I am looking for a way to start a file copy or move from the command line (i.e. a script). Of course, I can use cp and mv, but I would like to bring up the file operations dialog (I use gnome 2.22.1) that shows a progress bar. This would be very useful, because the script is designed to work from the nautilus right-click menu and it operates on very large video files. Opening the file operations dialog would make it integrate seamlessly into the desktop environement. In addition, not knowing how much time the operation will take is a major nuisance.

GNOME actually comes with a command-line utility that lets shell scripts use GNOME file choosers, progress bars etc., called "zenity". The man page for zenity gives some examples of how to use it.

Thanks for the tip. I had a look at zenity and it seems simple enough, I'll be using it in a few other scripts. In this case however, the problem is that mv and cp have no way to report progress while copying the file, and therefore zenity can't make a dialog.