Well, scp seems to be one of those commands that works really well for a defined and limited set of operations, but never got moved to the point where it needed to solve all problems. Thus, it only handles symlinks one way (it de-references them all), so if you have self-referential symlinks or anything else like that it will do the Wrong Thing.
So, I still use it all the time, but if I need to copy anything more complicated than a single directory I usually use rsync over ssh, which is much more efficient in the case where some portion of the files are already there. I don't know how bad rsync is against scp or some other method when none of the files exist on the remote system, but most of my transfers are bandwidth-limited to about 80kB/sec so I hardly imagine it matters.
So unless you're trying to copy symlinks or otherwise map the semantics of one file system on to another, you should be fine.
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So, I still use it all the time, but if I need to copy anything more complicated than a single directory I usually use rsync over ssh, which is much more efficient in the case where some portion of the files are already there. I don't know how bad rsync is against scp or some other method when none of the files exist on the remote system, but most of my transfers are bandwidth-limited to about 80kB/sec so I hardly imagine it matters.
So unless you're trying to copy symlinks or otherwise map the semantics of one file system on to another, you should be fine.
-Peter
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*sigh* I don't know what any of that means (not true, I know what ssh and "self-referential", and doing the "Wrong Thing" is).
But mostly, my reply was snotty. Stupid internet and its sarcasm scrambler.
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Go take a ride before the storms hit!
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