cpio will exit with one of the following values:
0
All files were processed successfully.
Whenever
cpio cannot create a file or a link when extracting an archive or cannot find a file while writing an archive, or cannot preserve the user ID, group ID, file mode, or access and modification times when the
-p option is specified, a diagnostic message is written to standard error and a non-zero exit value will be returned, but processing will continue. In the case where
cpio cannot create a link to a file,
cpio will not create a second copy of the file.
If the extraction of a file from an archive is prematurely terminated by a signal or error,
cpio may have only partially extracted the file the user wanted. Additionally, the file modes of extracted files and directories may have incorrect file bits, and the modification and access times may be wrong.
If the creation of an archive is prematurely terminated by a signal or error,
cpio may have only partially created the archive which may violate the specific archive format specification.