Repository navigation
cpSync fails with ENOENT when copying symlinks into non-existent directories #28997
Description
Title: cpSync fails with ENOENT when copying symlinks into non-existent directories
cpSync with recursive: true fails when the source is a symlink and the destination's parent directory doesn't exist. Regular files work fine in the same scenario.
Reproduction
const { cpSync, symlinkSync, writeFileSync, rmSync, mkdirSync } = require("fs");
const dir = "/tmp/bun-cpsync-symlink";
rmSync(dir, { recursive: true, force: true });
mkdirSync(dir);
process.chdir(dir);
writeFileSync("target.md", "# Hello");
symlinkSync("target.md", "link.md");
// Regular file → works
cpSync("target.md", "out/target.md", { recursive: true });
// Symlink → ENOENT
cpSync("link.md", "out2/link.md", { recursive: true });ENOENT: no such file or directory, copyfile 'link.md'
Works fine with Node 25. Also works in Bun if you pre-create the parent dir, or pass dereference: true (which forces the JS fallback path).
Cause
The native Zig implementation in _copySingleFileSync (node_fs.zig) already handles ENOENT for regular files by creating parent directories and retrying. The symlink code paths skip this:
- macOS (~L6296): calls
copyfile()withCOPYFILE_NOFOLLOW_SRC, returns immediately on error - Linux (~L6410): calls
symlink(src, dest)directly, no parent dir creation
The JS fallback (cp-sync.ts) doesn't have this problem because checkParentDir() runs for all source types before dispatching.
Version
Bun 1.3.11, macOS 15.5 (arm64). Likely affects all platforms.
Activity
robobun commentedon Apr 8, 2026
🔄 Rebased onto main. Main refactored the Linux symlink path into a
_cpSymlinkhelper (that resolves relative link targets againstdirname(src), matching Node) and added a FreeBSD path using the same helper. The rebase conflict was innode_fs.zig; resolved by wrapping the_cpSymlinkcalls on Linux and FreeBSD with the sameENOENT → makePath → retryfallback I already had for the macOScopyfileand WindowsCreateSymbolicLinkWbranches.Gate:
0 pass / 2 fail,ENOENT: no such file or directory, symlinkat thecpSynccalls2 pass / 0 failForce-pushed
4068bc0013.fs: create parent dirs when cpSync copies a symlink
fs: create parent dirs when cpSync copies a symlink
davidpoblador commentedon May 13, 2026
v1.3.14 (released 2026-05-12) appears to ship fixes for both cpSync issues on Linux/FreeBSD — the symlink target resolution and the ENOENT when copying a symlink to a destination whose parent directory doesn't exist (https://bun.com/blog/bun-v1.3.14). Can this be closed?