cp – cannot create regular file : permission denied (root): Solution to FIX the issue

Here is the complete solution to fix the unexpected error cp – cannot create regular file : permission denied even when the user is logged into ubuntu or other linux server as root.

[root@server]# sudo cp /home/login.css /usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img
cp: cannot create regular file ‘/usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img/login.css’: Permission denied
[root@server]# sudo cp -f /home/login.css /usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img
cp: cannot remove ‘/usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img/login.css’: Permission denied

Solution to fix the error ‘cp – cannot create regular file : permission denied’

First you need to know whether you are a superuser or user with root level permission.

Check if you are really superuser with:

whoami

if the output is root, then you are superuser and you can make the copy of the file with:

cp -f /home/login.css /usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img

otherwise you have to use sudo:

sudo cp -f /home/login.css /usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img

However in the above actual case the user is logged in as root, but cannot copy. So in this case you can skip the above steps and try the below steps.

1. the directory has the immutable flag enabled. check with lsattr.
2. the directory is mounted with read-only permissions: type in terminal:cat /proc/mounts (or mount or cat /etc/mtab)and check the output, if directory is mounted read-only.

If you are in the first case, change the directory attributes with chattr;

• remove immutable flag on file or directory chattr -i <file/dir>
• adding immutable flag on file or directory again chattr +i <file/dir>

Quick Fix: cp – cannot create regular file : permission denied

Follow the procedure for a quick fix for the permission denied issue like this “cp – cannot create regular file : permission denied”. More details are given above. Let’s solve it fast.

If you take the actual case as an example, then try the following as superuser or root.

chattr -i /usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img/
chattr -i /usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img/login.css
sudo cp -f /home/login.css /usr/local/itplore/htdocs/admin/design/img

If you’re in the latter case, edit the file /etc/fstab as given above on this page.

If this helps to solve your permission denied issue, please share it.

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