If someone (i.e. my VPS provider), does the following command, how can I from my ssh know if the copy is complete? Thanks
cp /home/abc/hugeDir /home/cba
You can just check the process list:
ps aux | grep cp
If the prcoess is finished, it will vanish from the list.
Use md5deep on the source directory and when they tell you the copy is complete use it on the destination directory, the output hash should be the same.
There are many approaches; however, I find one to be very easy and simple to apply.
I recommend to use rsync and start a data transfer; if no files are copied, the initial copy must have been complete.
Example command:
rsync -Hav --progress /home/abc/hugeDir /home/cba
If you want to know what the options mean simply type in "man rsync".
If you know how much they are supposed to transfer you can watch du -hs /path/to/target/dir
to see when it reaches the right size.
cp
command is visible to all users, unless the admin has enabled obfuscations.