Linux: copy and create destination dir if it does not exist

Question

I want a command (or probably an option to cp) that creates the destination directory if it does not exist.

Example:

cp -? file /path/to/copy/file/to/is/very/deep/there 

Answer 1

mkdir -p "$d" && cp file "$d" 

(there's no such option for cp).

Answer 2

If both of the following are true:

1. You are using the GNU version of cp (and not, for instance, the Mac version), and
2. You are copying from some existing directory structure and you just need it recreated

then you can do this with the --parents flag of cp. From the info page (viewable at http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/cp-invocation.html#cp-invocation or with info cp or man cp):

--parents      Form the name of each destination file by appending to the target      directory a slash and the specified name of the source file.  The      last argument given to `cp' must be the name of an existing      directory.  For example, the command:            cp --parents a/b/c existing_dir       copies the file `a/b/c' to `existing_dir/a/b/c', creating any      missing intermediate directories. 

Example:

/tmp $ mkdir foo /tmp $ mkdir foo/foo /tmp $ touch foo/foo/foo.txt /tmp $ mkdir bar /tmp $ cp --parents foo/foo/foo.txt bar /tmp $ ls bar/foo/foo foo.txt