without trouble. In this mode, modification times are preserved, so I was able to re-copy my photos and have their dates preserved.



Thank you Sergey and david6 for your suggestions. Hopefully people will find this information valuable.






share|improve this answer
























  • I've used "Connect to server" to connect to another Ubuntu machine from Nautilus on Ubuntu 18.04, and when copying files, Nautilus preserved the timestamps of directories, but not files. Midnight commander set all file modification timestamps to the time of the copy. BeyondCompare preserved file, but not directory, timestamps.

    – Dan Dascalescu
    Jan 5 at 11:59



















2














Standard cp command has --preserve flag which preserved certain attributes (by default - mode,ownership,timestamps) when copying.



So something like this:



cp -rp /source/photos/folder /destination/photos/folder


should do the trick in the "normal" case. However, the afp:// thing in the URL confuses me - is it Apple Filing Protocol? All bets are off in this case.



One think I'd like to add - relying on file modification dates for cataloging your photos is very fragile. This is what image metadata (EXIF etc.) is for. Or, at least, just put them in directories according to their shooting date: photos/2012/12/05 etc.






share|improve this answer
























  • Thanks for the tip, Sergey. If I have to use the command line, I will, but I was hoping that Ubuntu would be able to do the right thing through the GUI. It has in the past (pre-12.04). And yes, I was about to move the photos to folders organized by month when I noticed the modification time problem.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 6 '12 at 7:48











  • I tried cp -p from a terminal and I got this error: "cp: preserving times for '.gvfs/AFP volume photo for randall on DiskStation/target_dir/image.JPG': Operation not supported". So I guess cp -p won't work. I'll try david6's suggestion.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 8 '12 at 6:35













  • When using Mac OS to access the Synology NAS via terminal, cp -p does not preserve the time stamps. I've mounted the NAS via smb. I asked Synology support, and apparently the lack of preservation is the default behavior. On the other hand, rsync does preserve time stamps.

    – andrewj
    Jun 18 '13 at 19:53













  • Only regarding images and if the EXIF Image taken date bothers you (and fragile indeed). If anyone wants to restore last-modified-dates from Exif Information, look here: → photo.stackexchange.com/a/69193/48640

    – Frank Nocke
    Nov 5 '16 at 6:20













  • Consider using cp -a instead.

    – Pablo Bianchi
    Nov 16 '17 at 2:18



















2














This is the classic push/pull problem, for remote copy.



The recipient host is not honouring the date-stamp of the received files.
Nautilus has this same fault, from 10.04 LTS through 12.10 ..



This is solved (for Nautilus), when copying between two Ubuntu hosts, by always copying from the remote-host (source) to the local-host (recipient). (AKA 'PULL')





Your problem is with the NAS box, and not with Ubuntu.



You need it to honour the date-stamp of received files (by default).



Are you using NFS (Linux) or CIFS (Windows) for file sharing?






share|improve this answer
























  • Thanks, david6. I'm definitely not using NFS, as it is disabled on the DiskStation, but Windows and Mac file sharing are enabled. When I connect to the DiskStation, Nautilus (I guess) only asks me for a username and password, not a protocol. The mount I get has "AFP" in its name, so I guess it chose the Apple file protocol. I'll try forcing a CIFS mount, see if that works, and then find a way to automatically get that.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 8 '12 at 6:50



















0














Turns out that preserving timestamps for files and directories is still a problem in 2019! I was copying files from an Ubuntu 16 machine to an Ubuntu 18 one over SFTP, using Nautilus on the Ubuntu 18, and all files had the current timestamp, but directories had the original timestamps. Other tools failed as well:




  • BeyondCompare did not preserve the timestamps of directories


  • DoubleCommander gave random errors throughout the copying process (no other tool did that; both machines use SSDs and are on the local Wi-Fi)

  • Midnight Commander lost the timestamps for both files and directories


What did work was to mount the remote filesystem using sshfs:



$ sudo mkdir /mnt/remote-machine
$ sudo sshfs -o allow_other,default_permissions dandv@10.15.x.x:/ /mnt/remote-machine
$ cp -rp /mnt/remote-machine/path/to/files ./
$ # ... or use another file manager


Copying from the mounted path also enabled Midnight Commander to preserve the timestamps (but didn't help BeyondCompare).






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    4 Answers
    4






    active

    oldest

    votes








    4 Answers
    4






    active

    oldest

    votes









    active

    oldest

    votes






    active

    oldest

    votes









    3














    I believe I have solved the problem. In Ubuntu 12.04, in Nautilus there are two ways to connect to the remote DiskStation NAS. One preserves modification times, one does not.



    In the menu on the left-hand side of a Nautilus window, the Browse Network... button eventually leads to an AFP (Apple Filing Protocol) connection to the DiskStation, through which neither Nautilus nor cp -p copies preserve modification time. I tried disabling Apple support in the DiskStation, but in that mode the DiskStation wasn't even visible in Browse Network.



    In Nautilus's File menu there is a Connect to Server... option that offers a host of protocols. I chose Windows, entered my credentials, and connected without trouble. In this mode, modification times are preserved, so I was able to re-copy my photos and have their dates preserved.



    Thank you Sergey and david6 for your suggestions. Hopefully people will find this information valuable.






    share|improve this answer
























    • I've used "Connect to server" to connect to another Ubuntu machine from Nautilus on Ubuntu 18.04, and when copying files, Nautilus preserved the timestamps of directories, but not files. Midnight commander set all file modification timestamps to the time of the copy. BeyondCompare preserved file, but not directory, timestamps.

      – Dan Dascalescu
      Jan 5 at 11:59
















    3














    I believe I have solved the problem. In Ubuntu 12.04, in Nautilus there are two ways to connect to the remote DiskStation NAS. One preserves modification times, one does not.



    In the menu on the left-hand side of a Nautilus window, the Browse Network... button eventually leads to an AFP (Apple Filing Protocol) connection to the DiskStation, through which neither Nautilus nor cp -p copies preserve modification time. I tried disabling Apple support in the DiskStation, but in that mode the DiskStation wasn't even visible in Browse Network.



    In Nautilus's File menu there is a Connect to Server... option that offers a host of protocols. I chose Windows, entered my credentials, and connected without trouble. In this mode, modification times are preserved, so I was able to re-copy my photos and have their dates preserved.



    Thank you Sergey and david6 for your suggestions. Hopefully people will find this information valuable.






    share|improve this answer
























    • I've used "Connect to server" to connect to another Ubuntu machine from Nautilus on Ubuntu 18.04, and when copying files, Nautilus preserved the timestamps of directories, but not files. Midnight commander set all file modification timestamps to the time of the copy. BeyondCompare preserved file, but not directory, timestamps.

      – Dan Dascalescu
      Jan 5 at 11:59














    3












    3








    3







    I believe I have solved the problem. In Ubuntu 12.04, in Nautilus there are two ways to connect to the remote DiskStation NAS. One preserves modification times, one does not.



    In the menu on the left-hand side of a Nautilus window, the Browse Network... button eventually leads to an AFP (Apple Filing Protocol) connection to the DiskStation, through which neither Nautilus nor cp -p copies preserve modification time. I tried disabling Apple support in the DiskStation, but in that mode the DiskStation wasn't even visible in Browse Network.



    In Nautilus's File menu there is a Connect to Server... option that offers a host of protocols. I chose Windows, entered my credentials, and connected without trouble. In this mode, modification times are preserved, so I was able to re-copy my photos and have their dates preserved.



    Thank you Sergey and david6 for your suggestions. Hopefully people will find this information valuable.






    share|improve this answer













    I believe I have solved the problem. In Ubuntu 12.04, in Nautilus there are two ways to connect to the remote DiskStation NAS. One preserves modification times, one does not.



    In the menu on the left-hand side of a Nautilus window, the Browse Network... button eventually leads to an AFP (Apple Filing Protocol) connection to the DiskStation, through which neither Nautilus nor cp -p copies preserve modification time. I tried disabling Apple support in the DiskStation, but in that mode the DiskStation wasn't even visible in Browse Network.



    In Nautilus's File menu there is a Connect to Server... option that offers a host of protocols. I chose Windows, entered my credentials, and connected without trouble. In this mode, modification times are preserved, so I was able to re-copy my photos and have their dates preserved.



    Thank you Sergey and david6 for your suggestions. Hopefully people will find this information valuable.







    share|improve this answer












    share|improve this answer



    share|improve this answer










    answered Dec 8 '12 at 19:40









    Randall CookRandall Cook

    2,16541220




    2,16541220













    • I've used "Connect to server" to connect to another Ubuntu machine from Nautilus on Ubuntu 18.04, and when copying files, Nautilus preserved the timestamps of directories, but not files. Midnight commander set all file modification timestamps to the time of the copy. BeyondCompare preserved file, but not directory, timestamps.

      – Dan Dascalescu
      Jan 5 at 11:59



















    • I've used "Connect to server" to connect to another Ubuntu machine from Nautilus on Ubuntu 18.04, and when copying files, Nautilus preserved the timestamps of directories, but not files. Midnight commander set all file modification timestamps to the time of the copy. BeyondCompare preserved file, but not directory, timestamps.

      – Dan Dascalescu
      Jan 5 at 11:59

















    I've used "Connect to server" to connect to another Ubuntu machine from Nautilus on Ubuntu 18.04, and when copying files, Nautilus preserved the timestamps of directories, but not files. Midnight commander set all file modification timestamps to the time of the copy. BeyondCompare preserved file, but not directory, timestamps.

    – Dan Dascalescu
    Jan 5 at 11:59





    I've used "Connect to server" to connect to another Ubuntu machine from Nautilus on Ubuntu 18.04, and when copying files, Nautilus preserved the timestamps of directories, but not files. Midnight commander set all file modification timestamps to the time of the copy. BeyondCompare preserved file, but not directory, timestamps.

    – Dan Dascalescu
    Jan 5 at 11:59













    2














    Standard cp command has --preserve flag which preserved certain attributes (by default - mode,ownership,timestamps) when copying.



    So something like this:



    cp -rp /source/photos/folder /destination/photos/folder


    should do the trick in the "normal" case. However, the afp:// thing in the URL confuses me - is it Apple Filing Protocol? All bets are off in this case.



    One think I'd like to add - relying on file modification dates for cataloging your photos is very fragile. This is what image metadata (EXIF etc.) is for. Or, at least, just put them in directories according to their shooting date: photos/2012/12/05 etc.






    share|improve this answer
























    • Thanks for the tip, Sergey. If I have to use the command line, I will, but I was hoping that Ubuntu would be able to do the right thing through the GUI. It has in the past (pre-12.04). And yes, I was about to move the photos to folders organized by month when I noticed the modification time problem.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 6 '12 at 7:48











    • I tried cp -p from a terminal and I got this error: "cp: preserving times for '.gvfs/AFP volume photo for randall on DiskStation/target_dir/image.JPG': Operation not supported". So I guess cp -p won't work. I'll try david6's suggestion.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 8 '12 at 6:35













    • When using Mac OS to access the Synology NAS via terminal, cp -p does not preserve the time stamps. I've mounted the NAS via smb. I asked Synology support, and apparently the lack of preservation is the default behavior. On the other hand, rsync does preserve time stamps.

      – andrewj
      Jun 18 '13 at 19:53













    • Only regarding images and if the EXIF Image taken date bothers you (and fragile indeed). If anyone wants to restore last-modified-dates from Exif Information, look here: → photo.stackexchange.com/a/69193/48640

      – Frank Nocke
      Nov 5 '16 at 6:20













    • Consider using cp -a instead.

      – Pablo Bianchi
      Nov 16 '17 at 2:18
















    2














    Standard cp command has --preserve flag which preserved certain attributes (by default - mode,ownership,timestamps) when copying.



    So something like this:



    cp -rp /source/photos/folder /destination/photos/folder


    should do the trick in the "normal" case. However, the afp:// thing in the URL confuses me - is it Apple Filing Protocol? All bets are off in this case.



    One think I'd like to add - relying on file modification dates for cataloging your photos is very fragile. This is what image metadata (EXIF etc.) is for. Or, at least, just put them in directories according to their shooting date: photos/2012/12/05 etc.






    share|improve this answer
























    • Thanks for the tip, Sergey. If I have to use the command line, I will, but I was hoping that Ubuntu would be able to do the right thing through the GUI. It has in the past (pre-12.04). And yes, I was about to move the photos to folders organized by month when I noticed the modification time problem.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 6 '12 at 7:48











    • I tried cp -p from a terminal and I got this error: "cp: preserving times for '.gvfs/AFP volume photo for randall on DiskStation/target_dir/image.JPG': Operation not supported". So I guess cp -p won't work. I'll try david6's suggestion.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 8 '12 at 6:35













    • When using Mac OS to access the Synology NAS via terminal, cp -p does not preserve the time stamps. I've mounted the NAS via smb. I asked Synology support, and apparently the lack of preservation is the default behavior. On the other hand, rsync does preserve time stamps.

      – andrewj
      Jun 18 '13 at 19:53













    • Only regarding images and if the EXIF Image taken date bothers you (and fragile indeed). If anyone wants to restore last-modified-dates from Exif Information, look here: → photo.stackexchange.com/a/69193/48640

      – Frank Nocke
      Nov 5 '16 at 6:20













    • Consider using cp -a instead.

      – Pablo Bianchi
      Nov 16 '17 at 2:18














    2












    2








    2







    Standard cp command has --preserve flag which preserved certain attributes (by default - mode,ownership,timestamps) when copying.



    So something like this:



    cp -rp /source/photos/folder /destination/photos/folder


    should do the trick in the "normal" case. However, the afp:// thing in the URL confuses me - is it Apple Filing Protocol? All bets are off in this case.



    One think I'd like to add - relying on file modification dates for cataloging your photos is very fragile. This is what image metadata (EXIF etc.) is for. Or, at least, just put them in directories according to their shooting date: photos/2012/12/05 etc.






    share|improve this answer













    Standard cp command has --preserve flag which preserved certain attributes (by default - mode,ownership,timestamps) when copying.



    So something like this:



    cp -rp /source/photos/folder /destination/photos/folder


    should do the trick in the "normal" case. However, the afp:// thing in the URL confuses me - is it Apple Filing Protocol? All bets are off in this case.



    One think I'd like to add - relying on file modification dates for cataloging your photos is very fragile. This is what image metadata (EXIF etc.) is for. Or, at least, just put them in directories according to their shooting date: photos/2012/12/05 etc.







    share|improve this answer












    share|improve this answer



    share|improve this answer










    answered Dec 6 '12 at 7:40









    SergeySergey

    36.3k98799




    36.3k98799













    • Thanks for the tip, Sergey. If I have to use the command line, I will, but I was hoping that Ubuntu would be able to do the right thing through the GUI. It has in the past (pre-12.04). And yes, I was about to move the photos to folders organized by month when I noticed the modification time problem.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 6 '12 at 7:48











    • I tried cp -p from a terminal and I got this error: "cp: preserving times for '.gvfs/AFP volume photo for randall on DiskStation/target_dir/image.JPG': Operation not supported". So I guess cp -p won't work. I'll try david6's suggestion.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 8 '12 at 6:35













    • When using Mac OS to access the Synology NAS via terminal, cp -p does not preserve the time stamps. I've mounted the NAS via smb. I asked Synology support, and apparently the lack of preservation is the default behavior. On the other hand, rsync does preserve time stamps.

      – andrewj
      Jun 18 '13 at 19:53













    • Only regarding images and if the EXIF Image taken date bothers you (and fragile indeed). If anyone wants to restore last-modified-dates from Exif Information, look here: → photo.stackexchange.com/a/69193/48640

      – Frank Nocke
      Nov 5 '16 at 6:20













    • Consider using cp -a instead.

      – Pablo Bianchi
      Nov 16 '17 at 2:18



















    • Thanks for the tip, Sergey. If I have to use the command line, I will, but I was hoping that Ubuntu would be able to do the right thing through the GUI. It has in the past (pre-12.04). And yes, I was about to move the photos to folders organized by month when I noticed the modification time problem.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 6 '12 at 7:48











    • I tried cp -p from a terminal and I got this error: "cp: preserving times for '.gvfs/AFP volume photo for randall on DiskStation/target_dir/image.JPG': Operation not supported". So I guess cp -p won't work. I'll try david6's suggestion.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 8 '12 at 6:35













    • When using Mac OS to access the Synology NAS via terminal, cp -p does not preserve the time stamps. I've mounted the NAS via smb. I asked Synology support, and apparently the lack of preservation is the default behavior. On the other hand, rsync does preserve time stamps.

      – andrewj
      Jun 18 '13 at 19:53













    • Only regarding images and if the EXIF Image taken date bothers you (and fragile indeed). If anyone wants to restore last-modified-dates from Exif Information, look here: → photo.stackexchange.com/a/69193/48640

      – Frank Nocke
      Nov 5 '16 at 6:20













    • Consider using cp -a instead.

      – Pablo Bianchi
      Nov 16 '17 at 2:18

















    Thanks for the tip, Sergey. If I have to use the command line, I will, but I was hoping that Ubuntu would be able to do the right thing through the GUI. It has in the past (pre-12.04). And yes, I was about to move the photos to folders organized by month when I noticed the modification time problem.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 6 '12 at 7:48





    Thanks for the tip, Sergey. If I have to use the command line, I will, but I was hoping that Ubuntu would be able to do the right thing through the GUI. It has in the past (pre-12.04). And yes, I was about to move the photos to folders organized by month when I noticed the modification time problem.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 6 '12 at 7:48













    I tried cp -p from a terminal and I got this error: "cp: preserving times for '.gvfs/AFP volume photo for randall on DiskStation/target_dir/image.JPG': Operation not supported". So I guess cp -p won't work. I'll try david6's suggestion.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 8 '12 at 6:35







    I tried cp -p from a terminal and I got this error: "cp: preserving times for '.gvfs/AFP volume photo for randall on DiskStation/target_dir/image.JPG': Operation not supported". So I guess cp -p won't work. I'll try david6's suggestion.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 8 '12 at 6:35















    When using Mac OS to access the Synology NAS via terminal, cp -p does not preserve the time stamps. I've mounted the NAS via smb. I asked Synology support, and apparently the lack of preservation is the default behavior. On the other hand, rsync does preserve time stamps.

    – andrewj
    Jun 18 '13 at 19:53







    When using Mac OS to access the Synology NAS via terminal, cp -p does not preserve the time stamps. I've mounted the NAS via smb. I asked Synology support, and apparently the lack of preservation is the default behavior. On the other hand, rsync does preserve time stamps.

    – andrewj
    Jun 18 '13 at 19:53















    Only regarding images and if the EXIF Image taken date bothers you (and fragile indeed). If anyone wants to restore last-modified-dates from Exif Information, look here: → photo.stackexchange.com/a/69193/48640

    – Frank Nocke
    Nov 5 '16 at 6:20







    Only regarding images and if the EXIF Image taken date bothers you (and fragile indeed). If anyone wants to restore last-modified-dates from Exif Information, look here: → photo.stackexchange.com/a/69193/48640

    – Frank Nocke
    Nov 5 '16 at 6:20















    Consider using cp -a instead.

    – Pablo Bianchi
    Nov 16 '17 at 2:18





    Consider using cp -a instead.

    – Pablo Bianchi
    Nov 16 '17 at 2:18











    2














    This is the classic push/pull problem, for remote copy.



    The recipient host is not honouring the date-stamp of the received files.
    Nautilus has this same fault, from 10.04 LTS through 12.10 ..



    This is solved (for Nautilus), when copying between two Ubuntu hosts, by always copying from the remote-host (source) to the local-host (recipient). (AKA 'PULL')





    Your problem is with the NAS box, and not with Ubuntu.



    You need it to honour the date-stamp of received files (by default).



    Are you using NFS (Linux) or CIFS (Windows) for file sharing?






    share|improve this answer
























    • Thanks, david6. I'm definitely not using NFS, as it is disabled on the DiskStation, but Windows and Mac file sharing are enabled. When I connect to the DiskStation, Nautilus (I guess) only asks me for a username and password, not a protocol. The mount I get has "AFP" in its name, so I guess it chose the Apple file protocol. I'll try forcing a CIFS mount, see if that works, and then find a way to automatically get that.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 8 '12 at 6:50
















    2














    This is the classic push/pull problem, for remote copy.



    The recipient host is not honouring the date-stamp of the received files.
    Nautilus has this same fault, from 10.04 LTS through 12.10 ..



    This is solved (for Nautilus), when copying between two Ubuntu hosts, by always copying from the remote-host (source) to the local-host (recipient). (AKA 'PULL')





    Your problem is with the NAS box, and not with Ubuntu.



    You need it to honour the date-stamp of received files (by default).



    Are you using NFS (Linux) or CIFS (Windows) for file sharing?






    share|improve this answer
























    • Thanks, david6. I'm definitely not using NFS, as it is disabled on the DiskStation, but Windows and Mac file sharing are enabled. When I connect to the DiskStation, Nautilus (I guess) only asks me for a username and password, not a protocol. The mount I get has "AFP" in its name, so I guess it chose the Apple file protocol. I'll try forcing a CIFS mount, see if that works, and then find a way to automatically get that.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 8 '12 at 6:50














    2












    2








    2







    This is the classic push/pull problem, for remote copy.



    The recipient host is not honouring the date-stamp of the received files.
    Nautilus has this same fault, from 10.04 LTS through 12.10 ..



    This is solved (for Nautilus), when copying between two Ubuntu hosts, by always copying from the remote-host (source) to the local-host (recipient). (AKA 'PULL')





    Your problem is with the NAS box, and not with Ubuntu.



    You need it to honour the date-stamp of received files (by default).



    Are you using NFS (Linux) or CIFS (Windows) for file sharing?






    share|improve this answer













    This is the classic push/pull problem, for remote copy.



    The recipient host is not honouring the date-stamp of the received files.
    Nautilus has this same fault, from 10.04 LTS through 12.10 ..



    This is solved (for Nautilus), when copying between two Ubuntu hosts, by always copying from the remote-host (source) to the local-host (recipient). (AKA 'PULL')





    Your problem is with the NAS box, and not with Ubuntu.



    You need it to honour the date-stamp of received files (by default).



    Are you using NFS (Linux) or CIFS (Windows) for file sharing?







    share|improve this answer












    share|improve this answer



    share|improve this answer










    answered Dec 6 '12 at 10:03









    david6david6

    13.7k43144




    13.7k43144













    • Thanks, david6. I'm definitely not using NFS, as it is disabled on the DiskStation, but Windows and Mac file sharing are enabled. When I connect to the DiskStation, Nautilus (I guess) only asks me for a username and password, not a protocol. The mount I get has "AFP" in its name, so I guess it chose the Apple file protocol. I'll try forcing a CIFS mount, see if that works, and then find a way to automatically get that.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 8 '12 at 6:50



















    • Thanks, david6. I'm definitely not using NFS, as it is disabled on the DiskStation, but Windows and Mac file sharing are enabled. When I connect to the DiskStation, Nautilus (I guess) only asks me for a username and password, not a protocol. The mount I get has "AFP" in its name, so I guess it chose the Apple file protocol. I'll try forcing a CIFS mount, see if that works, and then find a way to automatically get that.

      – Randall Cook
      Dec 8 '12 at 6:50

















    Thanks, david6. I'm definitely not using NFS, as it is disabled on the DiskStation, but Windows and Mac file sharing are enabled. When I connect to the DiskStation, Nautilus (I guess) only asks me for a username and password, not a protocol. The mount I get has "AFP" in its name, so I guess it chose the Apple file protocol. I'll try forcing a CIFS mount, see if that works, and then find a way to automatically get that.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 8 '12 at 6:50





    Thanks, david6. I'm definitely not using NFS, as it is disabled on the DiskStation, but Windows and Mac file sharing are enabled. When I connect to the DiskStation, Nautilus (I guess) only asks me for a username and password, not a protocol. The mount I get has "AFP" in its name, so I guess it chose the Apple file protocol. I'll try forcing a CIFS mount, see if that works, and then find a way to automatically get that.

    – Randall Cook
    Dec 8 '12 at 6:50











    0














    Turns out that preserving timestamps for files and directories is still a problem in 2019! I was copying files from an Ubuntu 16 machine to an Ubuntu 18 one over SFTP, using Nautilus on the Ubuntu 18, and all files had the current timestamp, but directories had the original timestamps. Other tools failed as well:




    • BeyondCompare did not preserve the timestamps of directories


    • DoubleCommander gave random errors throughout the copying process (no other tool did that; both machines use SSDs and are on the local Wi-Fi)

    • Midnight Commander lost the timestamps for both files and directories


    What did work was to mount the remote filesystem using sshfs:



    $ sudo mkdir /mnt/remote-machine
    $ sudo sshfs -o allow_other,default_permissions dandv@10.15.x.x:/ /mnt/remote-machine
    $ cp -rp /mnt/remote-machine/path/to/files ./
    $ # ... or use another file manager


    Copying from the mounted path also enabled Midnight Commander to preserve the timestamps (but didn't help BeyondCompare).






    share|improve this answer




























      0














      Turns out that preserving timestamps for files and directories is still a problem in 2019! I was copying files from an Ubuntu 16 machine to an Ubuntu 18 one over SFTP, using Nautilus on the Ubuntu 18, and all files had the current timestamp, but directories had the original timestamps. Other tools failed as well:




      • BeyondCompare did not preserve the timestamps of directories


      • DoubleCommander gave random errors throughout the copying process (no other tool did that; both machines use SSDs and are on the local Wi-Fi)

      • Midnight Commander lost the timestamps for both files and directories


      What did work was to mount the remote filesystem using sshfs:



      $ sudo mkdir /mnt/remote-machine
      $ sudo sshfs -o allow_other,default_permissions dandv@10.15.x.x:/ /mnt/remote-machine
      $ cp -rp /mnt/remote-machine/path/to/files ./
      $ # ... or use another file manager


      Copying from the mounted path also enabled Midnight Commander to preserve the timestamps (but didn't help BeyondCompare).






      share|improve this answer


























        0












        0








        0







        Turns out that preserving timestamps for files and directories is still a problem in 2019! I was copying files from an Ubuntu 16 machine to an Ubuntu 18 one over SFTP, using Nautilus on the Ubuntu 18, and all files had the current timestamp, but directories had the original timestamps. Other tools failed as well:




        • BeyondCompare did not preserve the timestamps of directories


        • DoubleCommander gave random errors throughout the copying process (no other tool did that; both machines use SSDs and are on the local Wi-Fi)

        • Midnight Commander lost the timestamps for both files and directories


        What did work was to mount the remote filesystem using sshfs:



        $ sudo mkdir /mnt/remote-machine
        $ sudo sshfs -o allow_other,default_permissions dandv@10.15.x.x:/ /mnt/remote-machine
        $ cp -rp /mnt/remote-machine/path/to/files ./
        $ # ... or use another file manager


        Copying from the mounted path also enabled Midnight Commander to preserve the timestamps (but didn't help BeyondCompare).






        share|improve this answer













        Turns out that preserving timestamps for files and directories is still a problem in 2019! I was copying files from an Ubuntu 16 machine to an Ubuntu 18 one over SFTP, using Nautilus on the Ubuntu 18, and all files had the current timestamp, but directories had the original timestamps. Other tools failed as well:




        • BeyondCompare did not preserve the timestamps of directories


        • DoubleCommander gave random errors throughout the copying process (no other tool did that; both machines use SSDs and are on the local Wi-Fi)

        • Midnight Commander lost the timestamps for both files and directories


        What did work was to mount the remote filesystem using sshfs:



        $ sudo mkdir /mnt/remote-machine
        $ sudo sshfs -o allow_other,default_permissions dandv@10.15.x.x:/ /mnt/remote-machine
        $ cp -rp /mnt/remote-machine/path/to/files ./
        $ # ... or use another file manager


        Copying from the mounted path also enabled Midnight Commander to preserve the timestamps (but didn't help BeyondCompare).







        share|improve this answer












        share|improve this answer



        share|improve this answer










        answered Jan 5 at 12:30









        Dan DascalescuDan Dascalescu

        1,08421636




        1,08421636






























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