cp

Copy files and directories to and from containers

Copy files and directories to and from containers.

Command

  1. $ kubectl cp <file-spec-src> <file-spec-dest>

Example

Current State

files in local machine. Also notice a file named simple.txt which is about to be copied to a pod named nginx-6db489d4b7-qkd5d

  1. $ ls -l
  3. total 8
  4. drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Mar  1  2020 Desktop
  5. -rw-r--r-- 1 root root    6 Sep 21 03:51 simple.txt

files in a pod named nginx-6db489d4b7-qkd5d

  1. $ kubectl exec nginx-6db489d4b7-qkd5d -- ls -al
  3. total 84
  4. drwxr-xr-x   1 root root 4096 Sep 21 03:17 .
  5. drwxr-xr-x   1 root root 4096 Sep 21 03:17 ..
  6. -rwxr-xr-x   1 root root    0 Sep 21 03:17 .dockerenv
  7. drwxr-xr-x   2 root root 4096 Sep  8 07:00 bin
  8. drwxr-xr-x   2 root root 4096 Jul 10 21:04 boot
  9. drwxr-xr-x   5 root root  360 Sep 21 03:17 dev
  10. ...
  11. drwxr-xr-x  10 root root 4096 Sep  8 07:00 usr
  12. drwxr-xr-x   1 root root 4096 Sep  8 07:00 var

Command

  1. kubectl cp simple.txt nginx-6db489d4b7-qkd5d:.

Notice the . followed by nginx-6db489d4b7-qkd5d: this specifies the current directory .i.e., root, if you want to copy the file to another directory - you can use absolute path to paste it there.

Example: If you would like to copy simple.txt to /temp then use command

  1. kubectl cp simple.txt nginx-6db489d4b7-qkd5d:./temp

Output

  1. $ kubectl exec nginx-6db489d4b7-qkd5d -- ls -al
  3. total 84
  4. drwxr-xr-x   1 root root 4096 Sep 21 03:17 .
  5. drwxr-xr-x   1 root root 4096 Sep 21 03:17 ..
  6. -rwxr-xr-x   1 root root    0 Sep 21 03:17 .dockerenv
  7. ...
  8. -rw-r--r--   1 root root    6 Sep 21 03:54 simple.txt
  9. ...
  10. drwxr-xr-x  10 root root 4096 Sep  8 07:00 usr
  11. drwxr-xr-x   1 root root 4096 Sep  8 07:00 var

Install Tar

Copy requires that tar be installed in the container image.

Local to Remote

Copy a local file to a remote Pod in a cluster.

  • Local file format is <path>
  • Remote file format is <pod-name>:<path>
  1. kubectl cp /tmp/foo_dir <some-pod>:/tmp/bar_dir

Remote to Local

Copy a remote file from a Pod to a local file.

  • Local file format is <path>
  • Remote file format is <pod-name>:<path>
  1. kubectl cp <some-pod>:/tmp/foo /tmp/bar

Specify the Container

Specify the Container within a Pod running multiple containers.

  • -c <container-name>
  1. kubectl cp /tmp/foo <some-pod>:/tmp/bar -c <specific-container>

Namespaces

Set the Pod namespace by prefixing the Pod name with <namespace>/ .

  • <pod-namespace>/<pod-name>:<path>
  1. kubectl cp /tmp/foo <some-namespace>/<some-pod>:/tmp/bar