Barry: I think it has specifically to do with root, and hgfs not allowing you to set root ownership on hgfs. examine this: cro@ubuntu:~$ touch test2 cro@ubuntu:~$ cp -p test2 /mnt/hgfs/cro/Documents/ cro@ubuntu:~$ sudo touch test3 cro@ubuntu:~$ sudo cp -p test3 /mnt/hgfs/cro/Documents/ cp: failed to preserve ownership for '/mnt/hgfs/cro/Documents/test3': Operation not permitted cro@ubuntu:~$ sudo touch test4 cro@ubuntu:~$ sudo cp --preserve=mode,ownership test4 /mnt/hgfs/cro/Documents/ cp: failed to preserve ownership for '/mnt/hgfs/cro/Documents/test4': Operation not permitted cro@ubuntu:~$ ask you can see, -p works fine for a normal user... I would recommend just dropping it. I'm not sure what the added benefit of '-p' is in a practical sense.... If the permissions in question were a priority for the the user, than that user should select umasks and filesystems appropriately.. I think the default functionality of `cp' simply does the right thing... On Tue, Dec 13, 2016 at 3:30 PM Barry Warsaw