don't try to write errors to a dead socket
[rsync/rsync.git] / rsync.yo
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9e3c856a 1mailto(rsync-bugs@samba.org)
460f6b99 2manpage(rsync)(1)(1 Mar 1999)()()
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3manpagename(rsync)(faster, flexible replacement for rcp)
4manpagesynopsis()
5
9ef53907 6rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST:DEST
41059f75 7
9ef53907 8rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST:SRC DEST
41059f75 9
9ef53907 10rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... DEST
41059f75 11
9ef53907 12rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST::SRC [DEST]
41059f75 13
9ef53907 14rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST::DEST
41059f75 15
9ef53907 16rsync [OPTION]... rsync://[USER@]HOST[:PORT]/SRC [DEST]
039faa86 17
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18manpagedescription()
19
20rsync is a program that behaves in much the same way that rcp does,
21but has many more options and uses the rsync remote-update protocol to
22greatly speedup file transfers when the destination file already
23exists.
24
25The rsync remote-update protocol allows rsync to transfer just the
26differences between two sets of files across the network link, using
27an efficient checksum-search algorithm described in the technical
28report that accompanies this package.
29
30Some of the additional features of rsync are:
31
32itemize(
33 it() support for copying links, devices, owners, groups and permissions
34 it() exclude and exclude-from options similar to GNU tar
35 it() a CVS exclude mode for ignoring the same files that CVS would ignore
36 it() can use any transparent remote shell, including rsh or ssh
37 it() does not require root privileges
38 it() pipelining of file transfers to minimize latency costs
39 it() support for anonymous or authenticated rsync servers (ideal for
40 mirroring)
41)
42
43manpagesection(GENERAL)
44
039faa86 45There are six different ways of using rsync. They are:
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46
47itemize(
48 it() for copying local files. This is invoked when neither
49 source nor destination path contains a : separator
50
51 it() for copying from the local machine to a remote machine using
52 a remote shell program as the transport (such as rsh or
53 ssh). This is invoked when the destination path contains a
54 single : separator.
55
56 it() for copying from a remote machine to the local machine
6c7c2ef3 57 using a remote shell program. This is invoked when the source
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58 contains a : separator.
59
60 it() for copying from a remote rsync server to the local
61 machine. This is invoked when the source path contains a ::
946347b8 62 separator or a rsync:// URL.
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63
64 it() for copying from the local machine to a remote rsync
65 server. This is invoked when the destination path contains a ::
66 separator.
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67
68 it() for listing files on a remote machine. This is done the
69 same way as rsync transfers except that you leave off the
70 local destination.
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71)
72
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73Note that in all cases (other than listing) at least one of the source
74and destination paths must be local.
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75
76manpagesection(SETUP)
77
78See the file README for installation instructions.
79
80Once installed you can use rsync to any machine that you can use rsh
81to. rsync uses rsh for its communications, unless both the source and
82destination are local.
83
14d43f1f 84You can also specify an alternative to rsh, by either using the -e
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85command line option, or by setting the RSYNC_RSH environment variable.
86
87One common substitute is to use ssh, which offers a high degree of
88security.
89
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90Note that rsync must be installed on both the source and destination
91machines.
92
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93manpagesection(USAGE)
94
95You use rsync in the same way you use rcp. You must specify a source
96and a destination, one of which may be remote.
97
98Perhaps the best way to explain the syntax is some examples:
99
100quote(rsync *.c foo:src/)
101
102this would transfer all files matching the pattern *.c from the
103current directory to the directory src on the machine foo. If any of
104the files already exist on the remote system then the rsync
105remote-update protocol is used to update the file by sending only the
106differences. See the tech report for details.
107
108quote(rsync -avz foo:src/bar /data/tmp)
109
14d43f1f 110this would recursively transfer all files from the directory src/bar on the
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111machine foo into the /data/tmp/bar directory on the local machine. The
112files are transferred in "archive" mode, which ensures that symbolic
113links, devices, attributes, permissions, ownerships etc are preserved
14d43f1f 114in the transfer. Additionally, compression will be used to reduce the
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115size of data portions of the transfer.
116
117quote(rsync -avz foo:src/bar/ /data/tmp)
118
14d43f1f 119a trailing slash on the source changes this behavior to transfer
41059f75 120all files from the directory src/bar on the machine foo into the
14d43f1f 121/data/tmp/. A trailing / on a source name means "copy the
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122contents of this directory". Without a trailing slash it means "copy
123the directory". This difference becomes particularly important when
124using the --delete option.
125
126You can also use rsync in local-only mode, where both the source and
127destination don't have a ':' in the name. In this case it behaves like
128an improved copy command.
129
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130quote(rsync somehost.mydomain.com::)
131
132this would list all the anonymous rsync modules available on the host
133somehost.mydomain.com. (See the following section for more details.)
134
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135
136manpagesection(CONNECTING TO AN RSYNC SERVER)
137
138It is also possible to use rsync without using rsh or ssh as the
139transport. In this case you will connect to a remote rsync server
140running on TCP port 873.
141
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142You may establish the connetcion via a web proxy by setting the
143environment variable RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair pointing to
144your web proxy. Note that your web proxy must allow proxying to port
145873, this must be configured in your proxy servers ruleset.
146
14d43f1f 147Using rsync in this way is the same as using it with rsh or ssh except
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148that:
149
150itemize(
151 it() you use a double colon :: instead of a single colon to
152 separate the hostname from the path.
153
154 it() the remote server may print a message of the day when you
14d43f1f 155 connect.
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156
157 it() if you specify no path name on the remote server then the
158 list of accessible paths on the server will be shown.
14d43f1f 159
f7632fc6 160 it() if you specify no local destination then a listing of the
14d43f1f 161 specified files on the remote server is provided.
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162)
163
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164Some paths on the remote server may require authentication. If so then
165you will receive a password prompt when you connect. You can avoid the
166password prompt by setting the environment variable RSYNC_PASSWORD to
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167the password you want to use or using the --password-file option. This
168may be useful when scripting rsync.
4c3d16be 169
3bc67f0c 170WARNING: On some systems environment variables are visible to all
65575e96 171users. On those systems using --password-file is recommended.
3bc67f0c 172
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173manpagesection(RUNNING AN RSYNC SERVER)
174
175An rsync server is configured using a config file which by default is
176called /etc/rsyncd.conf. Please see the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more
177information.
178
179manpagesection(EXAMPLES)
180
181Here are some examples of how I use rsync.
182
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183To backup my wife's home directory, which consists of large MS Word
184files and mail folders, I use a cron job that runs
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185
186quote(rsync -Cavz . arvidsjaur:backup)
187
188each night over a PPP link to a duplicate directory on my machine
189"arvidsjaur".
190
191To synchronize my samba source trees I use the following Makefile
192targets:
193
194quote( get:nl()
195 rsync -avuzb --exclude '*~' samba:samba/ .
196
197 put:nl()
198 rsync -Cavuzb . samba:samba/
199
200 sync: get put)
201
202this allows me to sync with a CVS directory at the other end of the
203link. I then do cvs operations on the remote machine, which saves a
204lot of time as the remote cvs protocol isn't very efficient.
205
206I mirror a directory between my "old" and "new" ftp sites with the
207command
208
209quote(rsync -az -e ssh --delete ~ftp/pub/samba/ nimbus:"~ftp/pub/tridge/samba")
210
211this is launched from cron every few hours.
212
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213manpagesection(OPTIONS SUMMARY)
214
14d43f1f 215Here is a short summary of the options available in rsync. Please refer
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216to the detailed description below for a complete description.
217
218verb(
9ef53907 219Usage: rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST:DEST
d853783f 220 or rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST:SRC DEST
9ef53907 221 or rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... DEST
14d43f1f 222 or rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST::SRC [DEST]
9ef53907 223 or rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST::DEST
14d43f1f 224 or rsync [OPTION]... rsync://[USER@]HOST[:PORT]/SRC [DEST]
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225SRC on single-colon remote HOST will be expanded by remote shell
226SRC on server remote HOST may contain shell wildcards or multiple
227 sources separated by space as long as they have same top-level
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228
229Options
c95da96a 230 -v, --verbose increase verbosity
b86f0cef 231 -q, --quiet decrease verbosity
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232 -c, --checksum always checksum
233 -a, --archive archive mode
234 -r, --recursive recurse into directories
235 -R, --relative use relative path names
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236 -b, --backup make backups (default ~ suffix)
237 --suffix=SUFFIX override backup suffix
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238 -u, --update update only (don't overwrite newer files)
239 -l, --links preserve soft links
240 -L, --copy-links treat soft links like regular files
b5313607 241 --copy-unsafe-links copy links outside the source tree
d853783f 242 --safe-links ignore links outside the destination tree
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243 -H, --hard-links preserve hard links
244 -p, --perms preserve permissions
245 -o, --owner preserve owner (root only)
246 -g, --group preserve group
247 -D, --devices preserve devices (root only)
248 -t, --times preserve times
249 -S, --sparse handle sparse files efficiently
250 -n, --dry-run show what would have been transferred
251 -W, --whole-file copy whole files, no incremental checks
252 -x, --one-file-system don't cross filesystem boundaries
9ef53907 253 -B, --block-size=SIZE checksum blocking size (default 700)
c95da96a 254 -e, --rsh=COMMAND specify rsh replacement
d9fcc198 255 --rsync-path=PATH specify path to rsync on the remote machine
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256 -C, --cvs-exclude auto ignore files in the same way CVS does
257 --delete delete files that don't exist on the sending side
b33b791e 258 --delete-excluded also delete excluded files on the receiving side
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259 --partial keep partially transferred files
260 --force force deletion of directories even if not empty
261 --numeric-ids don't map uid/gid values by user/group name
262 --timeout=TIME set IO timeout in seconds
263 -I, --ignore-times don't exclude files that match length and time
f83f0548 264 --size-only only use file size when determining if a file should be transferred
c95da96a 265 -T --temp-dir=DIR create temporary files in directory DIR
375a4556 266 --compare-dest=DIR also compare destination files relative to DIR
d9fcc198 267 -P equivalent to --partial --progress
c95da96a 268 -z, --compress compress file data
2acf81eb 269 --exclude=PATTERN exclude files matching PATTERN
9ef53907 270 --exclude-from=FILE exclude patterns listed in FILE
2acf81eb 271 --include=PATTERN don't exclude files matching PATTERN
9ef53907 272 --include-from=FILE don't exclude patterns listed in FILE
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273 --version print version number
274 --daemon run as a rsync daemon
5c9730a4 275 --address bind to the specified address
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276 --config=FILE specify alternate rsyncd.conf file
277 --port=PORT specify alternate rsyncd port number
278 --stats give some file transfer stats
eb86d661 279 --progress show progress during transfer
b6062654 280 --log-format=FORMAT log file transfers using specified format
9ef53907 281 --password-file=FILE get password from FILE
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282 -h, --help show this help screen
283)
284
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285manpageoptions()
286
287rsync uses the GNU long options package. Many of the command line
288options have two variants, one short and one long. These are shown
14d43f1f 289below, separated by commas. Some options only have a long variant.
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290The '=' for options that take a parameter is optional; whitespace
291can be used instead.
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292
293startdit()
294dit(bf(-h, --help)) Print a short help page describing the options
295available in rsync
296
297dit(bf(--version)) print the rsync version number and exit
298
299dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information you
14d43f1f 300are given during the transfer. By default, rsync works silently. A
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301single -v will give you information about what files are being
302transferred and a brief summary at the end. Two -v flags will give you
303information on what files are being skipped and slightly more
304information at the end. More than two -v flags should only be used if
14d43f1f 305you are debugging rsync.
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307dit(bf(-q, --quiet)) This option decreases the amount of information you
308are given during the transfer, notably suppressing information messages
309from the remote server. This flag is useful when invoking rsync from
310cron.
311
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312dit(bf(-I, --ignore-times)) Normally rsync will skip any files that are
313already the same length and have the same time-stamp. This option turns
314off this behavior.
315
a7d068ab 316dit(bf(--size-only)) Normally rsync will skip any files that are
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317already the same length and have the same time-stamp. With the
318--size-only option files will be skipped if they have the same size,
319regardless of timestamp. This is useful when starting to use rsync
320after using another mirroring system which may not preserve timestamps
321exactly.
322
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323dit(bf(-c, --checksum)) This forces the sender to checksum all files using
324a 128-bit MD4 checksum before transfer. The checksum is then
325explicitly checked on the receiver and any files of the same name
326which already exist and have the same checksum and size on the
327receiver are skipped. This option can be quite slow.
328
460f6b99 329dit(bf(-a, --archive)) This is equivalent to -rlptg. It is a quick way
14d43f1f 330of saying you want recursion and want to preserve everything.
41059f75 331
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332Note: if the user launching rsync is root then the -o (preserve
333uid) and -D (preserve devices) options are also implied.
5243c216 334
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335dit(bf(-r, --recursive)) This tells rsync to copy directories
336recursively. If you don't specify this then rsync won't copy
337directories at all.
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338
339dit(bf(-R, --relative)) Use relative paths. This means that the full path
340names specified on the command line are sent to the server rather than
341just the last parts of the filenames. This is particularly useful when
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342you want to send several different directories at the same time. For
343example, if you used the command
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344
345verb(rsync foo/bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/)
346
347then this would create a file called foo.c in /tmp/ on the remote
348machine. If instead you used
349
350verb(rsync -R foo/bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/)
351
352then a file called /tmp/foo/bar/foo.c would be created on the remote
353machine. The full path name is preserved.
354
355dit(bf(-b, --backup)) With this option preexisting destination files are
356renamed with a ~ extension as each file is transferred. You can
357control the backup suffix using the --suffix option.
358
b5679335 359dit(bf(--suffix=SUFFIX)) This option allows you to override the default
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360backup suffix used with the -b option. The default is a ~.
361
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362dit(bf(-u, --update)) This forces rsync to skip any files for which the
363destination file already exists and has a date later than the source
364file.
365
366dit(bf(-l, --links)) This tells rsync to recreate symbolic links on the
367remote system to be the same as the local system. Without this
14d43f1f 368option, all symbolic links are skipped.
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369
370dit(bf(-L, --copy-links)) This tells rsync to treat symbolic links just
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371like ordinary files.
372
373dit(bf(--copy-unsafe-links)) This tells rsync to treat symbolic links that
374point outside the source tree like ordinary files. Absolute symlinks are
375also treated like ordinary files, and so are any symlinks in the source
376path itself when --relative is used.
41059f75 377
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378dit(bf(--safe-links)) This tells rsync to ignore any symbolic links
379which point outside the destination tree. All absolute symlinks are
380also ignored. Using this option in conjunction with --relative may
14d43f1f 381give unexpected results.
d310a212 382
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383dit(bf(-H, --hard-links)) This tells rsync to recreate hard links on
384the remote system to be the same as the local system. Without this
385option hard links are treated like regular files.
386
387Note that rsync can only detect hard links if both parts of the link
388are in the list of files being sent.
389
390This option can be quite slow, so only use it if you need it.
391
392dit(bf(-W, --whole-file)) With this option the incremental rsync algorithm
393is not used and the whole file is sent as-is instead. This may be
394useful when using rsync with a local machine.
395
396dit(bf(-p, --perms)) This option causes rsync to update the remote
397permissions to be the same as the local permissions.
398
399dit(bf(-o, --owner)) This option causes rsync to update the remote owner
400of the file to be the same as the local owner. This is only available
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401to the super-user. Note that if the source system is a daemon using chroot,
402the --numeric-ids option is implied because the source system cannot get
14d43f1f 403access to the usernames.
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404
405dit(bf(-g, --group)) This option causes rsync to update the remote group
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406of the file to be the same as the local group. If the receving system is
407not running as the super-user, only groups that the receiver is a member of
408will be preserved (by group name, not group id number).
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409
410dit(bf(-D, --devices)) This option causes rsync to transfer character and
411block device information to the remote system to recreate these
412devices. This option is only available to the super-user.
413
414dit(bf(-t, --times)) This tells rsync to transfer modification times along
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415with the files and update them on the remote system. Note that if this
416option is not used, the optimization that excludes files that have not been
417modified cannot be effective; in other words, a missing -t or -a will
418cause the next transfer to behave as if it used -I, and all files will have
419their checksums compared and show up in log messages even if they haven't
420changed.
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421
422dit(bf(-n, --dry-run)) This tells rsync to not do any file transfers,
423instead it will just report the actions it would have taken.
424
425dit(bf(-S, --sparse)) Try to handle sparse files efficiently so they take
426up less space on the destination.
427
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428NOTE: Don't use this option when the destination is a Solaris "tmpfs"
429filesystem. It doesn't seem to handle seeks over null regions
430correctly and ends up corrupting the files.
431
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432dit(bf(-x, --one-file-system)) This tells rsync not to cross filesystem
433boundaries when recursing. This is useful for transferring the
434contents of only one filesystem.
435
436dit(bf(--delete)) This tells rsync to delete any files on the receiving
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437side that aren't on the sending side. Files that are excluded from
438transfer are excluded from being deleted unless you use --delete-excluded.
41059f75 439
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440This option has no effect if directory recursion is not selected.
441
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442This option can be dangerous if used incorrectly! It is a very good idea
443to run first using the dry run option (-n) to see what files would be
444deleted to make sure important files aren't listed.
41059f75 445
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446If the sending side detects any IO errors then the deletion of any
447files at the destination will be automatically disabled. This is to
448prevent temporary filesystem failures (such as NFS errors) on the
449sending side causing a massive deletion of files on the
450destination.
41059f75 451
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452dit(bf(--delete-excluded)) In addition to deleting the files on the
453receiving side that are not on the sending side, this tells rsync to also
454delete any files on the receiving side that are excluded (see --exclude).
455
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456dit(bf(--delete-after)) By default rsync does file deletions before
457transferring files to try to ensure that there is sufficient space on
458the receiving filesystem. If you want to delete after transferring
459then use the --delete-after switch.
460
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461dit(bf(--force)) This options tells rsync to delete directories even if
462they are not empty. This applies to both the --delete option and to
463cases where rsync tries to copy a normal file but the destination
15800c7e 464contains a directory of the same name.
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466Since this option was added, deletions were reordered to be done depth-first
467so it is hardly ever needed anymore except in very obscure cases.
41059f75 468
b5679335 469dit(bf(-B , --block_size=BLOCKSIZE)) This controls the block size used in
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470the rsync algorithm. See the technical report for details.
471
b5679335 472dit(bf(-e, --rsh=COMMAND)) This option allows you to choose an alternative
41059f75 473remote shell program to use for communication between the local and
14d43f1f 474remote copies of rsync. By default, rsync will use rsh, but you may
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475like to instead use ssh because of its high security.
476
477You can also choose the remote shell program using the RSYNC_RSH
478environment variable.
479
b5679335 480dit(bf(--rsync-path=PATH)) Use this to specify the path to the copy of
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481rsync on the remote machine. Useful when it's not in your path. Note
482that this is the full path to the binary, not just the directory that
483the binary is in.
41059f75 484
b5679335 485dit(bf(--exclude=PATTERN)) This option allows you to selectively exclude
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486certain files from the list of files to be transferred. This is most
487useful in combination with a recursive transfer.
488
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489You may use as many --exclude options on the command line as you like
490to build up the list of files to exclude.
491
14d43f1f 492See the section on exclude patterns for information on the syntax of
43bd68e5 493this option.
41059f75 494
b5679335 495dit(bf(--exclude-from=FILE)) This option is similar to the --exclude
41059f75 496option, but instead it adds all filenames listed in the file FILE to
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497the exclude list. Blank lines in FILE and lines starting with ';' or '#'
498are ignored.
41059f75 499
b5679335 500dit(bf(--include=PATTERN)) This option tells rsync to not exclude the
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501specified pattern of filenames. This is useful as it allows you to
502build up quite complex exclude/include rules.
503
504See the section of exclude patterns for information on the syntax of
505this option.
506
b5679335 507dit(bf(--include-from=FILE)) This specifies a list of include patterns
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508from a file.
509
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510dit(bf(-C, --cvs-exclude)) This is a useful shorthand for excluding a
511broad range of files that you often don't want to transfer between
512systems. It uses the same algorithm that CVS uses to determine if
513a file should be ignored.
514
515The exclude list is initialized to:
516
517quote(RCS SCCS CVS CVS.adm RCSLOG cvslog.* tags TAGS .make.state
518.nse_depinfo *~ #* .#* ,* *.old *.bak *.BAK *.orig *.rej .del-*
519*.a *.o *.obj *.so *.Z *.elc *.ln core)
520
521then files listed in a $HOME/.cvsignore are added to the list and any
522files listed in the CVSIGNORE environment variable (space delimited).
523
524Finally in each directory any files listed in the .cvsignore file in
525that directory are added to the list.
526
b5679335 527dit(bf(--csum-length=LENGTH)) By default the primary checksum used in
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528rsync is a very strong 16 byte MD4 checksum. In most cases you will
529find that a truncated version of this checksum is quite efficient, and
530this will decrease the size of the checksum data sent over the link,
de2fd20e 531making things faster.
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532
533You can choose the number of bytes in the truncated checksum using the
534--csum-length option. Any value less than or equal to 16 is valid.
535
536Note that if you use this option then you run the risk of ending up
537with an incorrect target file. The risk with a value of 16 is
538microscopic and can be safely ignored (the universe will probably end
539before it fails) but with smaller values the risk is higher.
540
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541Current versions of rsync actually use an adaptive algorithm for the
542checksum length by default, using a 16 byte file checksum to determine
543if a 2nd pass is required with a longer block checksum. Only use this
544option if you have read the source code and know what you are doing.
545
b5679335 546dit(bf(-T, --temp-dir=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use DIR as a
375a4556 547scratch directory when creating temporary copies of the files
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548transferred on the receiving side. The default behavior is to create
549the temporary files in the receiving directory.
550
b5679335 551dit(bf(--compare-dest=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use DIR as an
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552additional directory to compare destination files against when doing
553transfers. This is useful for doing transfers to a new destination while
554leaving existing files intact, and then doing a flash-cutover when all
14d43f1f 555files have been successfully transferred (for example by moving directories
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556around and removing the old directory, although this requires also doing
557the transfer with -I to avoid skipping files that haven't changed). This
558option increases the usefulness of --partial because partially transferred
559files will remain in the new temporary destination until they have a chance
560to be completed. If DIR is a relative path, it is relative to the
561destination directory.
375a4556 562
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563dit(bf(-z, --compress)) With this option, rsync compresses any data from
564the source file(s) which it sends to the destination machine. This
565option is useful on slow links. The compression method used is the
566same method that gzip uses.
567
568Note this this option typically achieves better compression ratios
569that can be achieved by using a compressing remote shell, or a
570compressing transport, as it takes advantage of the implicit
571information sent for matching data blocks.
572
573dit(bf(--numeric-ids)) With this option rsync will transfer numeric group
574and user ids rather than using user and group names and mapping them
575at both ends.
576
577By default rsync will use the user name and group name to determine
578what ownership to give files. The special uid 0 and the special group
14d43f1f 5790 are never mapped via user/group names even if the --numeric-ids
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580option is not specified.
581
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582If the source system is a daemon using chroot, or if a user or group name
583does not exist on the destination system, then the numeric id from the
584source system is used instead.
41059f75 585
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586dit(bf(--timeout=TIMEOUT)) This option allows you to set a maximum IO
587timeout in seconds. If no data is transferred for the specified time
588then rsync will exit. The default is 0, which means no timeout.
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589
590dit(bf(--daemon)) This tells rsync that it is to run as a rsync
591daemon. If standard input is a socket then rsync will assume that it
592is being run via inetd, otherwise it will detach from the current
5315b793 593terminal and become a background daemon. The daemon will read the
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594config file (/etc/rsyncd.conf) on each connect made by a client and
595respond to requests accordingly. See the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more
596details.
597
5c9730a4 598dit(bf(--address)) By default rsync will bind to the wildcard address
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599when run as a daemon with the --daemon option or when connecting to a
600rsync server. The --address option allows you to specify a specific IP
601address (or hostname) to bind to. This makes virtual hosting possible
602in conjunction with the --config option.
5c9730a4 603
b5679335 604dit(bf(--config=FILE)) This specifies an alternate config file than
5315b793 605the default /etc/rsyncd.conf. This is only relevant when --daemon is
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606specified.
607
b5679335 608dit(bf(--port=PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number to use
14d43f1f 609rather than the default port 873.
41059f75 610
3a64ad1f 611dit(bf(--log-format=FORMAT)) This allows you to specify exactly what the
14d43f1f 612rsync client logs to stdout on a per-file basis. The log format is
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613specified using the same format conventions as the log format option in
614rsyncd.conf.
b6062654 615
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616dit(bf(--stats)) This tells rsync to print a verbose set of statistics
617on the file transfer, allowing you to tell how effective the rsync
e19452a9 618algorithm is for your data.
b72f24c7 619
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620dit(bf(--partial)) By default, rsync will delete any partially
621transferred file if the transfer is interrupted. In some circumstances
622it is more desirable to keep partially transferred files. Using the
623--partial option tells rsync to keep the partial file which should
624make a subsequent transfer of the rest of the file much faster.
625
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626dit(bf(--progress)) This option tells rsync to print information
627showing the progress of the transfer. This gives a bored user
628something to watch.
629
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630This option is normally combined with -v. Using this option without
631the -v option will produce weird results on your display.
632
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633dit(bf(-P)) The -P option is equivalent to --partial --progress. I
634found myself typing that combination quite often so I created an
635option to make it easier.
636
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637dit(bf(--password-file)) This option allows you to provide a password
638in a file for accessing a remote rsync server. Note that this option
639is only useful when accessing a rsync server using the built in
640transport, not when using a remote shell as the transport. The file
641must not be world readable.
642
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643enddit()
644
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645manpagesection(EXCLUDE PATTERNS)
646
647The exclude and include patterns specified to rsync allow for flexible
14d43f1f 648selection of which files to transfer and which files to skip.
43bd68e5 649
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650rsync builds a ordered list of include/exclude options as specified on
651the command line. When a filename is encountered, rsync checks the
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652name against each exclude/include pattern in turn. The first matching
653pattern is acted on. If it is an exclude pattern than that file is
654skipped. If it is an include pattern then that filename is not
655skipped. If no matching include/exclude pattern is found then the
656filename is not skipped.
657
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658Note that the --include and --exclude options take one pattern
659each. To add multiple patterns use the --include-from and
660--exclude-from options or multiple --include and --exclude options.
661
14d43f1f 662The patterns can take several forms. The rules are:
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663
664itemize(
665 it() if the pattern starts with a / then it is matched against the
666 start of the filename, otherwise it is matched against the end of
667 the filename. Thus /foo would match a file called foo
668 at the base of the tree whereas foo would match any file
669 called foo anywhere in the tree.
670
671 it() if the pattern ends with a / then it will only match a
672 directory, not a file, link or device.
673
674 it() if the pattern contains a wildcard character from the set
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675 *?[ then expression matching is applied using the shell filename
676 matching rules. Otherwise a simple string match is used.
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677
678 it() if the pattern contains a / (not counting a trailing /) then it
679 is matched against the full filename, including any leading
680 directory. If the pattern doesn't contain a / then it is matched
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681 only against the final component of the filename. Furthermore, if
682 the pattern includes a double asterisk "**" then all wildcards in
683 the pattern will match slashes, otherwise they will stop at slashes.
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684
685 it() if the pattern starts with "+ " (a plus followed by a space)
5a554d5b 686 then it is always considered an include pattern, even if specified as
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687 part of an exclude option. The "+ " part is discarded before matching.
688
689 it() if the pattern starts with "- " (a minus followed by a space)
5a554d5b 690 then it is always considered an exclude pattern, even if specified as
43bd68e5 691 part of an include option. The "- " part is discarded before matching.
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692
693 it() if the pattern is a single exclamation mark ! then the current
694 exclude list is reset, removing all previous exclude patterns.
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695)
696
697The +/- rules are most useful in exclude lists, allowing you to have a
698single exclude list that contains both include and exclude options.
699
700Here are some examples:
701
702itemize(
703 it() --exclude "*.o" would exclude all filenames matching *.o
704 it() --exclude "/foo" would exclude a file in the base directory called foo
705 it() --exclude "foo/" would exclude any directory called foo
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706 it() --exclude "/foo/*/bar" would exclude any file called bar two
707 levels below a base directory called foo
708 it() --exclude "/foo/**/bar" would exclude any file called bar two
709 or more levels below a base directory called foo
43bd68e5 710 it() --include "*/" --include "*.c" --exclude "*" would include all
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711 directories and C source files
712 it() --include "foo/" --include "foo/bar.c" --exclude "*" would include
713 only foo/bar.c (the foo/ directory must be explicitly included or
714 it would be excluded by the "*")
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715)
716
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717manpagesection(DIAGNOSTICS)
718
14d43f1f 719rsync occasionally produces error messages that may seem a little
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720cryptic. The one that seems to cause the most confusion is "protocol
721version mismatch - is your shell clean?".
722
723This message is usually caused by your startup scripts or remote shell
724facility producing unwanted garbage on the stream that rsync is using
14d43f1f 725for its transport. The way to diagnose this problem is to run your
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726remote shell like this:
727
728verb(
729 rsh remotehost /bin/true > out.dat
730)
731
732then look at out.dat. If everything is working correctly then out.dat
2cfeab21 733should be a zero length file. If you are getting the above error from
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734rsync then you will probably find that out.dat contains some text or
735data. Look at the contents and try to work out what is producing
14d43f1f 736it. The most common cause is incorrectly configured shell startup
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737scripts (such as .cshrc or .profile) that contain output statements
738for non-interactive logins.
739
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740manpagesection(ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES)
741
742startdit()
743
744dit(bf(CVSIGNORE)) The CVSIGNORE environment variable supplements any
745ignore patterns in .cvsignore files. See the --cvs-exclude option for
746more details.
747
748dit(bf(RSYNC_RSH)) The RSYNC_RSH environment variable allows you to
749override the default shell used as the transport for rsync. This can
750be used instead of the -e option.
751
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752dit(bf(RSYNC_PROXY)) The RSYNC_PROXY environment variable allows you to
753redirect your rsync client to use a web proxy when connecting to a
754rsync daemon. You should set RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair.
755
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756dit(bf(RSYNC_PASSWORD)) Setting RSYNC_PASSWORD to the required
757password allows you to run authenticated rsync connections to a rsync
758daemon without user intervention. Note that this does not supply a
759password to a shell transport such as ssh.
760
761dit(bf(USER) or bf(LOGNAME)) The USER or LOGNAME environment variables
762are used to determine the default username sent to a rsync server.
763
14d43f1f 764dit(bf(HOME)) The HOME environment variable is used to find the user's
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765default .cvsignore file.
766
767enddit()
768
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769manpagefiles()
770
771/etc/rsyncd.conf
772
773manpageseealso()
774
775rsyncd.conf(5)
776
777manpagediagnostics()
778
779manpagebugs()
780
781times are transferred as unix time_t values
782
783file permissions, devices etc are transferred as native numerical
784values
785
a87b3b2a 786see also the comments on the --delete option
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787
788Please report bugs! The rsync bug tracking system is online at
9e3c856a 789url(http://rsync.samba.org/rsync/)(http://rsync.samba.org/rsync/)
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790
791manpagesection(VERSION)
792This man page is current for version 2.0 of rsync
793
794manpagesection(CREDITS)
795
796rsync is distributed under the GNU public license. See the file
797COPYING for details.
798
41059f75 799A WEB site is available at
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800url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/)
801
802The primary ftp site for rsync is
803url(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync)(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync).
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804
805We would be delighted to hear from you if you like this program.
806
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807This program uses the excellent zlib compression library written by
808Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler.
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809
810manpagesection(THANKS)
811
812Thanks to Richard Brent, Brendan Mackay, Bill Waite, Stephen Rothwell
813and David Bell for helpful suggestions and testing of rsync. I've
814probably missed some people, my apologies if I have.
815
816
817manpageauthor()
818
819rsync was written by Andrew Tridgell and Paul Mackerras. They may be
9e3c856a 820contacted via email at tridge@samba.org and
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821Paul.Mackerras@cs.anu.edu.au
822