How can I copy multiple files inside a bash script

Question

I want to know how can I copy or shell copy multiple files within a bash script. What I mean is that

cp /path/to/source/{file1,file2,file3} /path/to/dest

and

scp /path/to/source/{file1,file2,file3} user@host:/path/to/dest

will work fine but as example

#!/bin/sh
scp /path/to/source/{file1,file2,file3} user@host:/path/to/dest

will throw an error like this:

/path/to/source/{file1,file2,file3}: No such file or directory

If you will copy or shell copy a single file it works, so the problem are multiple files. Also it works if I would use * for all files but I do not want to copy all files. I should only copy selected files because in both folders are files with the same name but their content is different. Thereby to copy all files and then remove the not needed files would not work.

For better understanding following would work:

#!/bin/sh
scp /path/to/source/file1 user@host:/path/to/dest

Also following:

#!/bin/sh
scp /path/to/source/* user@host:/path/to/dest

So it has something to do with the correct use of { ... } for multiple files which will work inside the terminal but not if I run the bash script in it.

Thanks in advance.

//Edit:

I add the error if I try it with cp:

cp: cannot stat '/path/to/source/{file1,file2,file3}': No such file or directory

Answer 1

You have #!/bin/sh in your script which means it will be run by sh, not bash. On many Debian-derived systems, Ubuntu for example, /bin/sh is a symlink to the basic POSIX shell dash. The brace expansion you are using is not supported by dash:

$ dash
$ echo {foo,bar}
{foo,bar}

This means that the command cp /path/to/source/{file1,file2,file3} /path/to/dest is looking for a file called {file1,file2,file3}. The simple solution is to use bash instead. Just change your shebang line from #!/bin/sh to #!/bin/bash and you should be fine.