INSTALL(1)

NAME
install - install binaries

SYNOPSIS
install [-bCclMpSsUv] [-B suffix] [-D destdir] [-f flags] [-g group] [-l linkflags] [-m mode] [-N dbdir] [-o owner] file1 file2
install [-bCclMpSsUv] [-B suffix] [-D destdir] [-f flags] [-g group] [-l linkflags] [-m mode] [-N dbdir] [-o owner] file1 ... fileN directory
install -d [-lUv] [-D destdir] [-g group] [-m mode] [-N dbdir] [-o owner] directory ...

DESCRIPTION
The file(s) are copied (or linked if the -l option is specified) to the target file or directory. If the destination is a directory, then the file is copied into directory with its original filename. If the target file already exists, it is either renamed to file.old if the -b option is given or overwritten if permissions allow. An alternate backup suffix may be specified via the -B option's argument.

The options are as follows:

-b  Back up any existing files before overwriting them by renaming them to file.old. See -B for specifying a different backup suffix.

-B suffix
    Use suffix as the backup suffix if -b is given.

-C  Copy the file. If the target file already exists and the files are the same, then don't change the modification time of the target.

-c  Copy the file. This is actually the default. The -c option is only included for backwards compatibility.

-d  Create directories. Missing parent directories are created as required.

-D destdir
    Specify the DESTDIR (top of the file hierarchy) that the items are installed into. This option is implemented for compatibility with the NetBSD version of install and does nothing.

-f  Specify the target's file flags; see chflags(1) for a list of possible flags and their meanings.

-g  Specify a group. A numeric GID is allowed.

-l linkflags
    Instead of copying the file make a link to the source. The type of the link is determined by the linkflags argument. Valid linkflags are: a (absolute), r (relative), h (hard), s (symbolic), m (mixed). Absolute and relative have effect only for symbolic links. Mixed links are hard links for files on the same filesystem, symbolic otherwise.

-M  Disable all use of mmap(2).

-m  Specify an alternate mode. The default mode is set to rwxr-xr-x (0755). The specified mode may be either an octal or symbolic value; see chmod(1) for a description of possible mode values.

-N  Use the user database text file master.passwd and group database text file group from dbdir, rather than using the results from the system's getpwnam(3) and getgrnam(3) (and related) library calls.

-o  Specify an owner. A numeric UID is allowed.

-p  Preserve the modification time. Copy the file, as if the -C (compare and copy) option is specified, except if the target file doesn't already exist or is different, then preserve the modification time of the file.

-S  Safe copy. Normally, install unlinks an existing target before installing the new file. With the -S flag a temporary file is used and then renamed to be the target. The reason this is safer is that if the copy or rename fails, the existing target is left untouched.

-s  install exec's the command strip(1) to strip binaries so that install can be portable over a large number of systems and binary types.

-U  Indicate that install is running unprivileged, and that it should not try to change the owner, the group, or the file flags of the destination.

-v  Cause install to be verbose, showing files as they are installed or backed up.

By default, install preserves all file flags, with the exception of the “nodump” flag.

The install utility attempts to prevent moving a file onto itself.

Installing /dev/null creates an empty file.

ENVIRONMENT
The install utility checks for the presence of the STRIPBIN environment variable and if present, uses the assigned value as the program to run if and when the -s option has been specified.

If the DONTSTRIP environment variable is present, install will ignore any specification of the -s option. This is mainly for use in debugging the DragonFly dports(7) collection.

FILES
INS@XXXX
    If either -S option is specified, or the -C or -p option is used in conjunction with the -s option, temporary files named INS@XXXX, where XXXX is decided by mkstemp(3), are created in the target directory.

EXIT STATUS

COMPATIBILITY
Historically install moved files by default. The default was changed to copy in FreeBSD 4.4.

SEE ALSO
chflags(1), chgrp(1), chmod(1), cp(1), mv(1), strip(1), mmap(2), getgrnam(3), getpwnam(3), chown(8)

HISTORY
The install utility appeared in 4.2BSD.

BUGS
Temporary files may be left in the target directory if install exits abnormally.

File flags cannot be set by fchflags(2) over a NFS filesystem. Other filesystems do not have a concept of flags. The install utility will only warn when flags could not be set on a filesystem that does not support them.

The install utility with -v falsely says a file is copied when -C snaps hard links.