What does hg copy do?

Question

We recently did a hg copy of a directory in our repository. We thought it does something like cp -a and hg add and maybe flag somehow

Answer 1

How do I unflag the file as being a copy of another file?

If you revert a hg copy, the copied-to file remains in your working directory afterwards, untracked. You just have to add it normally. The copied-from file isn't affected at all.

% hg copy file new-file
% hg status -C
A new-file
__file
% hg revert new-file
% hg add new-file
% hg status -C
A new-file

Reference: Mercurial: The definitive guide