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1 | mailto(rsync-bugs@samba.anu.edu.au) |
2 | manpage(rsync)(1)(13 May 1998)()() | |
3 | manpagename(rsync)(faster, flexible replacement for rcp) | |
4 | manpagesynopsis() | |
5 | ||
6 | rsync [options] [user@]host:path path | |
7 | ||
8 | rsync [options] path [user@]host:path | |
9 | ||
10 | rsync [options] path path | |
11 | ||
12 | rsync [options] [user@]host::path path | |
13 | ||
14 | rsync [options] path [user@]host::path | |
15 | ||
16 | manpagedescription() | |
17 | ||
18 | rsync is a program that behaves in much the same way that rcp does, | |
19 | but has many more options and uses the rsync remote-update protocol to | |
20 | greatly speedup file transfers when the destination file already | |
21 | exists. | |
22 | ||
23 | The rsync remote-update protocol allows rsync to transfer just the | |
24 | differences between two sets of files across the network link, using | |
25 | an efficient checksum-search algorithm described in the technical | |
26 | report that accompanies this package. | |
27 | ||
28 | Some of the additional features of rsync are: | |
29 | ||
30 | itemize( | |
31 | it() support for copying links, devices, owners, groups and permissions | |
32 | it() exclude and exclude-from options similar to GNU tar | |
33 | it() a CVS exclude mode for ignoring the same files that CVS would ignore | |
34 | it() can use any transparent remote shell, including rsh or ssh | |
35 | it() does not require root privileges | |
36 | it() pipelining of file transfers to minimize latency costs | |
37 | it() support for anonymous or authenticated rsync servers (ideal for | |
38 | mirroring) | |
39 | ) | |
40 | ||
41 | manpagesection(GENERAL) | |
42 | ||
43 | There are five different ways of using rsync. They are: | |
44 | ||
45 | itemize( | |
46 | it() for copying local files. This is invoked when neither | |
47 | source nor destination path contains a : separator | |
48 | ||
49 | it() for copying from the local machine to a remote machine using | |
50 | a remote shell program as the transport (such as rsh or | |
51 | ssh). This is invoked when the destination path contains a | |
52 | single : separator. | |
53 | ||
54 | it() for copying from a remote machine to the local machine | |
55 | using a remote shell program. This is invoked when the local path | |
56 | contains a : separator. | |
57 | ||
58 | it() for copying from a remote rsync server to the local | |
59 | machine. This is invoked when the source path contains a :: | |
60 | separator. | |
61 | ||
62 | it() for copying from the local machine to a remote rsync | |
63 | server. This is invoked when the destination path contains a :: | |
64 | separator. | |
65 | ) | |
66 | ||
67 | Note that in all cases at least one of the source and destination | |
68 | paths must be local. | |
69 | ||
70 | manpagesection(SETUP) | |
71 | ||
72 | See the file README for installation instructions. | |
73 | ||
74 | Once installed you can use rsync to any machine that you can use rsh | |
75 | to. rsync uses rsh for its communications, unless both the source and | |
76 | destination are local. | |
77 | ||
78 | You can also specify a alternative to rsh, by either using the -e | |
79 | command line option, or by setting the RSYNC_RSH environment variable. | |
80 | ||
81 | One common substitute is to use ssh, which offers a high degree of | |
82 | security. | |
83 | ||
84 | manpagesection(USAGE) | |
85 | ||
86 | You use rsync in the same way you use rcp. You must specify a source | |
87 | and a destination, one of which may be remote. | |
88 | ||
89 | Perhaps the best way to explain the syntax is some examples: | |
90 | ||
91 | quote(rsync *.c foo:src/) | |
92 | ||
93 | this would transfer all files matching the pattern *.c from the | |
94 | current directory to the directory src on the machine foo. If any of | |
95 | the files already exist on the remote system then the rsync | |
96 | remote-update protocol is used to update the file by sending only the | |
97 | differences. See the tech report for details. | |
98 | ||
99 | quote(rsync -avz foo:src/bar /data/tmp) | |
100 | ||
101 | recursively transfer all files from the directory src/bar on the | |
102 | machine foo into the /data/tmp/bar directory on the local machine. The | |
103 | files are transferred in "archive" mode, which ensures that symbolic | |
104 | links, devices, attributes, permissions, ownerships etc are preserved | |
105 | in the transfer. Additionally compression will be used to reduce the | |
106 | size of data portions of the transfer. | |
107 | ||
108 | quote(rsync -avz foo:src/bar/ /data/tmp) | |
109 | ||
110 | With a trailing slash on the source this behavior changes to transfer | |
111 | all files from the directory src/bar on the machine foo into the | |
112 | /data/tmp/. With a trailing / on a source name it means "copy the | |
113 | contents of this directory". Without a trailing slash it means "copy | |
114 | the directory". This difference becomes particularly important when | |
115 | using the --delete option. | |
116 | ||
117 | You can also use rsync in local-only mode, where both the source and | |
118 | destination don't have a ':' in the name. In this case it behaves like | |
119 | an improved copy command. | |
120 | ||
121 | ||
122 | manpagesection(CONNECTING TO AN RSYNC SERVER) | |
123 | ||
124 | It is also possible to use rsync without using rsh or ssh as the | |
125 | transport. In this case you will connect to a remote rsync server | |
126 | running on TCP port 873. | |
127 | ||
128 | Using rsync in this was is the same as using it with rsh or ssh except | |
129 | that: | |
130 | ||
131 | itemize( | |
132 | it() you use a double colon :: instead of a single colon to | |
133 | separate the hostname from the path. | |
134 | ||
135 | it() the remote server may print a message of the day when you | |
136 | connect | |
137 | ||
138 | it() if you specify no path name on the remote server then the | |
139 | list of accessible paths on the server will be shown. | |
140 | ) | |
141 | ||
142 | manpagesection(RUNNING AN RSYNC SERVER) | |
143 | ||
144 | An rsync server is configured using a config file which by default is | |
145 | called /etc/rsyncd.conf. Please see the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more | |
146 | information. | |
147 | ||
148 | manpagesection(EXAMPLES) | |
149 | ||
150 | Here are some examples of how I use rsync. | |
151 | ||
152 | To backup my wife's home directory, which consists of large MS word | |
153 | files and mail folders I use a cron job that runs | |
154 | ||
155 | quote(rsync -Cavz . arvidsjaur:backup) | |
156 | ||
157 | each night over a PPP link to a duplicate directory on my machine | |
158 | "arvidsjaur". | |
159 | ||
160 | To synchronize my samba source trees I use the following Makefile | |
161 | targets: | |
162 | ||
163 | quote( get:nl() | |
164 | rsync -avuzb --exclude '*~' samba:samba/ . | |
165 | ||
166 | put:nl() | |
167 | rsync -Cavuzb . samba:samba/ | |
168 | ||
169 | sync: get put) | |
170 | ||
171 | this allows me to sync with a CVS directory at the other end of the | |
172 | link. I then do cvs operations on the remote machine, which saves a | |
173 | lot of time as the remote cvs protocol isn't very efficient. | |
174 | ||
175 | I mirror a directory between my "old" and "new" ftp sites with the | |
176 | command | |
177 | ||
178 | quote(rsync -az -e ssh --delete ~ftp/pub/samba/ nimbus:"~ftp/pub/tridge/samba") | |
179 | ||
180 | this is launched from cron every few hours. | |
181 | ||
182 | manpageoptions() | |
183 | ||
184 | rsync uses the GNU long options package. Many of the command line | |
185 | options have two variants, one short and one long. These are shown | |
186 | below separated by commas. Some options only have a long variant. | |
187 | ||
188 | startdit() | |
189 | dit(bf(-h, --help)) Print a short help page describing the options | |
190 | available in rsync | |
191 | ||
192 | dit(bf(--version)) print the rsync version number and exit | |
193 | ||
194 | dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information you | |
195 | are given during the transfer. By default rsync works silently. A | |
196 | single -v will give you information about what files are being | |
197 | transferred and a brief summary at the end. Two -v flags will give you | |
198 | information on what files are being skipped and slightly more | |
199 | information at the end. More than two -v flags should only be used if | |
200 | you are debugging rsync | |
201 | ||
202 | dit(bf(-I, --ignore-times)) Normally rsync will skip any files that are | |
203 | already the same length and have the same time-stamp. This option turns | |
204 | off this behavior. | |
205 | ||
206 | dit(bf(-c, --checksum)) This forces the sender to checksum all files using | |
207 | a 128-bit MD4 checksum before transfer. The checksum is then | |
208 | explicitly checked on the receiver and any files of the same name | |
209 | which already exist and have the same checksum and size on the | |
210 | receiver are skipped. This option can be quite slow. | |
211 | ||
212 | dit(bf(-a, --archive)) This is equivalent to -rlptDog. It is a quick way | |
213 | of saying I want recursion and want to preserve everything. | |
214 | ||
215 | dit(bf(-r, --recursive)) This tells rsync to copy directories recursively | |
216 | ||
217 | dit(bf(-R, --relative)) Use relative paths. This means that the full path | |
218 | names specified on the command line are sent to the server rather than | |
219 | just the last parts of the filenames. This is particularly useful when | |
220 | you want to sent several different directories at the same time. For | |
221 | example if you used the command | |
222 | ||
223 | verb(rsync foo/bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/) | |
224 | ||
225 | then this would create a file called foo.c in /tmp/ on the remote | |
226 | machine. If instead you used | |
227 | ||
228 | verb(rsync -R foo/bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/) | |
229 | ||
230 | then a file called /tmp/foo/bar/foo.c would be created on the remote | |
231 | machine. The full path name is preserved. | |
232 | ||
233 | dit(bf(-b, --backup)) With this option preexisting destination files are | |
234 | renamed with a ~ extension as each file is transferred. You can | |
235 | control the backup suffix using the --suffix option. | |
236 | ||
237 | dit(bf(-u, --update)) This forces rsync to skip any files for which the | |
238 | destination file already exists and has a date later than the source | |
239 | file. | |
240 | ||
241 | dit(bf(-l, --links)) This tells rsync to recreate symbolic links on the | |
242 | remote system to be the same as the local system. Without this | |
243 | option all symbolic links are skipped. | |
244 | ||
245 | dit(bf(-L, --copy-links)) This tells rsync to treat symbolic links just | |
246 | like ordinary files. | |
247 | ||
248 | dit(bf(-H, --hard-links)) This tells rsync to recreate hard links on | |
249 | the remote system to be the same as the local system. Without this | |
250 | option hard links are treated like regular files. | |
251 | ||
252 | Note that rsync can only detect hard links if both parts of the link | |
253 | are in the list of files being sent. | |
254 | ||
255 | This option can be quite slow, so only use it if you need it. | |
256 | ||
257 | dit(bf(-W, --whole-file)) With this option the incremental rsync algorithm | |
258 | is not used and the whole file is sent as-is instead. This may be | |
259 | useful when using rsync with a local machine. | |
260 | ||
261 | dit(bf(-p, --perms)) This option causes rsync to update the remote | |
262 | permissions to be the same as the local permissions. | |
263 | ||
264 | dit(bf(-o, --owner)) This option causes rsync to update the remote owner | |
265 | of the file to be the same as the local owner. This is only available | |
266 | to the super-user. | |
267 | ||
268 | dit(bf(-g, --group)) This option causes rsync to update the remote group | |
269 | of the file to be the same as the local group. | |
270 | ||
271 | dit(bf(-D, --devices)) This option causes rsync to transfer character and | |
272 | block device information to the remote system to recreate these | |
273 | devices. This option is only available to the super-user. | |
274 | ||
275 | dit(bf(-t, --times)) This tells rsync to transfer modification times along | |
276 | with the files and update them on the remote system | |
277 | ||
278 | dit(bf(-n, --dry-run)) This tells rsync to not do any file transfers, | |
279 | instead it will just report the actions it would have taken. | |
280 | ||
281 | dit(bf(-S, --sparse)) Try to handle sparse files efficiently so they take | |
282 | up less space on the destination. | |
283 | ||
284 | dit(bf(-x, --one-file-system)) This tells rsync not to cross filesystem | |
285 | boundaries when recursing. This is useful for transferring the | |
286 | contents of only one filesystem. | |
287 | ||
288 | dit(bf(--delete)) This tells rsync to delete any files on the receiving | |
289 | side that aren't on the sending side. This option can be dangerous if | |
290 | used incorrectly! | |
291 | ||
292 | It is a very good idea to run first using the dry run option (-n) to | |
293 | see what files would be deleted to make sure important files aren't | |
294 | listed. | |
295 | ||
296 | rsync 1.6.4 changed the behavior of --delete to make it less | |
297 | dangerous. rsync now only scans directories on the receiving side | |
298 | that are explicitly transferred from the sending side. Only files in | |
299 | these directories are deleted. | |
300 | ||
301 | Still, it is probably easy to get burnt with this option. The moral | |
302 | of the story is to use the -n option until you get used to the | |
303 | behavior of --delete. | |
304 | ||
305 | NOTE: It also may delete files on the destination if the sending side | |
306 | can't open them or stat them. This is a bug that hopefully will be | |
307 | fixed in a future release. | |
308 | ||
309 | dit(bf(--force)) This options tells rsync to delete directories even if | |
310 | they are not empty. This applies to both the --delete option and to | |
311 | cases where rsync tries to copy a normal file but the destination | |
312 | contains a directory of the same name. Normally rsync will refuse to | |
313 | do a recursive directory deletion in such cases, by using --force | |
314 | the recursive deletion will be done. | |
315 | ||
316 | Use this option with caution! | |
317 | ||
318 | dit(bf(-B , --block_size BLOCKSIZE)) This controls the block size used in | |
319 | the rsync algorithm. See the technical report for details. | |
320 | ||
321 | dit(bf(-e, --rsh COMMAND)) This option allows you to choose an alternative | |
322 | remote shell program to use for communication between the local and | |
323 | remote copies of rsync. By default rsync will use rsh, but you may | |
324 | like to instead use ssh because of its high security. | |
325 | ||
326 | You can also choose the remote shell program using the RSYNC_RSH | |
327 | environment variable. | |
328 | ||
329 | dit(bf(--rsync-path PATH)) Use this to specify the path to the copy of | |
330 | rsync on the remote machine. Useful when its not in your path. | |
331 | ||
332 | dit(bf(--exclude FILE)) This option allows you to selectively exclude | |
333 | certain files from the list of files to be transferred. This is most | |
334 | useful in combination with a recursive transfer. | |
335 | ||
336 | The option FILE can either be a file name or a shell wildcard | |
337 | expression. If it is a directory name then rsync will not recurse into | |
338 | directories of that name. | |
339 | ||
340 | You may use as many --exclude options on the command line as you like | |
341 | to build up the list of files to exclude. | |
342 | ||
343 | If the filename is a single ! then the exclude list is reset. | |
344 | ||
345 | dit(bf(--exclude-from FILE)) This option is similar to the --exclude | |
346 | option, but instead it adds all filenames listed in the file FILE to | |
347 | the exclude list. | |
348 | ||
349 | dit(bf(-C, --cvs-exclude)) This is a useful shorthand for excluding a | |
350 | broad range of files that you often don't want to transfer between | |
351 | systems. It uses the same algorithm that CVS uses to determine if | |
352 | a file should be ignored. | |
353 | ||
354 | The exclude list is initialized to: | |
355 | ||
356 | quote(RCS SCCS CVS CVS.adm RCSLOG cvslog.* tags TAGS .make.state | |
357 | .nse_depinfo *~ #* .#* ,* *.old *.bak *.BAK *.orig *.rej .del-* | |
358 | *.a *.o *.obj *.so *.Z *.elc *.ln core) | |
359 | ||
360 | then files listed in a $HOME/.cvsignore are added to the list and any | |
361 | files listed in the CVSIGNORE environment variable (space delimited). | |
362 | ||
363 | Finally in each directory any files listed in the .cvsignore file in | |
364 | that directory are added to the list. | |
365 | ||
366 | dit(bf(--suffix SUFFIX)) This option allows you to override the default | |
367 | backup suffix used with the -b option. The default is a ~. | |
368 | ||
369 | dit(bf(--csum-length LENGTH)) By default the primary checksum used in | |
370 | rsync is a very strong 16 byte MD4 checksum. In most cases you will | |
371 | find that a truncated version of this checksum is quite efficient, and | |
372 | this will decrease the size of the checksum data sent over the link, | |
373 | making things faster. | |
374 | ||
375 | You can choose the number of bytes in the truncated checksum using the | |
376 | --csum-length option. Any value less than or equal to 16 is valid. | |
377 | ||
378 | Note that if you use this option then you run the risk of ending up | |
379 | with an incorrect target file. The risk with a value of 16 is | |
380 | microscopic and can be safely ignored (the universe will probably end | |
381 | before it fails) but with smaller values the risk is higher. | |
382 | ||
383 | dit(bf(-T, --temp-dir DIR)) This options instructs rsync to use DIR as a | |
384 | scratch directory when creating a temporary copies of the files | |
385 | transferred on the receiving side. The default behavior is to create | |
386 | the temporary files in the receiving directory. | |
387 | ||
388 | dit(bf(-z, --compress)) With this option, rsync compresses any data from | |
389 | the source file(s) which it sends to the destination machine. This | |
390 | option is useful on slow links. The compression method used is the | |
391 | same method that gzip uses. | |
392 | ||
393 | Note this this option typically achieves better compression ratios | |
394 | that can be achieved by using a compressing remote shell, or a | |
395 | compressing transport, as it takes advantage of the implicit | |
396 | information sent for matching data blocks. | |
397 | ||
398 | dit(bf(--numeric-ids)) With this option rsync will transfer numeric group | |
399 | and user ids rather than using user and group names and mapping them | |
400 | at both ends. | |
401 | ||
402 | By default rsync will use the user name and group name to determine | |
403 | what ownership to give files. The special uid 0 and the special group | |
404 | 0 and never mapped via user/group names even if the --numeric-ids | |
405 | option is not specified. | |
406 | ||
407 | If a user or group name does not exist on the destination system then | |
408 | the numeric id from the source system is used instead. | |
409 | ||
410 | dit(bf(--timeout)) This option allows you to set a maximum IO timeout in | |
411 | seconds. If no data is transferred for the specified time then rsync | |
412 | will exit. The default is 0, which means no timeout. | |
413 | ||
414 | dit(bf(--daemon)) This tells rsync that it is to run as a rsync | |
415 | daemon. If standard input is a socket then rsync will assume that it | |
416 | is being run via inetd, otherwise it will detach from the current | |
417 | terminal and become a background daemon. The dameon will read the | |
418 | config file (/etc/rsyncd.conf) on each connect made by a client and | |
419 | respond to requests accordingly. See the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more | |
420 | details. | |
421 | ||
422 | dit(bf(--config FILE)) This specifies an alternate config file than | |
423 | the default /etc/rsyncd.conf. This is only relevent when --daemon is | |
424 | specified. | |
425 | ||
426 | dit(bf(--port PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number to use | |
427 | rather than the default port 873. | |
428 | ||
429 | enddit() | |
430 | ||
431 | manpagefiles() | |
432 | ||
433 | /etc/rsyncd.conf | |
434 | ||
435 | manpageseealso() | |
436 | ||
437 | rsyncd.conf(5) | |
438 | ||
439 | manpagediagnostics() | |
440 | ||
441 | manpagebugs() | |
442 | ||
443 | times are transferred as unix time_t values | |
444 | ||
445 | file permissions, devices etc are transferred as native numerical | |
446 | values | |
447 | ||
448 | see also the comments on the -delete option | |
449 | ||
450 | Please report bugs! The rsync bug tracking system is online at | |
451 | url(http://samba.anu.edu.au/rsync/)(http://samba.anu.edu.au/rsync/) | |
452 | ||
453 | manpagesection(VERSION) | |
454 | This man page is current for version 2.0 of rsync | |
455 | ||
456 | manpagesection(CREDITS) | |
457 | ||
458 | rsync is distributed under the GNU public license. See the file | |
459 | COPYING for details. | |
460 | ||
461 | The primary ftp site for rsync is | |
462 | url(ftp://samba.anu.edu.au/pub/rsync)(ftp://samba.anu.edu.au/pub/rsync). | |
463 | ||
464 | A WEB site is available at | |
465 | url(http://samba.anu.edu.au/rsync/)(http://samba.anu.edu.au/rsync/) | |
466 | ||
467 | We would be delighted to hear from you if you like this program. | |
468 | ||
469 | This program uses the zlib compression library written by Jean-loup | |
470 | Gailly and Mark Adler. | |
471 | ||
472 | manpagesection(THANKS) | |
473 | ||
474 | Thanks to Richard Brent, Brendan Mackay, Bill Waite, Stephen Rothwell | |
475 | and David Bell for helpful suggestions and testing of rsync. I've | |
476 | probably missed some people, my apologies if I have. | |
477 | ||
478 | ||
479 | manpageauthor() | |
480 | ||
481 | rsync was written by Andrew Tridgell and Paul Mackerras. They may be | |
482 | contacted via email at tridge@samba.anu.edu.au and | |
483 | Paul.Mackerras@cs.anu.edu.au | |
484 |