In pool_free_old(), one code path was not clearing a "next" pointer,
[rsync/rsync.git] / rsync.yo
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9e3c856a 1mailto(rsync-bugs@samba.org)
0c6d7952 2manpage(rsync)(1)(6 Nov 2006)()()
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3manpagename(rsync)(faster, flexible replacement for rcp)
4manpagesynopsis()
5
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6rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... DEST
7
9ef53907 8rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST:DEST
41059f75 9
868676dc 10rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST::DEST
41059f75 11
868676dc 12rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... rsync://[USER@]HOST[:PORT]/DEST
41059f75 13
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14rsync [OPTION]... SRC
15
868676dc 16rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST:SRC [DEST]
41059f75 17
868676dc 18rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST::SRC [DEST]
41059f75 19
9ef53907 20rsync [OPTION]... rsync://[USER@]HOST[:PORT]/SRC [DEST]
039faa86 21
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22manpagedescription()
23
d858b274 24Rsync is a program that behaves in much the same way that rcp does,
41059f75 25but has many more options and uses the rsync remote-update protocol to
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26greatly speed up file transfers when the destination file is being
27updated.
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28
29The rsync remote-update protocol allows rsync to transfer just the
f39281ae 30differences between two sets of files across the network connection, using
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31an efficient checksum-search algorithm described in the technical
32report that accompanies this package.
33
d858b274 34Rsync finds files that need to be transferred using a "quick check" algorithm
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35that looks for files that have changed in size or in last-modified time (by
36default). Any changes in the other preserved attributes (as requested by
37options) are made on the destination file directly when the quick check
38indicates that the file's data does not need to be updated.
39
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40Some of the additional features of rsync are:
41
b8a6dae0 42itemization(
b9f592fb 43 it() support for copying links, devices, owners, groups, and permissions
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44 it() exclude and exclude-from options similar to GNU tar
45 it() a CVS exclude mode for ignoring the same files that CVS would ignore
43cd760f 46 it() can use any transparent remote shell, including ssh or rsh
d38772e0 47 it() does not require super-user privileges
41059f75 48 it() pipelining of file transfers to minimize latency costs
5a727522 49 it() support for anonymous or authenticated rsync daemons (ideal for
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50 mirroring)
51)
52
53manpagesection(GENERAL)
54
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55Rsync copies files either to or from a remote host, or locally on the
56current host (it does not support copying files between two remote hosts).
57
58There are two different ways for rsync to contact a remote system: using a
59remote-shell program as the transport (such as ssh or rsh) or contacting an
60rsync daemon directly via TCP. The remote-shell transport is used whenever
61the source or destination path contains a single colon (:) separator after
62a host specification. Contacting an rsync daemon directly happens when the
63source or destination path contains a double colon (::) separator after a
ba3542cf 64host specification, OR when an rsync:// URL is specified (see also the
754a080f 65"USING RSYNC-DAEMON FEATURES VIA A REMOTE-SHELL CONNECTION" section for
ba3542cf 66an exception to this latter rule).
15997547 67
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68As a special case, if a single source arg is specified without a
69destination, the files are listed in an output format similar to "ls -l".
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70
71As expected, if neither the source or destination path specify a remote
72host, the copy occurs locally (see also the bf(--list-only) option).
73
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74manpagesection(SETUP)
75
76See the file README for installation instructions.
77
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78Once installed, you can use rsync to any machine that you can access via
79a remote shell (as well as some that you can access using the rsync
43cd760f 80daemon-mode protocol). For remote transfers, a modern rsync uses ssh
1bbf83c0 81for its communications, but it may have been configured to use a
43cd760f 82different remote shell by default, such as rsh or remsh.
41059f75 83
faa82484 84You can also specify any remote shell you like, either by using the bf(-e)
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85command line option, or by setting the RSYNC_RSH environment variable.
86
8e987130 87Note that rsync must be installed on both the source and destination
faa82484 88machines.
8e987130 89
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90manpagesection(USAGE)
91
92You use rsync in the same way you use rcp. You must specify a source
93and a destination, one of which may be remote.
94
4d888108 95Perhaps the best way to explain the syntax is with some examples:
41059f75 96
faa82484 97quote(tt(rsync -t *.c foo:src/))
41059f75 98
8a97fc2e 99This would transfer all files matching the pattern *.c from the
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100current directory to the directory src on the machine foo. If any of
101the files already exist on the remote system then the rsync
102remote-update protocol is used to update the file by sending only the
103differences. See the tech report for details.
104
faa82484 105quote(tt(rsync -avz foo:src/bar /data/tmp))
41059f75 106
8a97fc2e 107This would recursively transfer all files from the directory src/bar on the
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108machine foo into the /data/tmp/bar directory on the local machine. The
109files are transferred in "archive" mode, which ensures that symbolic
b5accaba 110links, devices, attributes, permissions, ownerships, etc. are preserved
14d43f1f 111in the transfer. Additionally, compression will be used to reduce the
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112size of data portions of the transfer.
113
faa82484 114quote(tt(rsync -avz foo:src/bar/ /data/tmp))
41059f75 115
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116A trailing slash on the source changes this behavior to avoid creating an
117additional directory level at the destination. You can think of a trailing
118/ on a source as meaning "copy the contents of this directory" as opposed
119to "copy the directory by name", but in both cases the attributes of the
120containing directory are transferred to the containing directory on the
121destination. In other words, each of the following commands copies the
122files in the same way, including their setting of the attributes of
123/dest/foo:
124
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125quote(
126tt(rsync -av /src/foo /dest)nl()
127tt(rsync -av /src/foo/ /dest/foo)nl()
128)
41059f75 129
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130Note also that host and module references don't require a trailing slash to
131copy the contents of the default directory. For example, both of these
132copy the remote directory's contents into "/dest":
133
134quote(
135tt(rsync -av host: /dest)nl()
136tt(rsync -av host::module /dest)nl()
137)
138
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139You can also use rsync in local-only mode, where both the source and
140destination don't have a ':' in the name. In this case it behaves like
141an improved copy command.
142
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143Finally, you can list all the (listable) modules available from a
144particular rsync daemon by leaving off the module name:
145
faa82484 146quote(tt(rsync somehost.mydomain.com::))
14d43f1f 147
bb9bdba4 148See the following section for more details.
14d43f1f 149
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150manpagesection(ADVANCED USAGE)
151
152The syntax for requesting multiple files from a remote host involves using
153quoted spaces in the SRC. Some examples:
154
faa82484 155quote(tt(rsync host::'modname/dir1/file1 modname/dir2/file2' /dest))
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156
157This would copy file1 and file2 into /dest from an rsync daemon. Each
158additional arg must include the same "modname/" prefix as the first one,
159and must be preceded by a single space. All other spaces are assumed
160to be a part of the filenames.
161
faa82484 162quote(tt(rsync -av host:'dir1/file1 dir2/file2' /dest))
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163
164This would copy file1 and file2 into /dest using a remote shell. This
165word-splitting is done by the remote shell, so if it doesn't work it means
166that the remote shell isn't configured to split its args based on
167whitespace (a very rare setting, but not unknown). If you need to transfer
168a filename that contains whitespace, you'll need to either escape the
169whitespace in a way that the remote shell will understand, or use wildcards
170in place of the spaces. Two examples of this are:
171
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172quote(
173tt(rsync -av host:'file\ name\ with\ spaces' /dest)nl()
174tt(rsync -av host:file?name?with?spaces /dest)nl()
175)
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176
177This latter example assumes that your shell passes through unmatched
178wildcards. If it complains about "no match", put the name in quotes.
179
5a727522 180manpagesection(CONNECTING TO AN RSYNC DAEMON)
41059f75 181
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182It is also possible to use rsync without a remote shell as the transport.
183In this case you will directly connect to a remote rsync daemon, typically
184using TCP port 873. (This obviously requires the daemon to be running on
185the remote system, so refer to the STARTING AN RSYNC DAEMON TO ACCEPT
186CONNECTIONS section below for information on that.)
4c3b4b25 187
1bbf83c0 188Using rsync in this way is the same as using it with a remote shell except
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189that:
190
b8a6dae0 191itemization(
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192 it() you either use a double colon :: instead of a single colon to
193 separate the hostname from the path, or you use an rsync:// URL.
2c64b258 194 it() the first word of the "path" is actually a module name.
5a727522 195 it() the remote daemon may print a message of the day when you
14d43f1f 196 connect.
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197 it() if you specify no path name on the remote daemon then the
198 list of accessible paths on the daemon will be shown.
f7632fc6 199 it() if you specify no local destination then a listing of the
5a727522 200 specified files on the remote daemon is provided.
2c64b258 201 it() you must not specify the bf(--rsh) (bf(-e)) option.
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202)
203
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204An example that copies all the files in a remote module named "src":
205
206verb( rsync -av host::src /dest)
207
208Some modules on the remote daemon may require authentication. If so,
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209you will receive a password prompt when you connect. You can avoid the
210password prompt by setting the environment variable RSYNC_PASSWORD to
faa82484 211the password you want to use or using the bf(--password-file) option. This
65575e96 212may be useful when scripting rsync.
4c3d16be 213
3bc67f0c 214WARNING: On some systems environment variables are visible to all
faa82484 215users. On those systems using bf(--password-file) is recommended.
3bc67f0c 216
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217You may establish the connection via a web proxy by setting the
218environment variable RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair pointing to
219your web proxy. Note that your web proxy's configuration must support
220proxy connections to port 873.
bef49340 221
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222You may also establish a daemon connection using a program as a proxy by
223setting the environment variable RSYNC_CONNECT_PROG to the commands you
224wish to run in place of making a direct socket connection. The string may
225contain the escape "%H" to represent the hostname specified in the rsync
226command (so use "%%" if you need a single "%" in your string). For
227example:
228
229verb( export RSYNC_CONNECT_PROG='ssh proxyhost nc %H 873'
230 rsync -av targethost1::module/src/ /dest/
231 rsync -av rsync:://targethost2/module/src/ /dest/ )
232
233The command specifed above uses ssh to run nc (netcat) on a proxyhost,
234which forwards all data to port 873 (the rsync daemon) on the targethost
235(%H).
236
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237manpagesection(USING RSYNC-DAEMON FEATURES VIA A REMOTE-SHELL CONNECTION)
238
239It is sometimes useful to use various features of an rsync daemon (such as
240named modules) without actually allowing any new socket connections into a
241system (other than what is already required to allow remote-shell access).
242Rsync supports connecting to a host using a remote shell and then spawning
243a single-use "daemon" server that expects to read its config file in the
244home dir of the remote user. This can be useful if you want to encrypt a
245daemon-style transfer's data, but since the daemon is started up fresh by
246the remote user, you may not be able to use features such as chroot or
247change the uid used by the daemon. (For another way to encrypt a daemon
248transfer, consider using ssh to tunnel a local port to a remote machine and
249configure a normal rsync daemon on that remote host to only allow
250connections from "localhost".)
251
252From the user's perspective, a daemon transfer via a remote-shell
253connection uses nearly the same command-line syntax as a normal
254rsync-daemon transfer, with the only exception being that you must
255explicitly set the remote shell program on the command-line with the
256bf(--rsh=COMMAND) option. (Setting the RSYNC_RSH in the environment
257will not turn on this functionality.) For example:
258
259verb( rsync -av --rsh=ssh host::module /dest)
260
261If you need to specify a different remote-shell user, keep in mind that the
262user@ prefix in front of the host is specifying the rsync-user value (for a
263module that requires user-based authentication). This means that you must
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264give the '-l user' option to ssh when specifying the remote-shell, as in
265this example that uses the short version of the bf(--rsh) option:
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266
267verb( rsync -av -e "ssh -l ssh-user" rsync-user@host::module /dest)
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268
269The "ssh-user" will be used at the ssh level; the "rsync-user" will be
754a080f 270used to log-in to the "module".
bef49340 271
754a080f 272manpagesection(STARTING AN RSYNC DAEMON TO ACCEPT CONNECTIONS)
bef49340 273
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274In order to connect to an rsync daemon, the remote system needs to have a
275daemon already running (or it needs to have configured something like inetd
276to spawn an rsync daemon for incoming connections on a particular port).
277For full information on how to start a daemon that will handling incoming
49f4cfdf 278socket connections, see the bf(rsyncd.conf)(5) man page -- that is the config
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279file for the daemon, and it contains the full details for how to run the
280daemon (including stand-alone and inetd configurations).
bef49340 281
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282If you're using one of the remote-shell transports for the transfer, there is
283no need to manually start an rsync daemon.
bef49340 284
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285manpagesection(EXAMPLES)
286
287Here are some examples of how I use rsync.
288
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289To backup my wife's home directory, which consists of large MS Word
290files and mail folders, I use a cron job that runs
41059f75 291
faa82484 292quote(tt(rsync -Cavz . arvidsjaur:backup))
41059f75 293
f39281ae 294each night over a PPP connection to a duplicate directory on my machine
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295"arvidsjaur".
296
297To synchronize my samba source trees I use the following Makefile
298targets:
299
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300verb( get:
301 rsync -avuzb --exclude '*~' samba:samba/ .
302 put:
303 rsync -Cavuzb . samba:samba/
304 sync: get put)
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305
306this allows me to sync with a CVS directory at the other end of the
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307connection. I then do CVS operations on the remote machine, which saves a
308lot of time as the remote CVS protocol isn't very efficient.
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309
310I mirror a directory between my "old" and "new" ftp sites with the
faa82484 311command:
41059f75 312
faa82484 313tt(rsync -az -e ssh --delete ~ftp/pub/samba nimbus:"~ftp/pub/tridge")
41059f75 314
faa82484 315This is launched from cron every few hours.
41059f75 316
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317manpagesection(OPTIONS SUMMARY)
318
14d43f1f 319Here is a short summary of the options available in rsync. Please refer
faa82484 320to the detailed description below for a complete description. verb(
c95da96a 321 -v, --verbose increase verbosity
44d98d61 322 -q, --quiet suppress non-error messages
1de02c27 323 --no-motd suppress daemon-mode MOTD (see caveat)
44d98d61 324 -c, --checksum skip based on checksum, not mod-time & size
16edf865 325 -a, --archive archive mode; equals -rlptgoD (no -H,-A,-X)
f40aa6fb 326 --no-OPTION turn off an implied OPTION (e.g. --no-D)
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327 -r, --recursive recurse into directories
328 -R, --relative use relative path names
f40aa6fb 329 --no-implied-dirs don't send implied dirs with --relative
915dd207 330 -b, --backup make backups (see --suffix & --backup-dir)
44d98d61 331 --backup-dir=DIR make backups into hierarchy based in DIR
915dd207 332 --suffix=SUFFIX backup suffix (default ~ w/o --backup-dir)
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333 -u, --update skip files that are newer on the receiver
334 --inplace update destination files in-place
94f20a9f 335 --append append data onto shorter files
09ed3099 336 -d, --dirs transfer directories without recursing
eb06fa95 337 -l, --links copy symlinks as symlinks
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338 -L, --copy-links transform symlink into referent file/dir
339 --copy-unsafe-links only "unsafe" symlinks are transformed
340 --safe-links ignore symlinks that point outside the tree
f2ebbebe 341 -k, --copy-dirlinks transform symlink to dir into referent dir
09ed3099 342 -K, --keep-dirlinks treat symlinked dir on receiver as dir
f2ebbebe 343 -H, --hard-links preserve hard links
c95da96a 344 -p, --perms preserve permissions
2d5279ac 345 -E, --executability preserve executability
dfe1ed5e 346 --chmod=CHMOD affect file and/or directory permissions
1c3344a1 347 -A, --acls preserve ACLs (implies -p)
eb7e7b24 348 -X, --xattrs preserve extended attributes
d38772e0 349 -o, --owner preserve owner (super-user only)
c95da96a 350 -g, --group preserve group
d38772e0 351 --devices preserve device files (super-user only)
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352 --specials preserve special files
353 -D same as --devices --specials
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354 -t, --times preserve modification times
355 -O, --omit-dir-times omit directories from --times
d38772e0 356 --super receiver attempts super-user activities
9439c0cb 357 --fake-super store/recover privileged attrs using xattrs
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358 -S, --sparse handle sparse files efficiently
359 -n, --dry-run show what would have been transferred
98bf61c8 360 -W, --whole-file copy files whole (without rsync algorithm)
c95da96a 361 -x, --one-file-system don't cross filesystem boundaries
3ed8eb3f 362 -B, --block-size=SIZE force a fixed checksum block-size
44d98d61 363 -e, --rsh=COMMAND specify the remote shell to use
68e169ab 364 --rsync-path=PROGRAM specify the rsync to run on remote machine
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365 --existing skip creating new files on receiver
366 --ignore-existing skip updating files that exist on receiver
47c11975 367 --remove-source-files sender removes synchronized files (non-dir)
ae76a740 368 --del an alias for --delete-during
8517e9c1 369 --delete delete extraneous files from dest dirs
598c409e 370 --delete-before receiver deletes before transfer (default)
ae76a740 371 --delete-during receiver deletes during xfer, not before
fd0a130c 372 --delete-delay find deletions during, delete after
ae76a740 373 --delete-after receiver deletes after transfer, not before
8517e9c1 374 --delete-excluded also delete excluded files from dest dirs
b5accaba 375 --ignore-errors delete even if there are I/O errors
866925bf 376 --force force deletion of dirs even if not empty
0b73ca12 377 --max-delete=NUM don't delete more than NUM files
3610c458 378 --max-size=SIZE don't transfer any file larger than SIZE
59dd6786 379 --min-size=SIZE don't transfer any file smaller than SIZE
c95da96a 380 --partial keep partially transferred files
44cad59f 381 --partial-dir=DIR put a partially transferred file into DIR
44d98d61 382 --delay-updates put all updated files into place at end
a272ff8c 383 -m, --prune-empty-dirs prune empty directory chains from file-list
c95da96a 384 --numeric-ids don't map uid/gid values by user/group name
b5accaba 385 --timeout=TIME set I/O timeout in seconds
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386 -I, --ignore-times don't skip files that match size and time
387 --size-only skip files that match in size
388 --modify-window=NUM compare mod-times with reduced accuracy
abce74bb 389 -T, --temp-dir=DIR create temporary files in directory DIR
5b483755 390 -y, --fuzzy find similar file for basis if no dest file
915dd207 391 --compare-dest=DIR also compare received files relative to DIR
2f03ce67 392 --copy-dest=DIR ... and include copies of unchanged files
b127c1dc 393 --link-dest=DIR hardlink to files in DIR when unchanged
32a5edf4 394 -z, --compress compress file data during the transfer
bad01106 395 --compress-level=NUM explicitly set compression level
2b967218 396 --skip-compress=LIST skip compressing files with suffix in LIST
44d98d61 397 -C, --cvs-exclude auto-ignore files in the same way CVS does
16e5de84 398 -f, --filter=RULE add a file-filtering RULE
8a6f3fea 399 -F same as --filter='dir-merge /.rsync-filter'
16e5de84 400 repeated: --filter='- .rsync-filter'
2acf81eb 401 --exclude=PATTERN exclude files matching PATTERN
44d98d61 402 --exclude-from=FILE read exclude patterns from FILE
2acf81eb 403 --include=PATTERN don't exclude files matching PATTERN
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404 --include-from=FILE read include patterns from FILE
405 --files-from=FILE read list of source-file names from FILE
fa92818a 406 -0, --from0 all *from/filter files are delimited by 0s
3ae5367f 407 --address=ADDRESS bind address for outgoing socket to daemon
c259892c 408 --port=PORT specify double-colon alternate port number
04f48837 409 --sockopts=OPTIONS specify custom TCP options
b5accaba 410 --blocking-io use blocking I/O for the remote shell
44d98d61 411 --stats give some file-transfer stats
a6a27602 412 -8, --8-bit-output leave high-bit chars unescaped in output
955c3145 413 -h, --human-readable output numbers in a human-readable format
eb86d661 414 --progress show progress during transfer
44d98d61 415 -P same as --partial --progress
b78296cb 416 -i, --itemize-changes output a change-summary for all updates
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417 --out-format=FORMAT output updates using the specified FORMAT
418 --log-file=FILE log what we're doing to the specified FILE
419 --log-file-format=FMT log updates using the specified FMT
09a54c39 420 --password-file=FILE read daemon-access password from FILE
09ed3099 421 --list-only list the files instead of copying them
44d98d61 422 --bwlimit=KBPS limit I/O bandwidth; KBytes per second
faa82484 423 --write-batch=FILE write a batched update to FILE
326bb56e 424 --only-write-batch=FILE like --write-batch but w/o updating dest
44d98d61 425 --read-batch=FILE read a batched update from FILE
0b941479 426 --protocol=NUM force an older protocol version to be used
332cf6df 427 --iconv=CONVERT_SPEC request charset conversion of filesnames
44d98d61 428 --checksum-seed=NUM set block/file checksum seed (advanced)
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429 -4, --ipv4 prefer IPv4
430 -6, --ipv6 prefer IPv6
81c453b1 431 --version print version number
b8a6dae0 432(-h) --help show this help (see below for -h comment))
6902ed17 433
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434Rsync can also be run as a daemon, in which case the following options are
435accepted: verb(
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436 --daemon run as an rsync daemon
437 --address=ADDRESS bind to the specified address
44d98d61 438 --bwlimit=KBPS limit I/O bandwidth; KBytes per second
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439 --config=FILE specify alternate rsyncd.conf file
440 --no-detach do not detach from the parent
c259892c 441 --port=PORT listen on alternate port number
a2ed5801 442 --log-file=FILE override the "log file" setting
4b90820d 443 --log-file-format=FMT override the "log format" setting
04f48837 444 --sockopts=OPTIONS specify custom TCP options
24b0922b 445 -v, --verbose increase verbosity
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446 -4, --ipv4 prefer IPv4
447 -6, --ipv6 prefer IPv6
b8a6dae0 448 -h, --help show this help (if used after --daemon))
c95da96a 449
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450manpageoptions()
451
452rsync uses the GNU long options package. Many of the command line
453options have two variants, one short and one long. These are shown
14d43f1f 454below, separated by commas. Some options only have a long variant.
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455The '=' for options that take a parameter is optional; whitespace
456can be used instead.
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457
458startdit()
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459dit(bf(--help)) Print a short help page describing the options
460available in rsync and exit. For backward-compatibility with older
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461versions of rsync, the help will also be output if you use the bf(-h)
462option without any other args.
41059f75 463
bdf278f7 464dit(bf(--version)) print the rsync version number and exit.
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465
466dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information you
14d43f1f 467are given during the transfer. By default, rsync works silently. A
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468single bf(-v) will give you information about what files are being
469transferred and a brief summary at the end. Two bf(-v) flags will give you
41059f75 470information on what files are being skipped and slightly more
faa82484 471information at the end. More than two bf(-v) flags should only be used if
14d43f1f 472you are debugging rsync.
41059f75 473
4f90eb43 474Note that the names of the transferred files that are output are done using
4b90820d 475a default bf(--out-format) of "%n%L", which tells you just the name of the
81c453b1 476file and, if the item is a link, where it points. At the single bf(-v)
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477level of verbosity, this does not mention when a file gets its attributes
478changed. If you ask for an itemized list of changed attributes (either
4b90820d 479bf(--itemize-changes) or adding "%i" to the bf(--out-format) setting), the
4f90eb43 480output (on the client) increases to mention all items that are changed in
4b90820d 481any way. See the bf(--out-format) option for more details.
4f90eb43 482
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483dit(bf(-q, --quiet)) This option decreases the amount of information you
484are given during the transfer, notably suppressing information messages
485from the remote server. This flag is useful when invoking rsync from
486cron.
487
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488dit(bf(--no-motd)) This option affects the information that is output
489by the client at the start of a daemon transfer. This suppresses the
490message-of-the-day (MOTD) text, but it also affects the list of modules
491that the daemon sends in response to the "rsync host::" request (due to
492a limitation in the rsync protocol), so omit this option if you want to
c5b6e57a 493request the list of modules from the daemon.
1de02c27 494
41059f75 495dit(bf(-I, --ignore-times)) Normally rsync will skip any files that are
1874f7e2 496already the same size and have the same modification timestamp.
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497This option turns off this "quick check" behavior, causing all files to
498be updated.
41059f75 499
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500dit(bf(--size-only)) This modifies rsync's "quick check" algorithm for
501finding files that need to be transferred, changing it from the default of
502transferring files with either a changed size or a changed last-modified
d15f2ff0 503time to just looking for files that have changed in size. This is useful
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504when starting to use rsync after using another mirroring system which may
505not preserve timestamps exactly.
f83f0548 506
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507dit(bf(--modify-window)) When comparing two timestamps, rsync treats the
508timestamps as being equal if they differ by no more than the modify-window
509value. This is normally 0 (for an exact match), but you may find it useful
510to set this to a larger value in some situations. In particular, when
511transferring to or from an MS Windows FAT filesystem (which represents
512times with a 2-second resolution), bf(--modify-window=1) is useful
513(allowing times to differ by up to 1 second).
5b56cc19 514
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515dit(bf(-c, --checksum)) This changes the way rsync checks if the files have
516been changed and are in need of a transfer. Without this option, rsync
517uses a "quick check" that (by default) checks if each file's size and time
518of last modification match between the sender and receiver. This option
519changes this to compare a 128-bit MD4 checksum for each file that has a
520matching size. Generating the checksums means that both sides will expend
521a lot of disk I/O reading all the data in the files in the transfer (and
522this is prior to any reading that will be done to transfer changed files),
523so this can slow things down significantly.
524
525The sending side generates its checksums while it is doing the file-system
526scan that builds the list of the available files. The receiver generates
527its checksums when it is scanning for changed files, and will checksum any
528file that has the same size as the corresponding sender's file: files with
529either a changed size or a changed checksum are selected for transfer.
530
531Note that rsync always verifies that each em(transferred) file was
532correctly reconstructed on the receiving side by checking a whole-file
533checksum that is generated when as the file is transferred, but that
534automatic after-the-transfer verification has nothing to do with this
2a24b4bd 535option's before-the-transfer "Does this file need to be updated?" check.
41059f75 536
faa82484 537dit(bf(-a, --archive)) This is equivalent to bf(-rlptgoD). It is a quick
e7bf3e5e 538way of saying you want recursion and want to preserve almost
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539everything (with -H being a notable omission).
540The only exception to the above equivalence is when bf(--files-from) is
5dd97ab9 541specified, in which case bf(-r) is not implied.
e7bf3e5e 542
faa82484 543Note that bf(-a) bf(does not preserve hardlinks), because
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544finding multiply-linked files is expensive. You must separately
545specify bf(-H).
41059f75 546
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547dit(--no-OPTION) You may turn off one or more implied options by prefixing
548the option name with "no-". Not all options may be prefixed with a "no-":
549only options that are implied by other options (e.g. bf(--no-D),
550bf(--no-perms)) or have different defaults in various circumstances
551(e.g. bf(--no-whole-file), bf(--no-blocking-io), bf(--no-dirs)). You may
552specify either the short or the long option name after the "no-" prefix
553(e.g. bf(--no-R) is the same as bf(--no-relative)).
554
555For example: if you want to use bf(-a) (bf(--archive)) but don't want
556bf(-o) (bf(--owner)), instead of converting bf(-a) into bf(-rlptgD), you
557could specify bf(-a --no-o) (or bf(-a --no-owner)).
558
559The order of the options is important: if you specify bf(--no-r -a), the
560bf(-r) option would end up being turned on, the opposite of bf(-a --no-r).
561Note also that the side-effects of the bf(--files-from) option are NOT
a9af5d8e 562positional, as it affects the default state of several options and slightly
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563changes the meaning of bf(-a) (see the bf(--files-from) option for more
564details).
565
24986abd 566dit(bf(-r, --recursive)) This tells rsync to copy directories
faa82484 567recursively. See also bf(--dirs) (bf(-d)).
41059f75 568
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569Beginning with rsync 3.0.0, the recursive algorithm used is now an
570incremental scan that uses much less memory than before and begins the
571transfer after the scanning of the first few directories have been
572completed. This incremental scan only affects our recursion algorithm, and
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573does not change a non-recursive transfer.
574It is also only possible when both ends of the
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575transfer are at least version 3.0.0.
576
577Some options require rsync to know the full file list, so these options
1e05b590 578disable the incremental recursion mode. These include: bf(--delete-before),
05a41409 579bf(--delete-after), bf(--prune-empty-dirs), bf(--delay-updates), and bf(--hard-links).
d9f46544 580Because of this, the default delete mode when you specify bf(--delete) is now
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581bf(--delete-during) when both ends of the connection are at least 3.0.0
582(use bf(--del) or bf(--delete-during) to request this improved deletion mode
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583explicitly). See also the bf(--delete-delay) option that is a better choice
584than using bf(--delete-after).
585
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586dit(bf(-R, --relative)) Use relative paths. This means that the full path
587names specified on the command line are sent to the server rather than
588just the last parts of the filenames. This is particularly useful when
14d43f1f 589you want to send several different directories at the same time. For
1dc42d12 590example, if you used this command:
41059f75 591
1dc42d12 592quote(tt( rsync -av /foo/bar/baz.c remote:/tmp/))
41059f75 593
58718881 594... this would create a file named baz.c in /tmp/ on the remote
41059f75
AT
595machine. If instead you used
596
1dc42d12 597quote(tt( rsync -avR /foo/bar/baz.c remote:/tmp/))
41059f75 598
58718881 599then a file named /tmp/foo/bar/baz.c would be created on the remote
9bef934c 600machine -- the full path name is preserved. To limit the amount of
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601path information that is sent, you have a couple options: (1) With
602a modern rsync on the sending side (beginning with 2.6.7), you can
f2ebbebe 603insert a dot and a slash into the source path, like this:
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604
605quote(tt( rsync -avR /foo/./bar/baz.c remote:/tmp/))
606
607That would create /tmp/bar/baz.c on the remote machine. (Note that the
f2ebbebe 608dot must be followed by a slash, so "/foo/." would not be abbreviated.)
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609(2) For older rsync versions, you would need to use a chdir to limit the
610source path. For example, when pushing files:
611
53cf0b8b 612quote(tt( (cd /foo; rsync -avR bar/baz.c remote:/tmp/) ))
1dc42d12 613
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614(Note that the parens put the two commands into a sub-shell, so that the
615"cd" command doesn't remain in effect for future commands.)
616If you're pulling files, use this idiom (which doesn't work with an
617rsync daemon):
9bef934c 618
faa82484 619quote(
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620tt( rsync -avR --rsync-path="cd /foo; rsync" \ )nl()
621tt( remote:bar/baz.c /tmp/)
faa82484 622)
9bef934c 623
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624dit(bf(--no-implied-dirs)) This option affects the default behavior of the
625bf(--relative) option. When it is specified, the attributes of the implied
626directories from the source names are not included in the transfer. This
627means that the corresponding path elements on the destination system are
628left unchanged if they exist, and any missing implied directories are
629created with default attributes. This even allows these implied path
630elements to have big differences, such as being a symlink to a directory on
631one side of the transfer, and a real directory on the other side.
632
633For instance, if a command-line arg or a files-from entry told rsync to
634transfer the file "path/foo/file", the directories "path" and "path/foo"
635are implied when bf(--relative) is used. If "path/foo" is a symlink to
636"bar" on the destination system, the receiving rsync would ordinarily
637delete "path/foo", recreate it as a directory, and receive the file into
638the new directory. With bf(--no-implied-dirs), the receiving rsync updates
639"path/foo/file" using the existing path elements, which means that the file
640ends up being created in "path/bar". Another way to accomplish this link
641preservation is to use the bf(--keep-dirlinks) option (which will also
642affect symlinks to directories in the rest of the transfer).
643
644In a similar but opposite scenario, if the transfer of "path/foo/file" is
645requested and "path/foo" is a symlink on the sending side, running without
646bf(--no-implied-dirs) would cause rsync to transform "path/foo" on the
647receiving side into an identical symlink, and then attempt to transfer
648"path/foo/file", which might fail if the duplicated symlink did not point
649to a directory on the receiving side. Another way to avoid this sending of
650a symlink as an implied directory is to use bf(--copy-unsafe-links), or
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651bf(--copy-dirlinks) (both of which also affect symlinks in the rest of the
652transfer -- see their descriptions for full details).
41059f75 653
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654dit(bf(-b, --backup)) With this option, preexisting destination files are
655renamed as each file is transferred or deleted. You can control where the
656backup file goes and what (if any) suffix gets appended using the
faa82484 657bf(--backup-dir) and bf(--suffix) options.
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658
659Note that if you don't specify bf(--backup-dir), (1) the
660bf(--omit-dir-times) option will be implied, and (2) if bf(--delete) is
2d5279ac 661also in effect (without bf(--delete-excluded)), rsync will add a "protect"
4c72f27d 662filter-rule for the backup suffix to the end of all your existing excludes
f49c8376 663(e.g. bf(-f "Pp *~")). This will prevent previously backed-up files from being
4c72f27d
WD
664deleted. Note that if you are supplying your own filter rules, you may
665need to manually insert your own exclude/protect rule somewhere higher up
666in the list so that it has a high enough priority to be effective (e.g., if
667your rules specify a trailing inclusion/exclusion of '*', the auto-added
668rule would never be reached).
41059f75 669
faa82484 670dit(bf(--backup-dir=DIR)) In combination with the bf(--backup) option, this
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671tells rsync to store all backups in the specified directory on the receiving
672side. This can be used for incremental backups. You can additionally
faa82484 673specify a backup suffix using the bf(--suffix) option
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674(otherwise the files backed up in the specified directory
675will keep their original filenames).
66203a98 676
b5679335 677dit(bf(--suffix=SUFFIX)) This option allows you to override the default
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WD
678backup suffix used with the bf(--backup) (bf(-b)) option. The default suffix is a ~
679if no -bf(-backup-dir) was specified, otherwise it is an empty string.
9ef53907 680
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WD
681dit(bf(-u, --update)) This forces rsync to skip any files which exist on
682the destination and have a modified time that is newer than the source
42b06481 683file. (If an existing destination file has a modification time equal to the
4539c0d7 684source file's, it will be updated if the sizes are different.)
41059f75 685
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WD
686Note that this does not affect the copying of symlinks or other special
687files. Also, a difference of file format between the sender and receiver
688is always considered to be important enough for an update, no matter what
689date is on the objects. In other words, if the source has a directory
690where the destination has a file, the transfer would occur regardless of
691the timestamps.
adddd075 692
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693dit(bf(--inplace)) This causes rsync not to create a new copy of the file
694and then move it into place. Instead rsync will overwrite the existing
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695file, meaning that the rsync algorithm can't accomplish the full amount of
696network reduction it might be able to otherwise (since it does not yet try
697to sort data matches). One exception to this is if you combine the option
faa82484 698with bf(--backup), since rsync is smart enough to use the backup file as the
eb162f3b 699basis file for the transfer.
a3221d2a 700
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701This option is useful for transfer of large files with block-based changes
702or appended data, and also on systems that are disk bound, not network
703bound.
704
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WD
705The option implies bf(--partial) (since an interrupted transfer does not delete
706the file), but conflicts with bf(--partial-dir) and bf(--delay-updates).
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707Prior to rsync 2.6.4 bf(--inplace) was also incompatible with bf(--compare-dest)
708and bf(--link-dest).
a3221d2a 709
399371e7 710WARNING: The file's data will be in an inconsistent state during the
98f51bfb 711transfer (and possibly afterward if the transfer gets interrupted), so you
399371e7 712should not use this option to update files that are in use. Also note that
eb162f3b 713rsync will be unable to update a file in-place that is not writable by the
75b243a5 714receiving user.
a3221d2a 715
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716dit(bf(--append)) This causes rsync to update a file by appending data onto
717the end of the file, which presumes that the data that already exists on
718the receiving side is identical with the start of the file on the sending
719side. If that is not true, the file will fail the checksum test, and the
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WD
720resend will do a normal bf(--inplace) update to correct the mismatched data.
721Only files on the receiving side that are shorter than the corresponding
73f2fa81 722file on the sending side (as well as new files) are transferred.
a8cbb57c
WD
723Implies bf(--inplace), but does not conflict with bf(--sparse) (though the
724bf(--sparse) option will be auto-disabled if a resend of the already-existing
725data is required).
94f20a9f 726
09ed3099 727dit(bf(-d, --dirs)) Tell the sending side to include any directories that
faa82484 728are encountered. Unlike bf(--recursive), a directory's contents are not copied
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WD
729unless the directory name specified is "." or ends with a trailing slash
730(e.g. ".", "dir/.", "dir/", etc.). Without this option or the
faa82484 731bf(--recursive) option, rsync will skip all directories it encounters (and
f40aa6fb 732output a message to that effect for each one). If you specify both
6e6cc163 733bf(--dirs) and bf(--recursive), bf(--recursive) takes precedence.
09ed3099 734
eb06fa95
MP
735dit(bf(-l, --links)) When symlinks are encountered, recreate the
736symlink on the destination.
41059f75 737
f2ebbebe 738dit(bf(-L, --copy-links)) When symlinks are encountered, the item that
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WD
739they point to (the referent) is copied, rather than the symlink. In older
740versions of rsync, this option also had the side-effect of telling the
741receiving side to follow symlinks, such as symlinks to directories. In a
faa82484 742modern rsync such as this one, you'll need to specify bf(--keep-dirlinks) (bf(-K))
ef855d19 743to get this extra behavior. The only exception is when sending files to
faa82484
WD
744an rsync that is too old to understand bf(-K) -- in that case, the bf(-L) option
745will still have the side-effect of bf(-K) on that older receiving rsync.
b5313607 746
eb06fa95 747dit(bf(--copy-unsafe-links)) This tells rsync to copy the referent of
7af4227a 748symbolic links that point outside the copied tree. Absolute symlinks
eb06fa95 749are also treated like ordinary files, and so are any symlinks in the
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WD
750source path itself when bf(--relative) is used. This option has no
751additional effect if bf(--copy-links) was also specified.
41059f75 752
d310a212 753dit(bf(--safe-links)) This tells rsync to ignore any symbolic links
7af4227a 754which point outside the copied tree. All absolute symlinks are
faa82484
WD
755also ignored. Using this option in conjunction with bf(--relative) may
756give unexpected results.
d310a212 757
1a515b49 758dit(bf(-k, --copy-dirlinks)) This option causes the sending side to treat
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759a symlink to a directory as though it were a real directory. This is
760useful if you don't want symlinks to non-directories to be affected, as
761they would be using bf(--copy-links).
41059f75 762
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763Without this option, if the sending side has replaced a directory with a
764symlink to a directory, the receiving side will delete anything that is in
765the way of the new symlink, including a directory hierarchy (as long as
766bf(--force) or bf(--delete) is in effect).
41059f75 767
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WD
768See also bf(--keep-dirlinks) for an analogous option for the receiving
769side.
41059f75 770
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WD
771dit(bf(-K, --keep-dirlinks)) This option causes the receiving side to treat
772a symlink to a directory as though it were a real directory, but only if it
773matches a real directory from the sender. Without this option, the
774receiver's symlink would be deleted and replaced with a real directory.
09ed3099 775
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776For example, suppose you transfer a directory "foo" that contains a file
777"file", but "foo" is a symlink to directory "bar" on the receiver. Without
778bf(--keep-dirlinks), the receiver deletes symlink "foo", recreates it as a
779directory, and receives the file into the new directory. With
780bf(--keep-dirlinks), the receiver keeps the symlink and "file" ends up in
781"bar".
782
783See also bf(--copy-dirlinks) for an analogous option for the sending side.
784
785dit(bf(-H, --hard-links)) This tells rsync to look for hard-linked files in
786the transfer and link together the corresponding files on the receiving
787side. Without this option, hard-linked files in the transfer are treated
788as though they were separate files.
789
790Note that rsync can only detect hard links if both parts of the link
791are in the list of files being sent.
41059f75 792
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793dit(bf(-p, --perms)) This option causes the receiving rsync to set the
794destination permissions to be the same as the source permissions. (See
795also the bf(--chmod) option for a way to modify what rsync considers to
796be the source permissions.)
8dc74608 797
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798When this option is em(off), permissions are set as follows:
799
b8a6dae0 800quote(itemization(
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WD
801 it() Existing files (including updated files) retain their existing
802 permissions, though the bf(--executability) option might change just
803 the execute permission for the file.
77ed253c 804 it() New files get their "normal" permission bits set to the source
1c3344a1
WD
805 file's permissions masked with the receiving directory's default
806 permissions (either the receiving process's umask, or the permissions
807 specified via the destination directory's default ACL), and
77ed253c
WD
808 their special permission bits disabled except in the case where a new
809 directory inherits a setgid bit from its parent directory.
2d5279ac 810))
77ed253c 811
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WD
812Thus, when bf(--perms) and bf(--executability) are both disabled,
813rsync's behavior is the same as that of other file-copy utilities,
814such as bf(cp)(1) and bf(tar)(1).
815
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WD
816In summary: to give destination files (both old and new) the source
817permissions, use bf(--perms). To give new files the destination-default
1f77038e 818permissions (while leaving existing files unchanged), make sure that the
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WD
819bf(--perms) option is off and use bf(--chmod=ugo=rwX) (which ensures that
820all non-masked bits get enabled). If you'd care to make this latter
821behavior easier to type, you could define a popt alias for it, such as
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WD
822putting this line in the file ~/.popt (this defines the bf(-s) option,
823and includes --no-g to use the default group of the destination dir):
77ed253c 824
662127e6 825quote(tt( rsync alias -s --no-p --no-g --chmod=ugo=rwX))
77ed253c
WD
826
827You could then use this new option in a command such as this one:
828
829quote(tt( rsync -asv src/ dest/))
830
662127e6
WD
831(Caveat: make sure that bf(-a) does not follow bf(-s), or it will re-enable
832the "--no-*" options.)
833
77ed253c
WD
834The preservation of the destination's setgid bit on newly-created
835directories when bf(--perms) is off was added in rsync 2.6.7. Older rsync
836versions erroneously preserved the three special permission bits for
837newly-created files when bf(--perms) was off, while overriding the
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WD
838destination's setgid bit setting on a newly-created directory. Default ACL
839observance was added to the ACL patch for rsync 2.6.7, so older (or
840non-ACL-enabled) rsyncs use the umask even if default ACLs are present.
841(Keep in mind that it is the version of the receiving rsync that affects
842these behaviors.)
77ed253c 843
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WD
844dit(bf(-E, --executability)) This option causes rsync to preserve the
845executability (or non-executability) of regular files when bf(--perms) is
846not enabled. A regular file is considered to be executable if at least one
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WD
847'x' is turned on in its permissions. When an existing destination file's
848executability differs from that of the corresponding source file, rsync
849modifies the destination file's permissions as follows:
2d5279ac 850
b8a6dae0 851quote(itemization(
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WD
852 it() To make a file non-executable, rsync turns off all its 'x'
853 permissions.
854 it() To make a file executable, rsync turns on each 'x' permission that
855 has a corresponding 'r' permission enabled.
856))
857
858If bf(--perms) is enabled, this option is ignored.
41059f75 859
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WD
860dit(bf(-A, --acls)) This option causes rsync to update the destination
861ACLs to be the same as the source ACLs. This nonstandard option only
862works if the remote rsync also supports it. bf(--acls) implies bf(--perms).
863
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WD
864dit(bf(-X, --xattrs)) This option causes rsync to update the remote
865extended attributes to be the same as the local ones. This will work
eb7e7b24 866only if the remote machine's rsync also supports this option.
16edf865 867
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WD
868dit(bf(--chmod)) This option tells rsync to apply one or more
869comma-separated "chmod" strings to the permission of the files in the
870transfer. The resulting value is treated as though it was the permissions
871that the sending side supplied for the file, which means that this option
872can seem to have no effect on existing files if bf(--perms) is not enabled.
873
874In addition to the normal parsing rules specified in the bf(chmod)(1)
875manpage, you can specify an item that should only apply to a directory by
876prefixing it with a 'D', or specify an item that should only apply to a
877file by prefixing it with a 'F'. For example:
878
879quote(--chmod=Dg+s,ug+w,Fo-w,+X)
880
881It is also legal to specify multiple bf(--chmod) options, as each
882additional option is just appended to the list of changes to make.
883
884See the bf(--perms) and bf(--executability) options for how the resulting
885permission value can be applied to the files in the transfer.
886
eb06fa95 887dit(bf(-o, --owner)) This option causes rsync to set the owner of the
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888destination file to be the same as the source file, but only if the
889receiving rsync is being run as the super-user (see also the bf(--super)
9439c0cb 890and bf(--fake-super) options).
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891Without this option, the owner is set to the invoking user on the
892receiving side.
893
894The preservation of ownership will associate matching names by default, but
895may fall back to using the ID number in some circumstances (see also the
896bf(--numeric-ids) option for a full discussion).
41059f75 897
eb06fa95
MP
898dit(bf(-g, --group)) This option causes rsync to set the group of the
899destination file to be the same as the source file. If the receiving
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900program is not running as the super-user (or if bf(--no-super) was
901specified), only groups that the invoking user on the receiving side
902is a member of will be preserved.
903Without this option, the group is set to the default group of the invoking
904user on the receiving side.
905
906The preservation of group information will associate matching names by
907default, but may fall back to using the ID number in some circumstances
908(see also the bf(--numeric-ids) option for a full discussion).
41059f75 909
4e7d07c8 910dit(bf(--devices)) This option causes rsync to transfer character and
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911block device files to the remote system to recreate these devices.
912This option has no effect if the receiving rsync is not run as the
9439c0cb 913super-user (see also the bf(--super) and bf(--fake-super) options).
41059f75 914
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915dit(bf(--specials)) This option causes rsync to transfer special files
916such as named sockets and fifos.
917
918dit(bf(-D)) The bf(-D) option is equivalent to bf(--devices) bf(--specials).
919
41059f75 920dit(bf(-t, --times)) This tells rsync to transfer modification times along
baf3e504
DD
921with the files and update them on the remote system. Note that if this
922option is not used, the optimization that excludes files that have not been
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923modified cannot be effective; in other words, a missing bf(-t) or bf(-a) will
924cause the next transfer to behave as if it used bf(-I), causing all files to be
d0bc3520 925updated (though the rsync algorithm will make the update fairly efficient
faa82484 926if the files haven't actually changed, you're much better off using bf(-t)).
41059f75 927
54e66f1d 928dit(bf(-O, --omit-dir-times)) This tells rsync to omit directories when
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929it is preserving modification times (see bf(--times)). If NFS is sharing
930the directories on the receiving side, it is a good idea to use bf(-O).
fbe5eeb8 931This option is inferred if you use bf(--backup) without bf(--backup-dir).
54e66f1d 932
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933dit(bf(--super)) This tells the receiving side to attempt super-user
934activities even if the receiving rsync wasn't run by the super-user. These
935activities include: preserving users via the bf(--owner) option, preserving
936all groups (not just the current user's groups) via the bf(--groups)
937option, and copying devices via the bf(--devices) option. This is useful
938for systems that allow such activities without being the super-user, and
939also for ensuring that you will get errors if the receiving side isn't
940being running as the super-user. To turn off super-user activities, the
941super-user can use bf(--no-super).
942
9439c0cb
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943dit(bf(--fake-super)) When this option is enabled, rsync simulates
944super-user activities by saving/restoring the privileged attributes via a
945special extended attribute that is attached to each file (as needed). This
946includes the file's owner and group (if it is not the default), the file's
947device info (device & special files are created as empty text files), and
948any permission bits that we won't allow to be set on the real file (e.g.
949the real file gets u-s,g-s,o-t for safety) or that would limit the owner's
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950access (since the real super-user can always access/change a file, the
951files we create can always be accessed/changed by the creating user).
9439c0cb
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952
953The bf(--fake-super) option only affects the side where the option is used.
954To affect the remote side of a remote-shell connection, specify an rsync
955path:
956
957quote(tt( rsync -av --rsync-path="rsync --fake-super" /src/ host:/dest/))
958
959Since there is only one "side" in a local copy, this option affects both
960the sending and recieving of files. You'll need to specify a copy using
961"localhost" if you need to avoid this. Note, however, that it is always
962safe to copy from some non-fake-super files into some fake-super files
963using a local bf(--fake-super) command because the non-fake source files
964will just have their normal attributes.
965
966This option is overridden by both bf(--super) and bf(--no-super).
967
968See also the "fake super" setting in the daemon's rsyncd.conf file.
969
41059f75 970dit(bf(-S, --sparse)) Try to handle sparse files efficiently so they take
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971up less space on the destination. Conflicts with bf(--inplace) because it's
972not possible to overwrite data in a sparse fashion.
41059f75 973
d310a212
AT
974NOTE: Don't use this option when the destination is a Solaris "tmpfs"
975filesystem. It doesn't seem to handle seeks over null regions
976correctly and ends up corrupting the files.
977
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WD
978dit(bf(-n, --dry-run)) This tells rsync to not do any file transfers,
979instead it will just report the actions it would have taken.
980
26ac1812 981dit(bf(-W, --whole-file)) With this option the delta transfer algorithm
f2ebbebe
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982is not used and the whole file is sent as-is instead. The transfer may be
983faster if this option is used when the bandwidth between the source and
984destination machines is higher than the bandwidth to disk (especially when the
985"disk" is actually a networked filesystem). This is the default when both
986the source and destination are specified as local paths.
987
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988dit(bf(-x, --one-file-system)) This tells rsync to avoid crossing a
989filesystem boundary when recursing. This does not limit the user's ability
990to specify items to copy from multiple filesystems, just rsync's recursion
991through the hierarchy of each directory that the user specified, and also
992the analogous recursion on the receiving side during deletion. Also keep
993in mind that rsync treats a "bind" mount to the same device as being on the
77ed253c 994same filesystem.
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995
996If this option is repeated, rsync omits all mount-point directories from
997the copy. Otherwise, it includes an empty directory at each mount-point it
998encounters (using the attributes of the mounted directory because those of
999the underlying mount-point directory are inaccessible).
1000
1001If rsync has been told to collapse symlinks (via bf(--copy-links) or
1002bf(--copy-unsafe-links)), a symlink to a directory on another device is
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WD
1003treated like a mount-point. Symlinks to non-directories are unaffected
1004by this option.
6d8c6bdb 1005
9639c718 1006dit(bf(--existing, --ignore-non-existing)) This tells rsync to skip
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1007creating files (including directories) that do not exist
1008yet on the destination. If this option is
9639c718 1009combined with the bf(--ignore-existing) option, no files will be updated
8e3b627d 1010(which can be useful if all you want to do is delete extraneous files).
9639c718 1011
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1012dit(bf(--ignore-existing)) This tells rsync to skip updating files that
1013already exist on the destination (this does em(not) ignore existing
c5b6e57a 1014directories, or nothing would get done). See also bf(--existing).
1347d512 1015
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1016This option can be useful for those doing backups using the bf(--link-dest)
1017option when they need to continue a backup run that got interrupted. Since
1018a bf(--link-dest) run is copied into a new directory hierarchy (when it is
1019used properly), using bf(--ignore existing) will ensure that the
1020already-handled files don't get tweaked (which avoids a change in
1021permissions on the hard-linked files). This does mean that this option
1022is only looking at the existing files in the destination hierarchy itself.
1023
47c11975 1024dit(bf(--remove-source-files)) This tells rsync to remove from the sending
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WD
1025side the files (meaning non-directories) that are a part of the transfer
1026and have been successfully duplicated on the receiving side.
96110304 1027
2c0fa6c5 1028dit(bf(--delete)) This tells rsync to delete extraneous files from the
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1029receiving side (ones that aren't on the sending side), but only for the
1030directories that are being synchronized. You must have asked rsync to
1031send the whole directory (e.g. "dir" or "dir/") without using a wildcard
1032for the directory's contents (e.g. "dir/*") since the wildcard is expanded
ae76a740 1033by the shell and rsync thus gets a request to transfer individual files, not
e8b155a3 1034the files' parent directory. Files that are excluded from transfer are
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WD
1035also excluded from being deleted unless you use the bf(--delete-excluded)
1036option or mark the rules as only matching on the sending side (see the
1037include/exclude modifiers in the FILTER RULES section).
41059f75 1038
505ada14 1039Prior to rsync 2.6.7, this option would have no effect unless bf(--recursive)
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1040was enabled. Beginning with 2.6.7, deletions will also occur when bf(--dirs)
1041(bf(-d)) is enabled, but only for directories whose contents are being copied.
24986abd 1042
b33b791e 1043This option can be dangerous if used incorrectly! It is a very good idea
faa82484 1044to run first using the bf(--dry-run) option (bf(-n)) to see what files would be
b33b791e 1045deleted to make sure important files aren't listed.
41059f75 1046
e8b155a3 1047If the sending side detects any I/O errors, then the deletion of any
3e578a19
AT
1048files at the destination will be automatically disabled. This is to
1049prevent temporary filesystem failures (such as NFS errors) on the
1050sending side causing a massive deletion of files on the
faa82484 1051destination. You can override this with the bf(--ignore-errors) option.
41059f75 1052
faa82484
WD
1053The bf(--delete) option may be combined with one of the --delete-WHEN options
1054without conflict, as well as bf(--delete-excluded). However, if none of the
d9f46544
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1055--delete-WHEN options are specified, rsync will choose the
1056bf(--delete-during) algorithm when talking to an rsync 3.0.0 or newer, and
1057the bf(--delete-before) algorithm when talking to an older rsync. See also
1058bf(--delete-delay) and bf(--delete-after).
2c0fa6c5
WD
1059
1060dit(bf(--delete-before)) Request that the file-deletions on the receiving
d9f46544 1061side be done before the transfer starts.
faa82484 1062See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
2c0fa6c5
WD
1063
1064Deleting before the transfer is helpful if the filesystem is tight for space
aaca3daa 1065and removing extraneous files would help to make the transfer possible.
ae76a740 1066However, it does introduce a delay before the start of the transfer,
faa82484 1067and this delay might cause the transfer to timeout (if bf(--timeout) was
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1068specified). It also forces rsync to use the old, non-incremental recursion
1069algorithm that requires rsync to scan all the files in the transfer into
1070memory at once (see bf(--recursive)).
ae76a740 1071
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WD
1072dit(bf(--delete-during, --del)) Request that the file-deletions on the
1073receiving side be done incrementally as the transfer happens. This is
ae283632 1074a faster method than choosing the before- or after-transfer algorithm,
ae76a740 1075but it is only supported beginning with rsync version 2.6.4.
faa82484 1076See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
aaca3daa 1077
fd0a130c 1078dit(bf(--delete-delay)) Request that the file-deletions on the receiving
d9f46544
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1079side be computed during the transfer, and then removed after the transfer
1080completes. If the number of removed files overflows an internal buffer, a
1081temporary file will be created on the receiving side to hold the names (it
1082is removed while open, so you shouldn't see it during the transfer). If
1083the creation of the temporary file fails, rsync will try to fall back to
1084using bf(--delete-after) (which it cannot do if bf(--recursive) is doing an
1085incremental scan).
fd0a130c 1086
2c0fa6c5 1087dit(bf(--delete-after)) Request that the file-deletions on the receiving
ae76a740
WD
1088side be done after the transfer has completed. This is useful if you
1089are sending new per-directory merge files as a part of the transfer and
1090you want their exclusions to take effect for the delete phase of the
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WD
1091current transfer. It also forces rsync to use the old, non-incremental
1092recursion algorithm that requires rsync to scan all the files in the
1093transfer into memory at once (see bf(--recursive)).
faa82484 1094See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
e8b155a3 1095
866925bf
WD
1096dit(bf(--delete-excluded)) In addition to deleting the files on the
1097receiving side that are not on the sending side, this tells rsync to also
faa82484 1098delete any files on the receiving side that are excluded (see bf(--exclude)).
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WD
1099See the FILTER RULES section for a way to make individual exclusions behave
1100this way on the receiver, and for a way to protect files from
1101bf(--delete-excluded).
faa82484 1102See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
866925bf 1103
faa82484 1104dit(bf(--ignore-errors)) Tells bf(--delete) to go ahead and delete files
b5accaba 1105even when there are I/O errors.
2c5548d2 1106
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WD
1107dit(bf(--force)) This option tells rsync to delete a non-empty directory
1108when it is to be replaced by a non-directory. This is only relevant if
1109deletions are not active (see bf(--delete) for details).
1110
1111Note for older rsync versions: bf(--force) used to still be required when
1112using bf(--delete-after), and it used to be non-functional unless the
1113bf(--recursive) option was also enabled.
41059f75 1114
e2124620 1115dit(bf(--max-delete=NUM)) This tells rsync not to delete more than NUM
e6109f49
WD
1116files or directories. If that limit is exceeded, a warning is output
1117and rsync exits with an error code of 25 (new for 3.0.0).
1118
1119Also new for version 3.0.0, you may specify bf(--max-delete=0) to be warned
1120about any extraneous files in the destination without removing any of them.
1121Older clients interpreted this as "unlimited", so if you don't know what
1122version the client is, you can use the less obvious bf(--max-delete=-1) as
1123a backward-compatible way to specify that no deletions be allowed (though
1124older versions didn't warn when the limit was exceeded).
e2124620
WD
1125
1126dit(bf(--max-size=SIZE)) This tells rsync to avoid transferring any
1127file that is larger than the specified SIZE. The SIZE value can be
926d86d1 1128suffixed with a string to indicate a size multiplier, and
e2124620
WD
1129may be a fractional value (e.g. "bf(--max-size=1.5m)").
1130
bee9df73
WD
1131The suffixes are as follows: "K" (or "KiB") is a kibibyte (1024),
1132"M" (or "MiB") is a mebibyte (1024*1024), and "G" (or "GiB") is a
1133gibibyte (1024*1024*1024).
1134If you want the multiplier to be 1000 instead of 1024, use "KB",
1135"MB", or "GB". (Note: lower-case is also accepted for all values.)
926d86d1
WD
1136Finally, if the suffix ends in either "+1" or "-1", the value will
1137be offset by one byte in the indicated direction.
bee9df73
WD
1138
1139Examples: --max-size=1.5mb-1 is 1499999 bytes, and --max-size=2g+1 is
926d86d1
WD
11402147483649 bytes.
1141
59dd6786
WD
1142dit(bf(--min-size=SIZE)) This tells rsync to avoid transferring any
1143file that is smaller than the specified SIZE, which can help in not
1144transferring small, junk files.
1145See the bf(--max-size) option for a description of SIZE.
1146
3ed8eb3f
WD
1147dit(bf(-B, --block-size=BLOCKSIZE)) This forces the block size used in
1148the rsync algorithm to a fixed value. It is normally selected based on
1149the size of each file being updated. See the technical report for details.
41059f75 1150
b5679335 1151dit(bf(-e, --rsh=COMMAND)) This option allows you to choose an alternative
41059f75 1152remote shell program to use for communication between the local and
43cd760f
WD
1153remote copies of rsync. Typically, rsync is configured to use ssh by
1154default, but you may prefer to use rsh on a local network.
41059f75 1155
bef49340 1156If this option is used with bf([user@]host::module/path), then the
5a727522 1157remote shell em(COMMAND) will be used to run an rsync daemon on the
bef49340
WD
1158remote host, and all data will be transmitted through that remote
1159shell connection, rather than through a direct socket connection to a
754a080f
WD
1160running rsync daemon on the remote host. See the section "USING
1161RSYNC-DAEMON FEATURES VIA A REMOTE-SHELL CONNECTION" above.
bef49340 1162
ea7f8108 1163Command-line arguments are permitted in COMMAND provided that COMMAND is
5d9530fe
WD
1164presented to rsync as a single argument. You must use spaces (not tabs
1165or other whitespace) to separate the command and args from each other,
1166and you can use single- and/or double-quotes to preserve spaces in an
1167argument (but not backslashes). Note that doubling a single-quote
1168inside a single-quoted string gives you a single-quote; likewise for
1169double-quotes (though you need to pay attention to which quotes your
1170shell is parsing and which quotes rsync is parsing). Some examples:
98393ae2 1171
5d9530fe
WD
1172quote(
1173tt( -e 'ssh -p 2234')nl()
1174tt( -e 'ssh -o "ProxyCommand nohup ssh firewall nc -w1 %h %p"')nl()
1175)
98393ae2
WD
1176
1177(Note that ssh users can alternately customize site-specific connect
1178options in their .ssh/config file.)
1179
41059f75 1180You can also choose the remote shell program using the RSYNC_RSH
faa82484 1181environment variable, which accepts the same range of values as bf(-e).
41059f75 1182
faa82484 1183See also the bf(--blocking-io) option which is affected by this option.
735a816e 1184
68e169ab
WD
1185dit(bf(--rsync-path=PROGRAM)) Use this to specify what program is to be run
1186on the remote machine to start-up rsync. Often used when rsync is not in
1187the default remote-shell's path (e.g. --rsync-path=/usr/local/bin/rsync).
1188Note that PROGRAM is run with the help of a shell, so it can be any
1189program, script, or command sequence you'd care to run, so long as it does
1190not corrupt the standard-in & standard-out that rsync is using to
1191communicate.
1192
1193One tricky example is to set a different default directory on the remote
1194machine for use with the bf(--relative) option. For instance:
1195
c5b6e57a 1196quote(tt( rsync -avR --rsync-path="cd /a/b && rsync" host:c/d /e/))
41059f75 1197
f177b7cc
WD
1198dit(bf(-C, --cvs-exclude)) This is a useful shorthand for excluding a
1199broad range of files that you often don't want to transfer between
c575f8ce 1200systems. It uses a similar algorithm to CVS to determine if
f177b7cc
WD
1201a file should be ignored.
1202
c575f8ce
WD
1203The exclude list is initialized to exclude the following items (these
1204initial items are marked as perishable -- see the FILTER RULES section):
f177b7cc 1205
faa82484 1206quote(quote(tt(RCS SCCS CVS CVS.adm RCSLOG cvslog.* tags TAGS .make.state
2a383be0 1207.nse_depinfo *~ #* .#* ,* _$* *$ *.old *.bak *.BAK *.orig *.rej
c575f8ce 1208.del-* *.a *.olb *.o *.obj *.so *.exe *.Z *.elc *.ln core .svn/ .bzr/)))
f177b7cc 1209
c575f8ce 1210then, files listed in a $HOME/.cvsignore are added to the list and any
2a383be0
WD
1211files listed in the CVSIGNORE environment variable (all cvsignore names
1212are delimited by whitespace).
1213
f177b7cc 1214Finally, any file is ignored if it is in the same directory as a
bafa4875
WD
1215.cvsignore file and matches one of the patterns listed therein. Unlike
1216rsync's filter/exclude files, these patterns are split on whitespace.
49f4cfdf 1217See the bf(cvs)(1) manual for more information.
f177b7cc 1218
bafa4875
WD
1219If you're combining bf(-C) with your own bf(--filter) rules, you should
1220note that these CVS excludes are appended at the end of your own rules,
3753975f 1221regardless of where the bf(-C) was placed on the command-line. This makes them
bafa4875
WD
1222a lower priority than any rules you specified explicitly. If you want to
1223control where these CVS excludes get inserted into your filter rules, you
1224should omit the bf(-C) as a command-line option and use a combination of
1225bf(--filter=:C) and bf(--filter=-C) (either on your command-line or by
1226putting the ":C" and "-C" rules into a filter file with your other rules).
1227The first option turns on the per-directory scanning for the .cvsignore
1228file. The second option does a one-time import of the CVS excludes
1229mentioned above.
1230
16e5de84
WD
1231dit(bf(-f, --filter=RULE)) This option allows you to add rules to selectively
1232exclude certain files from the list of files to be transferred. This is
1233most useful in combination with a recursive transfer.
41059f75 1234
faa82484 1235You may use as many bf(--filter) options on the command line as you like
41059f75
AT
1236to build up the list of files to exclude.
1237
16e5de84
WD
1238See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
1239
faa82484 1240dit(bf(-F)) The bf(-F) option is a shorthand for adding two bf(--filter) rules to
16e5de84
WD
1241your command. The first time it is used is a shorthand for this rule:
1242
78be8e0f 1243quote(tt( --filter='dir-merge /.rsync-filter'))
16e5de84
WD
1244
1245This tells rsync to look for per-directory .rsync-filter files that have
1246been sprinkled through the hierarchy and use their rules to filter the
faa82484 1247files in the transfer. If bf(-F) is repeated, it is a shorthand for this
16e5de84
WD
1248rule:
1249
78be8e0f 1250quote(tt( --filter='exclude .rsync-filter'))
16e5de84
WD
1251
1252This filters out the .rsync-filter files themselves from the transfer.
1253
1254See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on how these options
1255work.
1256
1257dit(bf(--exclude=PATTERN)) This option is a simplified form of the
faa82484 1258bf(--filter) option that defaults to an exclude rule and does not allow
16e5de84
WD
1259the full rule-parsing syntax of normal filter rules.
1260
1261See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
41059f75 1262
78be8e0f
WD
1263dit(bf(--exclude-from=FILE)) This option is related to the bf(--exclude)
1264option, but it specifies a FILE that contains exclude patterns (one per line).
1265Blank lines in the file and lines starting with ';' or '#' are ignored.
1266If em(FILE) is bf(-), the list will be read from standard input.
f8a94f0d 1267
16e5de84 1268dit(bf(--include=PATTERN)) This option is a simplified form of the
faa82484 1269bf(--filter) option that defaults to an include rule and does not allow
16e5de84 1270the full rule-parsing syntax of normal filter rules.
43bd68e5 1271
16e5de84 1272See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
43bd68e5 1273
78be8e0f
WD
1274dit(bf(--include-from=FILE)) This option is related to the bf(--include)
1275option, but it specifies a FILE that contains include patterns (one per line).
1276Blank lines in the file and lines starting with ';' or '#' are ignored.
1277If em(FILE) is bf(-), the list will be read from standard input.
f8a94f0d 1278
f177b7cc 1279dit(bf(--files-from=FILE)) Using this option allows you to specify the
78be8e0f 1280exact list of files to transfer (as read from the specified FILE or bf(-)
c769702f 1281for standard input). It also tweaks the default behavior of rsync to make
faa82484
WD
1282transferring just the specified files and directories easier:
1283
b8a6dae0 1284quote(itemization(
faa82484
WD
1285 it() The bf(--relative) (bf(-R)) option is implied, which preserves the path
1286 information that is specified for each item in the file (use
f40aa6fb 1287 bf(--no-relative) or bf(--no-R) if you want to turn that off).
faa82484
WD
1288 it() The bf(--dirs) (bf(-d)) option is implied, which will create directories
1289 specified in the list on the destination rather than noisily skipping
f40aa6fb 1290 them (use bf(--no-dirs) or bf(--no-d) if you want to turn that off).
faa82484
WD
1291 it() The bf(--archive) (bf(-a)) option's behavior does not imply bf(--recursive)
1292 (bf(-r)), so specify it explicitly, if you want it.
f40aa6fb
WD
1293 it() These side-effects change the default state of rsync, so the position
1294 of the bf(--files-from) option on the command-line has no bearing on how
1295 other options are parsed (e.g. bf(-a) works the same before or after
1296 bf(--files-from), as does bf(--no-R) and all other options).
faa82484 1297))
f177b7cc 1298
809724d7 1299The filenames that are read from the FILE are all relative to the
f177b7cc
WD
1300source dir -- any leading slashes are removed and no ".." references are
1301allowed to go higher than the source dir. For example, take this
1302command:
1303
faa82484 1304quote(tt( rsync -a --files-from=/tmp/foo /usr remote:/backup))
f177b7cc
WD
1305
1306If /tmp/foo contains the string "bin" (or even "/bin"), the /usr/bin
51cc96e4
WD
1307directory will be created as /backup/bin on the remote host. If it
1308contains "bin/" (note the trailing slash), the immediate contents of
1309the directory would also be sent (without needing to be explicitly
1310mentioned in the file -- this began in version 2.6.4). In both cases,
1311if the bf(-r) option was enabled, that dir's entire hierarchy would
1312also be transferred (keep in mind that bf(-r) needs to be specified
1313explicitly with bf(--files-from), since it is not implied by bf(-a)).
1314Also note
faa82484 1315that the effect of the (enabled by default) bf(--relative) option is to
f177b7cc
WD
1316duplicate only the path info that is read from the file -- it does not
1317force the duplication of the source-spec path (/usr in this case).
1318
faa82484 1319In addition, the bf(--files-from) file can be read from the remote host
f177b7cc
WD
1320instead of the local host if you specify a "host:" in front of the file
1321(the host must match one end of the transfer). As a short-cut, you can
1322specify just a prefix of ":" to mean "use the remote end of the
1323transfer". For example:
1324
faa82484 1325quote(tt( rsync -a --files-from=:/path/file-list src:/ /tmp/copy))
f177b7cc
WD
1326
1327This would copy all the files specified in the /path/file-list file that
1328was located on the remote "src" host.
1329
fa92818a 1330dit(bf(-0, --from0)) This tells rsync that the rules/filenames it reads from a
f177b7cc 1331file are terminated by a null ('\0') character, not a NL, CR, or CR+LF.
faa82484
WD
1332This affects bf(--exclude-from), bf(--include-from), bf(--files-from), and any
1333merged files specified in a bf(--filter) rule.
1334It does not affect bf(--cvs-exclude) (since all names read from a .cvsignore
f01b6368 1335file are split on whitespace).
41059f75 1336
b5679335 1337dit(bf(-T, --temp-dir=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use DIR as a
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1338scratch directory when creating temporary copies of the files transferred
1339on the receiving side. The default behavior is to create each temporary
1340file in the same directory as the associated destination file.
41059f75 1341
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1342This option is most often used when the receiving disk partition does not
1343have enough free space to hold a copy of the largest file in the transfer.
1344In this case (i.e. when the scratch directory in on a different disk
1345partition), rsync will not be able to rename each received temporary file
1346over the top of the associated destination file, but instead must copy it
1347into place. Rsync does this by copying the file over the top of the
1348destination file, which means that the destination file will contain
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1349truncated data during this copy. If this were not done this way (even if
1350the destination file were first removed, the data locally copied to a
1351temporary file in the destination directory, and then renamed into place)
1352it would be possible for the old file to continue taking up disk space (if
1353someone had it open), and thus there might not be enough room to fit the
1354new version on the disk at the same time.
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WD
1355
1356If you are using this option for reasons other than a shortage of disk
1357space, you may wish to combine it with the bf(--delay-updates) option,
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1358which will ensure that all copied files get put into subdirectories in the
1359destination hierarchy, awaiting the end of the transfer. If you don't
1360have enough room to duplicate all the arriving files on the destination
1361partition, another way to tell rsync that you aren't overly concerned
1362about disk space is to use the bf(--partial-dir) option with a relative
1363path; because this tells rsync that it is OK to stash off a copy of a
1364single file in a subdir in the destination hierarchy, rsync will use the
1365partial-dir as a staging area to bring over the copied file, and then
1366rename it into place from there. (Specifying a bf(--partial-dir) with
1367an absolute path does not have this side-effect.)
9ec1ef25 1368
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1369dit(bf(-y, --fuzzy)) This option tells rsync that it should look for a
1370basis file for any destination file that is missing. The current algorithm
1371looks in the same directory as the destination file for either a file that
1372has an identical size and modified-time, or a similarly-named file. If
1373found, rsync uses the fuzzy basis file to try to speed up the transfer.
1374
1375Note that the use of the bf(--delete) option might get rid of any potential
1376fuzzy-match files, so either use bf(--delete-after) or specify some
1377filename exclusions if you need to prevent this.
1378
b127c1dc 1379dit(bf(--compare-dest=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use em(DIR) on
e49f61f5
WD
1380the destination machine as an additional hierarchy to compare destination
1381files against doing transfers (if the files are missing in the destination
1382directory). If a file is found in em(DIR) that is identical to the
1383sender's file, the file will NOT be transferred to the destination
1384directory. This is useful for creating a sparse backup of just files that
1385have changed from an earlier backup.
1386
faa82484 1387Beginning in version 2.6.4, multiple bf(--compare-dest) directories may be
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WD
1388provided, which will cause rsync to search the list in the order specified
1389for an exact match.
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WD
1390If a match is found that differs only in attributes, a local copy is made
1391and the attributes updated.
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WD
1392If a match is not found, a basis file from one of the em(DIR)s will be
1393selected to try to speed up the transfer.
e49f61f5
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1394
1395If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
2f03ce67 1396See also bf(--copy-dest) and bf(--link-dest).
b127c1dc 1397
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WD
1398dit(bf(--copy-dest=DIR)) This option behaves like bf(--compare-dest), but
1399rsync will also copy unchanged files found in em(DIR) to the destination
1400directory using a local copy.
1401This is useful for doing transfers to a new destination while leaving
1402existing files intact, and then doing a flash-cutover when all files have
1403been successfully transferred.
1404
1405Multiple bf(--copy-dest) directories may be provided, which will cause
1406rsync to search the list in the order specified for an unchanged file.
1407If a match is not found, a basis file from one of the em(DIR)s will be
1408selected to try to speed up the transfer.
1409
1410If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
1411See also bf(--compare-dest) and bf(--link-dest).
1412
1413dit(bf(--link-dest=DIR)) This option behaves like bf(--copy-dest), but
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WD
1414unchanged files are hard linked from em(DIR) to the destination directory.
1415The files must be identical in all preserved attributes (e.g. permissions,
1416possibly ownership) in order for the files to be linked together.
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WD
1417An example:
1418
faa82484 1419quote(tt( rsync -av --link-dest=$PWD/prior_dir host:src_dir/ new_dir/))
59c95e42 1420
99eb41b2
WD
1421Beginning in version 2.6.4, multiple bf(--link-dest) directories may be
1422provided, which will cause rsync to search the list in the order specified
1423for an exact match.
2f03ce67
WD
1424If a match is found that differs only in attributes, a local copy is made
1425and the attributes updated.
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WD
1426If a match is not found, a basis file from one of the em(DIR)s will be
1427selected to try to speed up the transfer.
e49f61f5 1428
33689f48
WD
1429This option works best when copying into an empty destination hierarchy, as
1430rsync treats existing files as definitive (so it never looks in the link-dest
1431dirs when a destination file already exists), and as malleable (so it might
1432change the attributes of a destination file, which affects all the hard-linked
1433versions).
1434
d04e95e9
WD
1435Note that if you combine this option with bf(--ignore-times), rsync will not
1436link any files together because it only links identical files together as a
1437substitute for transferring the file, never as an additional check after the
1438file is updated.
1439
e49f61f5 1440If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
2f03ce67 1441See also bf(--compare-dest) and bf(--copy-dest).
b127c1dc 1442
e0204f56 1443Note that rsync versions prior to 2.6.1 had a bug that could prevent
d38772e0
WD
1444bf(--link-dest) from working properly for a non-super-user when bf(-o) was
1445specified (or implied by bf(-a)). You can work-around this bug by avoiding
1446the bf(-o) option when sending to an old rsync.
e0204f56 1447
32a5edf4
WD
1448dit(bf(-z, --compress)) With this option, rsync compresses the file data
1449as it is sent to the destination machine, which reduces the amount of data
1450being transmitted -- something that is useful over a slow connection.
41059f75 1451
02184920 1452Note that this option typically achieves better compression ratios than can
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WD
1453be achieved by using a compressing remote shell or a compressing transport
1454because it takes advantage of the implicit information in the matching data
1455blocks that are not explicitly sent over the connection.
41059f75 1456
2b967218
WD
1457See the bf(--skip-compress) option for the default list of file suffixes
1458that will not be compressed.
1459
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WD
1460dit(bf(--compress-level=NUM)) Explicitly set the compression level to use
1461(see bf(--compress)) instead of letting it default. If NUM is non-zero,
1462the bf(--compress) option is implied.
1463
2b967218
WD
1464dit(bf(--skip-compress=LIST)) Override the list of file suffixes that will
1465not be compressed. The bf(LIST) should be one or more file suffixes
1466(without the dot) separated by slashes (/).
1467
1468You may specify an empty string to indicate that no file should be skipped.
1469
1470Simple character-class matching is supported: each must consist of a list
1471of letters inside the square brackets (e.g. no special classes, such as
1472"[:alpha:]", are supported).
1473
1474The characters asterisk (*) and question-mark (?) have no special meaning.
1475
1476Here's an example that specifies 6 suffixes to skip (since 1 of the 5 rules
1477matches 2 suffixes):
1478
1479verb( --skip-compress=gz/jpg/mp[34]/7z/bz2)
1480
1481The default list of suffixes that will not be compressed is this (several
1482of these are newly added for 3.0.0):
1483
1484verb( gz/zip/z/rpm/deb/iso/bz2/t[gb]z/7z/mp[34]/mov/avi/ogg/jpg/jpeg)
1485
1486This list will be replaced by your bf(--skip-compress) list in all but one
1487situation: a copy from a daemon rsync will add your skipped suffixes to
1488its list of non-compressing files (and its list may be configured to a
1489different default).
1490
41059f75 1491dit(bf(--numeric-ids)) With this option rsync will transfer numeric group
4d888108 1492and user IDs rather than using user and group names and mapping them
41059f75
AT
1493at both ends.
1494
4d888108 1495By default rsync will use the username and groupname to determine
41059f75 1496what ownership to give files. The special uid 0 and the special group
faa82484 14970 are never mapped via user/group names even if the bf(--numeric-ids)
41059f75
AT
1498option is not specified.
1499
ec40899b
WD
1500If a user or group has no name on the source system or it has no match
1501on the destination system, then the numeric ID
1502from the source system is used instead. See also the comments on the
a2b0471f
WD
1503"use chroot" setting in the rsyncd.conf manpage for information on how
1504the chroot setting affects rsync's ability to look up the names of the
1505users and groups and what you can do about it.
41059f75 1506
b5accaba 1507dit(bf(--timeout=TIMEOUT)) This option allows you to set a maximum I/O
de2fd20e
AT
1508timeout in seconds. If no data is transferred for the specified time
1509then rsync will exit. The default is 0, which means no timeout.
41059f75 1510
3ae5367f
WD
1511dit(bf(--address)) By default rsync will bind to the wildcard address when
1512connecting to an rsync daemon. The bf(--address) option allows you to
1513specify a specific IP address (or hostname) to bind to. See also this
1514option in the bf(--daemon) mode section.
1515
c259892c
WD
1516dit(bf(--port=PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number to use
1517rather than the default of 873. This is only needed if you are using the
1518double-colon (::) syntax to connect with an rsync daemon (since the URL
1519syntax has a way to specify the port as a part of the URL). See also this
faa82484 1520option in the bf(--daemon) mode section.
c259892c 1521
04f48837
WD
1522dit(bf(--sockopts)) This option can provide endless fun for people
1523who like to tune their systems to the utmost degree. You can set all
1524sorts of socket options which may make transfers faster (or
49f4cfdf 1525slower!). Read the man page for the code(setsockopt()) system call for
04f48837
WD
1526details on some of the options you may be able to set. By default no
1527special socket options are set. This only affects direct socket
1528connections to a remote rsync daemon. This option also exists in the
1529bf(--daemon) mode section.
1530
b5accaba 1531dit(bf(--blocking-io)) This tells rsync to use blocking I/O when launching
314a74d7
WD
1532a remote shell transport. If the remote shell is either rsh or remsh,
1533rsync defaults to using
b5accaba
WD
1534blocking I/O, otherwise it defaults to using non-blocking I/O. (Note that
1535ssh prefers non-blocking I/O.)
64c704f0 1536
0cfdf226 1537dit(bf(-i, --itemize-changes)) Requests a simple itemized list of the
4f90eb43 1538changes that are being made to each file, including attribute changes.
4b90820d 1539This is exactly the same as specifying bf(--out-format='%i %n%L').
14cbb645
WD
1540If you repeat the option, unchanged files will also be output, but only
1541if the receiving rsync is at least version 2.6.7 (you can use bf(-vv)
1542with older versions of rsync, but that also turns on the output of other
1543verbose messages).
ea67c715 1544
1c3344a1
WD
1545The "%i" escape has a cryptic output that is 11 letters long. The general
1546format is like the string bf(YXcstpoguax), where bf(Y) is replaced by the
4f417448 1547type of update being done, bf(X) is replaced by the file-type, and the
a314f7c1 1548other letters represent attributes that may be output if they are being
ee171c6d 1549modified.
ea67c715 1550
2d5279ac 1551The update types that replace the bf(Y) are as follows:
ea67c715 1552
b8a6dae0 1553quote(itemization(
cc3e0770 1554 it() A bf(<) means that a file is being transferred to the remote host
a314f7c1 1555 (sent).
cc3e0770
WD
1556 it() A bf(>) means that a file is being transferred to the local host
1557 (received).
c48cff9f 1558 it() A bf(c) means that a local change/creation is occurring for the item
ee171c6d 1559 (such as the creation of a directory or the changing of a symlink, etc.).
02184920 1560 it() A bf(h) means that the item is a hard link to another item (requires
b4875de4 1561 bf(--hard-links)).
ee171c6d
WD
1562 it() A bf(.) means that the item is not being updated (though it might
1563 have attributes that are being modified).
a314f7c1 1564))
ea67c715 1565
a314f7c1 1566The file-types that replace the bf(X) are: bf(f) for a file, a bf(d) for a
4e7d07c8
WD
1567directory, an bf(L) for a symlink, a bf(D) for a device, and a bf(S) for a
1568special file (e.g. named sockets and fifos).
ea67c715 1569
a314f7c1 1570The other letters in the string above are the actual letters that
ea67c715
WD
1571will be output if the associated attribute for the item is being updated or
1572a "." for no change. Three exceptions to this are: (1) a newly created
b9f0ca72
WD
1573item replaces each letter with a "+", (2) an identical item replaces the
1574dots with spaces, and (3) an unknown attribute replaces each letter with
81c453b1 1575a "?" (this can happen when talking to an older rsync).
ea67c715
WD
1576
1577The attribute that is associated with each letter is as follows:
1578
b8a6dae0 1579quote(itemization(
ea67c715 1580 it() A bf(c) means the checksum of the file is different and will be
c48cff9f 1581 updated by the file transfer (requires bf(--checksum)).
ea67c715
WD
1582 it() A bf(s) means the size of the file is different and will be updated
1583 by the file transfer.
1584 it() A bf(t) means the modification time is different and is being updated
5a727522 1585 to the sender's value (requires bf(--times)). An alternate value of bf(T)
42b06481 1586 means that the modification time will be set to the transfer time, which happens
809724d7
WD
1587 anytime a symlink is transferred, or when a regular file or device is
1588 transferred without bf(--times).
ea67c715 1589 it() A bf(p) means the permissions are different and are being updated to
5a727522 1590 the sender's value (requires bf(--perms)).
4dc67d5e 1591 it() An bf(o) means the owner is different and is being updated to the
d38772e0 1592 sender's value (requires bf(--owner) and super-user privileges).
4dc67d5e 1593 it() A bf(g) means the group is different and is being updated to the
5a727522 1594 sender's value (requires bf(--group) and the authority to set the group).
1c3344a1
WD
1595 it() The bf(u) slot is reserved for reporting update (access) time changes
1596 (a feature that is not yet released).
1597 it() The bf(a) means that the ACL information changed.
1598 it() The bf(x) slot is reserved for reporting extended attribute changes
1599 (a feature that is not yet released).
ea67c715
WD
1600))
1601
1602One other output is possible: when deleting files, the "%i" will output
ee171c6d 1603the string "*deleting" for each item that is being removed (assuming that
ea67c715
WD
1604you are talking to a recent enough rsync that it logs deletions instead of
1605outputting them as a verbose message).
dc0f2497 1606
4b90820d
WD
1607dit(bf(--out-format=FORMAT)) This allows you to specify exactly what the
1608rsync client outputs to the user on a per-update basis. The format is a text
ea67c715
WD
1609string containing embedded single-character escape sequences prefixed with
1610a percent (%) character. For a list of the possible escape characters, see
4b90820d 1611the "log format" setting in the rsyncd.conf manpage.
ea67c715
WD
1612
1613Specifying this option will mention each file, dir, etc. that gets updated
1614in a significant way (a transferred file, a recreated symlink/device, or a
4b90820d
WD
1615touched directory). In addition, if the itemize-changes escape (%i) is
1616included in the string, the logging of names increases to mention any
81c453b1 1617item that is changed in any way (as long as the receiving side is at least
7c6ea3d8 16182.6.4). See the bf(--itemize-changes) option for a description of the
ea67c715
WD
1619output of "%i".
1620
1621The bf(--verbose) option implies a format of "%n%L", but you can use
4b90820d 1622bf(--out-format) without bf(--verbose) if you like, or you can override
ea67c715
WD
1623the format of its per-file output using this option.
1624
4b90820d 1625Rsync will output the out-format string prior to a file's transfer unless
ea67c715
WD
1626one of the transfer-statistic escapes is requested, in which case the
1627logging is done at the end of the file's transfer. When this late logging
1628is in effect and bf(--progress) is also specified, rsync will also output
1629the name of the file being transferred prior to its progress information
4b90820d
WD
1630(followed, of course, by the out-format output).
1631
1632dit(bf(--log-file=FILE)) This option causes rsync to log what it is doing
1633to a file. This is similar to the logging that a daemon does, but can be
1634requested for the client side and/or the server side of a non-daemon
1635transfer. If specified as a client option, transfer logging will be
1636enabled with a default format of "%i %n%L". See the bf(--log-file-format)
1637option if you wish to override this.
1638
1639Here's a example command that requests the remote side to log what is
1640happening:
1641
1642verb( rsync -av --rsync-path="rsync --log-file=/tmp/rlog" src/ dest/)
1643
1644This is very useful if you need to debug why a connection is closing
1645unexpectedly.
1646
1647dit(bf(--log-file-format=FORMAT)) This allows you to specify exactly what
1648per-update logging is put into the file specified by the bf(--log-file) option
1649(which must also be specified for this option to have any effect). If you
1650specify an empty string, updated files will not be mentioned in the log file.
1651For a list of the possible escape characters, see the "log format" setting
1652in the rsyncd.conf manpage.
b6062654 1653
b72f24c7
AT
1654dit(bf(--stats)) This tells rsync to print a verbose set of statistics
1655on the file transfer, allowing you to tell how effective the rsync
e19452a9 1656algorithm is for your data.
b72f24c7 1657
b8a6dae0 1658The current statistics are as follows: quote(itemization(
7b13ff97
WD
1659 it() bf(Number of files) is the count of all "files" (in the generic
1660 sense), which includes directories, symlinks, etc.
1661 it() bf(Number of files transferred) is the count of normal files that
1662 were updated via the rsync algorithm, which does not include created
1663 dirs, symlinks, etc.
1664 it() bf(Total file size) is the total sum of all file sizes in the transfer.
1665 This does not count any size for directories or special files, but does
1666 include the size of symlinks.
1667 it() bf(Total transferred file size) is the total sum of all files sizes
1668 for just the transferred files.
1669 it() bf(Literal data) is how much unmatched file-update data we had to
1670 send to the receiver for it to recreate the updated files.
1671 it() bf(Matched data) is how much data the receiver got locally when
1672 recreating the updated files.
1673 it() bf(File list size) is how big the file-list data was when the sender
1674 sent it to the receiver. This is smaller than the in-memory size for the
1675 file list due to some compressing of duplicated data when rsync sends the
1676 list.
1677 it() bf(File list generation time) is the number of seconds that the
1678 sender spent creating the file list. This requires a modern rsync on the
1679 sending side for this to be present.
1680 it() bf(File list transfer time) is the number of seconds that the sender
1681 spent sending the file list to the receiver.
1682 it() bf(Total bytes sent) is the count of all the bytes that rsync sent
1683 from the client side to the server side.
1684 it() bf(Total bytes received) is the count of all non-message bytes that
1685 rsync received by the client side from the server side. "Non-message"
1686 bytes means that we don't count the bytes for a verbose message that the
1687 server sent to us, which makes the stats more consistent.
38a4b9c2 1688))
7b13ff97 1689
a6a27602 1690dit(bf(-8, --8-bit-output)) This tells rsync to leave all high-bit characters
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WD
1691unescaped in the output instead of trying to test them to see if they're
1692valid in the current locale and escaping the invalid ones. All control
1693characters (but never tabs) are always escaped, regardless of this option's
1694setting.
1695
1696The escape idiom that started in 2.6.7 is to output a literal backslash (\)
1697and a hash (#), followed by exactly 3 octal digits. For example, a newline
1698would output as "\#012". A literal backslash that is in a filename is not
1699escaped unless it is followed by a hash and 3 digits (0-9).
1700
955c3145 1701dit(bf(-h, --human-readable)) Output numbers in a more human-readable format.
4c248a36
WD
1702This makes big numbers output using larger units, with a K, M, or G suffix. If
1703this option was specified once, these units are K (1000), M (1000*1000), and
1704G (1000*1000*1000); if the option is repeated, the units are powers of 1024
1705instead of 1000.
3b4ecc6b 1706
d9fcc198
AT
1707dit(bf(--partial)) By default, rsync will delete any partially
1708transferred file if the transfer is interrupted. In some circumstances
1709it is more desirable to keep partially transferred files. Using the
faa82484 1710bf(--partial) option tells rsync to keep the partial file which should
d9fcc198
AT
1711make a subsequent transfer of the rest of the file much faster.
1712
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WD
1713dit(bf(--partial-dir=DIR)) A better way to keep partial files than the
1714bf(--partial) option is to specify a em(DIR) that will be used to hold the
1715partial data (instead of writing it out to the destination file).
1716On the next transfer, rsync will use a file found in this
9ec1ef25 1717dir as data to speed up the resumption of the transfer and then delete it
c2582307 1718after it has served its purpose.
9ec1ef25 1719
c2582307
WD
1720Note that if bf(--whole-file) is specified (or implied), any partial-dir
1721file that is found for a file that is being updated will simply be removed
1722(since
26ac1812 1723rsync is sending files without using the delta transfer algorithm).
44cad59f 1724
c2582307
WD
1725Rsync will create the em(DIR) if it is missing (just the last dir -- not
1726the whole path). This makes it easy to use a relative path (such as
1727"bf(--partial-dir=.rsync-partial)") to have rsync create the
1728partial-directory in the destination file's directory when needed, and then
1729remove it again when the partial file is deleted.
44cad59f 1730
ee554411
WD
1731If the partial-dir value is not an absolute path, rsync will add an exclude
1732rule at the end of all your existing excludes. This will prevent the
1733sending of any partial-dir files that may exist on the sending side, and
1734will also prevent the untimely deletion of partial-dir items on the
1735receiving side. An example: the above bf(--partial-dir) option would add
f49c8376 1736the equivalent of "bf(-f '-p .rsync-partial/')" at the end of any other
ee554411
WD
1737filter rules.
1738
1739If you are supplying your own exclude rules, you may need to add your own
1740exclude/hide/protect rule for the partial-dir because (1) the auto-added
1741rule may be ineffective at the end of your other rules, or (2) you may wish
1742to override rsync's exclude choice. For instance, if you want to make
1743rsync clean-up any left-over partial-dirs that may be lying around, you
1744should specify bf(--delete-after) and add a "risk" filter rule, e.g.
1745bf(-f 'R .rsync-partial/'). (Avoid using bf(--delete-before) or
1746bf(--delete-during) unless you don't need rsync to use any of the
1747left-over partial-dir data during the current run.)
44cad59f 1748
faa82484 1749IMPORTANT: the bf(--partial-dir) should not be writable by other users or it
b4d1e854
WD
1750is a security risk. E.g. AVOID "/tmp".
1751
1752You can also set the partial-dir value the RSYNC_PARTIAL_DIR environment
faa82484 1753variable. Setting this in the environment does not force bf(--partial) to be
02184920 1754enabled, but rather it affects where partial files go when bf(--partial) is
faa82484
WD
1755specified. For instance, instead of using bf(--partial-dir=.rsync-tmp)
1756along with bf(--progress), you could set RSYNC_PARTIAL_DIR=.rsync-tmp in your
1757environment and then just use the bf(-P) option to turn on the use of the
9ec1ef25
WD
1758.rsync-tmp dir for partial transfers. The only times that the bf(--partial)
1759option does not look for this environment value are (1) when bf(--inplace) was
1760specified (since bf(--inplace) conflicts with bf(--partial-dir)), and (2) when
faa82484 1761bf(--delay-updates) was specified (see below).
01b835c2 1762
5a727522 1763For the purposes of the daemon-config's "refuse options" setting,
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WD
1764bf(--partial-dir) does em(not) imply bf(--partial). This is so that a
1765refusal of the bf(--partial) option can be used to disallow the overwriting
1766of destination files with a partial transfer, while still allowing the
1767safer idiom provided by bf(--partial-dir).
1768
01b835c2 1769dit(bf(--delay-updates)) This option puts the temporary file from each
c2582307 1770updated file into a holding directory until the end of the
01b835c2
WD
1771transfer, at which time all the files are renamed into place in rapid
1772succession. This attempts to make the updating of the files a little more
c2582307 1773atomic. By default the files are placed into a directory named ".~tmp~" in
64318670 1774each file's destination directory, but if you've specified the
ee554411
WD
1775bf(--partial-dir) option, that directory will be used instead. See the
1776comments in the bf(--partial-dir) section for a discussion of how this
1777".~tmp~" dir will be excluded from the transfer, and what you can do if
c5b6e57a 1778you want rsync to cleanup old ".~tmp~" dirs that might be lying around.
64318670 1779Conflicts with bf(--inplace) and bf(--append).
01b835c2
WD
1780
1781This option uses more memory on the receiving side (one bit per file
1782transferred) and also requires enough free disk space on the receiving
1783side to hold an additional copy of all the updated files. Note also that
5efbddba
WD
1784you should not use an absolute path to bf(--partial-dir) unless (1)
1785there is no
01b835c2
WD
1786chance of any of the files in the transfer having the same name (since all
1787the updated files will be put into a single directory if the path is
5efbddba
WD
1788absolute)
1789and (2) there are no mount points in the hierarchy (since the
1790delayed updates will fail if they can't be renamed into place).
01b835c2
WD
1791
1792See also the "atomic-rsync" perl script in the "support" subdir for an
faa82484 1793update algorithm that is even more atomic (it uses bf(--link-dest) and a
01b835c2 1794parallel hierarchy of files).
44cad59f 1795
a272ff8c 1796dit(bf(-m, --prune-empty-dirs)) This option tells the receiving rsync to get
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WD
1797rid of empty directories from the file-list, including nested directories
1798that have no non-directory children. This is useful for avoiding the
1799creation of a bunch of useless directories when the sending rsync is
1800recursively scanning a hierarchy of files using include/exclude/filter
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1801rules.
1802
1803Because the file-list is actually being pruned, this option also affects
1804what directories get deleted when a delete is active. However, keep in
1805mind that excluded files and directories can prevent existing items from
1806being deleted (because an exclude hides source files and protects
1807destination files).
1808
1809You can prevent the pruning of certain empty directories from the file-list
1810by using a global "protect" filter. For instance, this option would ensure
1811that the directory "emptydir" was kept in the file-list:
1812
1813quote( --filter 'protect emptydir/')
fb72aaba
WD
1814
1815Here's an example that copies all .pdf files in a hierarchy, only creating
1816the necessary destination directories to hold the .pdf files, and ensures
1817that any superfluous files and directories in the destination are removed
a272ff8c
WD
1818(note the hide filter of non-directories being used instead of an exclude):
1819
58718881 1820quote( rsync -avm --del --include='*.pdf' -f 'hide,! */' src/ dest)
fb72aaba 1821
a272ff8c 1822If you didn't want to remove superfluous destination files, the more
4743f0f4 1823time-honored options of "bf(--include='*/' --exclude='*')" would work fine
a272ff8c 1824in place of the hide-filter (if that is more natural to you).
fb72aaba 1825
eb86d661
AT
1826dit(bf(--progress)) This option tells rsync to print information
1827showing the progress of the transfer. This gives a bored user
1828something to watch.
c2582307 1829Implies bf(--verbose) if it wasn't already specified.
7b10f91d 1830
5e1f082d
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1831While rsync is transferring a regular file, it updates a progress line that
1832looks like this:
68f9910d 1833
faa82484 1834verb( 782448 63% 110.64kB/s 0:00:04)
68f9910d 1835
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WD
1836In this example, the receiver has reconstructed 782448 bytes or 63% of the
1837sender's file, which is being reconstructed at a rate of 110.64 kilobytes
1838per second, and the transfer will finish in 4 seconds if the current rate
1839is maintained until the end.
1840
26ac1812 1841These statistics can be misleading if the delta transfer algorithm is
5e1f082d
WD
1842in use. For example, if the sender's file consists of the basis file
1843followed by additional data, the reported rate will probably drop
1844dramatically when the receiver gets to the literal data, and the transfer
1845will probably take much longer to finish than the receiver estimated as it
1846was finishing the matched part of the file.
1847
1848When the file transfer finishes, rsync replaces the progress line with a
1849summary line that looks like this:
1850
1851verb( 1238099 100% 146.38kB/s 0:00:08 (xfer#5, to-check=169/396))
1852
1853In this example, the file was 1238099 bytes long in total, the average rate
1854of transfer for the whole file was 146.38 kilobytes per second over the 8
1855seconds that it took to complete, it was the 5th transfer of a regular file
1856during the current rsync session, and there are 169 more files for the
1857receiver to check (to see if they are up-to-date or not) remaining out of
1858the 396 total files in the file-list.
68f9910d 1859
faa82484 1860dit(bf(-P)) The bf(-P) option is equivalent to bf(--partial) bf(--progress). Its
183150b7
WD
1861purpose is to make it much easier to specify these two options for a long
1862transfer that may be interrupted.
d9fcc198 1863
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WD
1864dit(bf(--password-file)) This option allows you to provide a password in a
1865file for accessing an rsync daemon. The file must not be world readable.
1866It should contain just the password as a single line.
1867
1868When accessing an rsync daemon using a remote shell as the transport, this
1869option only comes into effect after the remote shell finishes its
1870authentication (i.e. if you have also specified a password in the daemon's
1871config file).
65575e96 1872
09ed3099 1873dit(bf(--list-only)) This option will cause the source files to be listed
b4c7c1ca
WD
1874instead of transferred. This option is inferred if there is a single source
1875arg and no destination specified, so its main uses are: (1) to turn a copy
1876command that includes a
c897f711
WD
1877destination arg into a file-listing command, (2) to be able to specify more
1878than one local source arg (note: be sure to include the destination), or
1879(3) to avoid the automatically added "bf(-r --exclude='/*/*')" options that
1880rsync usually uses as a compatibility kluge when generating a non-recursive
b4c7c1ca
WD
1881listing. Caution: keep in mind that a source arg with a wild-card is expanded
1882by the shell into multiple args, so it is never safe to try to list such an arg
1883without using this option. For example:
1884
1885verb( rsync -av --list-only foo* dest/)
09ed3099 1886
ef5d23eb
DD
1887dit(bf(--bwlimit=KBPS)) This option allows you to specify a maximum
1888transfer rate in kilobytes per second. This option is most effective when
1889using rsync with large files (several megabytes and up). Due to the nature
1890of rsync transfers, blocks of data are sent, then if rsync determines the
1891transfer was too fast, it will wait before sending the next data block. The
4d888108 1892result is an average transfer rate equaling the specified limit. A value
ef5d23eb
DD
1893of zero specifies no limit.
1894
b9f592fb 1895dit(bf(--write-batch=FILE)) Record a file that can later be applied to
faa82484 1896another identical destination with bf(--read-batch). See the "BATCH MODE"
32c7f91a 1897section for details, and also the bf(--only-write-batch) option.
6902ed17 1898
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WD
1899dit(bf(--only-write-batch=FILE)) Works like bf(--write-batch), except that
1900no updates are made on the destination system when creating the batch.
1901This lets you transport the changes to the destination system via some
32c7f91a
WD
1902other means and then apply the changes via bf(--read-batch).
1903
1904Note that you can feel free to write the batch directly to some portable
1905media: if this media fills to capacity before the end of the transfer, you
1906can just apply that partial transfer to the destination and repeat the
1907whole process to get the rest of the changes (as long as you don't mind a
1908partially updated destination system while the multi-update cycle is
1909happening).
1910
1911Also note that you only save bandwidth when pushing changes to a remote
1912system because this allows the batched data to be diverted from the sender
1913into the batch file without having to flow over the wire to the receiver
1914(when pulling, the sender is remote, and thus can't write the batch).
326bb56e 1915
b9f592fb 1916dit(bf(--read-batch=FILE)) Apply all of the changes stored in FILE, a
faa82484 1917file previously generated by bf(--write-batch).
78be8e0f 1918If em(FILE) is bf(-), the batch data will be read from standard input.
c769702f 1919See the "BATCH MODE" section for details.
6902ed17 1920
0b941479
WD
1921dit(bf(--protocol=NUM)) Force an older protocol version to be used. This
1922is useful for creating a batch file that is compatible with an older
1923version of rsync. For instance, if rsync 2.6.4 is being used with the
1924bf(--write-batch) option, but rsync 2.6.3 is what will be used to run the
81c453b1
WD
1925bf(--read-batch) option, you should use "--protocol=28" when creating the
1926batch file to force the older protocol version to be used in the batch
1927file (assuming you can't upgrade the rsync on the reading system).
0b941479 1928
332cf6df
WD
1929dit(bf(--iconv=CONVERT_SPEC)) Rsync can convert filenames between character
1930sets using this option. Using a CONVERT_SPEC of "." tells rsync to look up
1931the default character-set via the locale setting. Alternately, you can
1932fully specify what conversion to do by giving a local and a remote charset
1933separated by a comma (local first), e.g. bf(--iconv=utf8,iso88591).
1934Finally, you can specify a CONVERT_SPEC of "-" to turn off any conversion.
1935The default setting of this option is site-specific, and can also be
1936affected via the RSYNC_ICONV environment variable.
1937
1938Note that rsync does not do any conversion of names in filter files
1939(including include/exclude files), in a files-from file, nor those
1940specified on the command line. It is up to you to ensure that you're
1941requesting the right names from a remote server, and you can specify
1942extra include/exclude rules if there are filename differences on the
1943two sides that need to be accounted for. (In the future there may be
1944a way to specify a UTF-8 filter rule that gets auto-converted to the
1945local side's character set.)
1946
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WD
1947dit(bf(-4, --ipv4) or bf(-6, --ipv6)) Tells rsync to prefer IPv4/IPv6
1948when creating sockets. This only affects sockets that rsync has direct
1949control over, such as the outgoing socket when directly contacting an
faa82484 1950rsync daemon. See also these options in the bf(--daemon) mode section.
e40a46de 1951
c8d895de
WD
1952dit(bf(--checksum-seed=NUM)) Set the MD4 checksum seed to the integer
1953NUM. This 4 byte checksum seed is included in each block and file
1954MD4 checksum calculation. By default the checksum seed is generated
49f4cfdf 1955by the server and defaults to the current code(time()). This option
c8d895de
WD
1956is used to set a specific checksum seed, which is useful for
1957applications that want repeatable block and file checksums, or
1958in the case where the user wants a more random checksum seed.
49f4cfdf 1959Note that setting NUM to 0 causes rsync to use the default of code(time())
b9f592fb 1960for checksum seed.
41059f75
AT
1961enddit()
1962
faa82484
WD
1963manpagesection(DAEMON OPTIONS)
1964
bdf278f7
WD
1965The options allowed when starting an rsync daemon are as follows:
1966
1967startdit()
bdf278f7 1968dit(bf(--daemon)) This tells rsync that it is to run as a daemon. The
62f27e3c
WD
1969daemon you start running may be accessed using an rsync client using
1970the bf(host::module) or bf(rsync://host/module/) syntax.
bdf278f7
WD
1971
1972If standard input is a socket then rsync will assume that it is being
1973run via inetd, otherwise it will detach from the current terminal and
1974become a background daemon. The daemon will read the config file
1975(rsyncd.conf) on each connect made by a client and respond to
49f4cfdf 1976requests accordingly. See the bf(rsyncd.conf)(5) man page for more
bdf278f7
WD
1977details.
1978
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WD
1979dit(bf(--address)) By default rsync will bind to the wildcard address when
1980run as a daemon with the bf(--daemon) option. The bf(--address) option
1981allows you to specify a specific IP address (or hostname) to bind to. This
1982makes virtual hosting possible in conjunction with the bf(--config) option.
1983See also the "address" global option in the rsyncd.conf manpage.
bdf278f7 1984
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WD
1985dit(bf(--bwlimit=KBPS)) This option allows you to specify a maximum
1986transfer rate in kilobytes per second for the data the daemon sends.
faa82484 1987The client can still specify a smaller bf(--bwlimit) value, but their
1f69bec4
WD
1988requested value will be rounded down if they try to exceed it. See the
1989client version of this option (above) for some extra details.
1990
bdf278f7 1991dit(bf(--config=FILE)) This specifies an alternate config file than
faa82484 1992the default. This is only relevant when bf(--daemon) is specified.
bdf278f7 1993The default is /etc/rsyncd.conf unless the daemon is running over
d38772e0 1994a remote shell program and the remote user is not the super-user; in that case
bdf278f7
WD
1995the default is rsyncd.conf in the current directory (typically $HOME).
1996
1997dit(bf(--no-detach)) When running as a daemon, this option instructs
1998rsync to not detach itself and become a background process. This
1999option is required when running as a service on Cygwin, and may also
2000be useful when rsync is supervised by a program such as
2001bf(daemontools) or AIX's bf(System Resource Controller).
2002bf(--no-detach) is also recommended when rsync is run under a
2003debugger. This option has no effect if rsync is run from inetd or
2004sshd.
2005
c259892c
WD
2006dit(bf(--port=PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number for the
2007daemon to listen on rather than the default of 873. See also the "port"
2008global option in the rsyncd.conf manpage.
bdf278f7 2009
a2ed5801
WD
2010dit(bf(--log-file=FILE)) This option tells the rsync daemon to use the
2011given log-file name instead of using the "log file" setting in the config
2012file.
2013
4b90820d
WD
2014dit(bf(--log-file-format=FORMAT)) This option tells the rsync daemon to use the
2015given FORMAT string instead of using the "log format" setting in the config
2016file. It also enables "transfer logging" unless the string is empty, in which
2017case transfer logging is turned off.
2018
04f48837
WD
2019dit(bf(--sockopts)) This overrides the bf(socket options) setting in the
2020rsyncd.conf file and has the same syntax.
2021
24b0922b
WD
2022dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information the
2023daemon logs during its startup phase. After the client connects, the
2024daemon's verbosity level will be controlled by the options that the client
2025used and the "max verbosity" setting in the module's config section.
2026
bdf278f7
WD
2027dit(bf(-4, --ipv4) or bf(-6, --ipv6)) Tells rsync to prefer IPv4/IPv6
2028when creating the incoming sockets that the rsync daemon will use to
2029listen for connections. One of these options may be required in older
2030versions of Linux to work around an IPv6 bug in the kernel (if you see
2031an "address already in use" error when nothing else is using the port,
faa82484 2032try specifying bf(--ipv6) or bf(--ipv4) when starting the daemon).
bdf278f7 2033
faa82484 2034dit(bf(-h, --help)) When specified after bf(--daemon), print a short help
bdf278f7 2035page describing the options available for starting an rsync daemon.
bdf278f7
WD
2036enddit()
2037
16e5de84 2038manpagesection(FILTER RULES)
43bd68e5 2039
16e5de84
WD
2040The filter rules allow for flexible selection of which files to transfer
2041(include) and which files to skip (exclude). The rules either directly
2042specify include/exclude patterns or they specify a way to acquire more
2043include/exclude patterns (e.g. to read them from a file).
43bd68e5 2044
16e5de84
WD
2045As the list of files/directories to transfer is built, rsync checks each
2046name to be transferred against the list of include/exclude patterns in
2047turn, and the first matching pattern is acted on: if it is an exclude
2048pattern, then that file is skipped; if it is an include pattern then that
2049filename is not skipped; if no matching pattern is found, then the
43bd68e5
AT
2050filename is not skipped.
2051
16e5de84
WD
2052Rsync builds an ordered list of filter rules as specified on the
2053command-line. Filter rules have the following syntax:
2054
faa82484 2055quote(
d91de046
WD
2056tt(RULE [PATTERN_OR_FILENAME])nl()
2057tt(RULE,MODIFIERS [PATTERN_OR_FILENAME])nl()
16e5de84
WD
2058)
2059
d91de046
WD
2060You have your choice of using either short or long RULE names, as described
2061below. If you use a short-named rule, the ',' separating the RULE from the
2062MODIFIERS is optional. The PATTERN or FILENAME that follows (when present)
2063must come after either a single space or an underscore (_).
2064Here are the available rule prefixes:
16e5de84 2065
faa82484 2066quote(
d91de046
WD
2067bf(exclude, -) specifies an exclude pattern. nl()
2068bf(include, +) specifies an include pattern. nl()
2069bf(merge, .) specifies a merge-file to read for more rules. nl()
2070bf(dir-merge, :) specifies a per-directory merge-file. nl()
0dfffb88
WD
2071bf(hide, H) specifies a pattern for hiding files from the transfer. nl()
2072bf(show, S) files that match the pattern are not hidden. nl()
2073bf(protect, P) specifies a pattern for protecting files from deletion. nl()
2074bf(risk, R) files that match the pattern are not protected. nl()
d91de046 2075bf(clear, !) clears the current include/exclude list (takes no arg) nl()
16e5de84
WD
2076)
2077
d91de046
WD
2078When rules are being read from a file, empty lines are ignored, as are
2079comment lines that start with a "#".
2080
faa82484 2081Note that the bf(--include)/bf(--exclude) command-line options do not allow the
16e5de84 2082full range of rule parsing as described above -- they only allow the
d91de046
WD
2083specification of include/exclude patterns plus a "!" token to clear the
2084list (and the normal comment parsing when rules are read from a file).
2085If a pattern
16e5de84
WD
2086does not begin with "- " (dash, space) or "+ " (plus, space), then the
2087rule will be interpreted as if "+ " (for an include option) or "- " (for
faa82484 2088an exclude option) were prefixed to the string. A bf(--filter) option, on
d91de046
WD
2089the other hand, must always contain either a short or long rule name at the
2090start of the rule.
16e5de84 2091
faa82484 2092Note also that the bf(--filter), bf(--include), and bf(--exclude) options take one
16e5de84 2093rule/pattern each. To add multiple ones, you can repeat the options on
faa82484
WD
2094the command-line, use the merge-file syntax of the bf(--filter) option, or
2095the bf(--include-from)/bf(--exclude-from) options.
16e5de84 2096
16e5de84
WD
2097manpagesection(INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERN RULES)
2098
0dfffb88
WD
2099You can include and exclude files by specifying patterns using the "+",
2100"-", etc. filter rules (as introduced in the FILTER RULES section above).
bb5f4e72
WD
2101The include/exclude rules each specify a pattern that is matched against
2102the names of the files that are going to be transferred. These patterns
2103can take several forms:
16e5de84 2104
b8a6dae0 2105itemization(
16e5de84
WD
2106 it() if the pattern starts with a / then it is anchored to a
2107 particular spot in the hierarchy of files, otherwise it is matched
2108 against the end of the pathname. This is similar to a leading ^ in
2109 regular expressions.
809724d7 2110 Thus "/foo" would match a name of "foo" at either the "root of the
16e5de84
WD
2111 transfer" (for a global rule) or in the merge-file's directory (for a
2112 per-directory rule).
809724d7
WD
2113 An unqualified "foo" would match a name of "foo" anywhere in the
2114 tree because the algorithm is applied recursively from the
16e5de84 2115 top down; it behaves as if each path component gets a turn at being the
809724d7 2116 end of the filename. Even the unanchored "sub/foo" would match at
16e5de84
WD
2117 any point in the hierarchy where a "foo" was found within a directory
2118 named "sub". See the section on ANCHORING INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERNS for
2119 a full discussion of how to specify a pattern that matches at the root
2120 of the transfer.
16e5de84 2121 it() if the pattern ends with a / then it will only match a
809724d7 2122 directory, not a regular file, symlink, or device.
9639c718
WD
2123 it() rsync chooses between doing a simple string match and wildcard
2124 matching by checking if the pattern contains one of these three wildcard
2125 characters: '*', '?', and '[' .
2126 it() a '*' matches any non-empty path component (it stops at slashes).
2127 it() use '**' to match anything, including slashes.
2128 it() a '?' matches any character except a slash (/).
2129 it() a '[' introduces a character class, such as [a-z] or [[:alpha:]].
2130 it() in a wildcard pattern, a backslash can be used to escape a wildcard
2131 character, but it is matched literally when no wildcards are present.
2132 it() if the pattern contains a / (not counting a trailing /) or a "**",
16e5de84
WD
2133 then it is matched against the full pathname, including any leading
2134 directories. If the pattern doesn't contain a / or a "**", then it is
2135 matched only against the final component of the filename.
2136 (Remember that the algorithm is applied recursively so "full filename"
ae283632 2137 can actually be any portion of a path from the starting directory on
16e5de84 2138 down.)
d3db3eef 2139 it() a trailing "dir_name/***" will match both the directory (as if
809724d7 2140 "dir_name/" had been specified) and everything in the directory
c575f8ce
WD
2141 (as if "dir_name/**" had been specified). This behavior was added in
2142 version 2.6.7.
16e5de84
WD
2143)
2144
faa82484
WD
2145Note that, when using the bf(--recursive) (bf(-r)) option (which is implied by
2146bf(-a)), every subcomponent of every path is visited from the top down, so
16e5de84
WD
2147include/exclude patterns get applied recursively to each subcomponent's
2148full name (e.g. to include "/foo/bar/baz" the subcomponents "/foo" and
2149"/foo/bar" must not be excluded).
2150The exclude patterns actually short-circuit the directory traversal stage
2151when rsync finds the files to send. If a pattern excludes a particular
2152parent directory, it can render a deeper include pattern ineffectual
2153because rsync did not descend through that excluded section of the
2154hierarchy. This is particularly important when using a trailing '*' rule.
2155For instance, this won't work:
2156
faa82484
WD
2157quote(
2158tt(+ /some/path/this-file-will-not-be-found)nl()
2159tt(+ /file-is-included)nl()
2160tt(- *)nl()
16e5de84
WD
2161)
2162
2163This fails because the parent directory "some" is excluded by the '*'
2164rule, so rsync never visits any of the files in the "some" or "some/path"
2165directories. One solution is to ask for all directories in the hierarchy
a5a26484 2166to be included by using a single rule: "+ */" (put it somewhere before the
58718881
WD
2167"- *" rule), and perhaps use the bf(--prune-empty-dirs) option. Another
2168solution is to add specific include rules for all
16e5de84
WD
2169the parent dirs that need to be visited. For instance, this set of rules
2170works fine:
2171
faa82484
WD
2172quote(
2173tt(+ /some/)nl()
2174tt(+ /some/path/)nl()
2175tt(+ /some/path/this-file-is-found)nl()
2176tt(+ /file-also-included)nl()
2177tt(- *)nl()
16e5de84
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2178)
2179
2180Here are some examples of exclude/include matching:
2181
b8a6dae0 2182itemization(
809724d7 2183 it() "- *.o" would exclude all names matching *.o
58718881
WD
2184 it() "- /foo" would exclude a file (or directory) named foo in the
2185 transfer-root directory
2186 it() "- foo/" would exclude any directory named foo
2187 it() "- /foo/*/bar" would exclude any file named bar which is at two
2188 levels below a directory named foo in the transfer-root directory
2189 it() "- /foo/**/bar" would exclude any file named bar two
2190 or more levels below a directory named foo in the transfer-root directory
faa82484 2191 it() The combination of "+ */", "+ *.c", and "- *" would include all
58718881
WD
2192 directories and C source files but nothing else (see also the
2193 bf(--prune-empty-dirs) option)
16e5de84
WD
2194 it() The combination of "+ foo/", "+ foo/bar.c", and "- *" would include
2195 only the foo directory and foo/bar.c (the foo directory must be
2196 explicitly included or it would be excluded by the "*")
2197)
2198
2199manpagesection(MERGE-FILE FILTER RULES)
2200
2201You can merge whole files into your filter rules by specifying either a
d91de046
WD
2202merge (.) or a dir-merge (:) filter rule (as introduced in the FILTER RULES
2203section above).
16e5de84
WD
2204
2205There are two kinds of merged files -- single-instance ('.') and
2206per-directory (':'). A single-instance merge file is read one time, and
2207its rules are incorporated into the filter list in the place of the "."
2208rule. For per-directory merge files, rsync will scan every directory that
2209it traverses for the named file, merging its contents when the file exists
2210into the current list of inherited rules. These per-directory rule files
2211must be created on the sending side because it is the sending side that is
2212being scanned for the available files to transfer. These rule files may
2213also need to be transferred to the receiving side if you want them to
2214affect what files don't get deleted (see PER-DIRECTORY RULES AND DELETE
2215below).
2216
2217Some examples:
2218
faa82484 2219quote(
d91de046 2220tt(merge /etc/rsync/default.rules)nl()
faa82484 2221tt(. /etc/rsync/default.rules)nl()
d91de046
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2222tt(dir-merge .per-dir-filter)nl()
2223tt(dir-merge,n- .non-inherited-per-dir-excludes)nl()
faa82484 2224tt(:n- .non-inherited-per-dir-excludes)nl()
16e5de84
WD
2225)
2226
d91de046 2227The following modifiers are accepted after a merge or dir-merge rule:
16e5de84 2228
b8a6dae0 2229itemization(
62bf783f 2230 it() A bf(-) specifies that the file should consist of only exclude
d91de046 2231 patterns, with no other rule-parsing except for in-file comments.
62bf783f 2232 it() A bf(+) specifies that the file should consist of only include
d91de046
WD
2233 patterns, with no other rule-parsing except for in-file comments.
2234 it() A bf(C) is a way to specify that the file should be read in a
2235 CVS-compatible manner. This turns on 'n', 'w', and '-', but also
2236 allows the list-clearing token (!) to be specified. If no filename is
2237 provided, ".cvsignore" is assumed.
2238 it() A bf(e) will exclude the merge-file name from the transfer; e.g.
a5a26484 2239 "dir-merge,e .rules" is like "dir-merge .rules" and "- .rules".
62bf783f
WD
2240 it() An bf(n) specifies that the rules are not inherited by subdirectories.
2241 it() A bf(w) specifies that the rules are word-split on whitespace instead
16e5de84
WD
2242 of the normal line-splitting. This also turns off comments. Note: the
2243 space that separates the prefix from the rule is treated specially, so
d91de046
WD
2244 "- foo + bar" is parsed as two rules (assuming that prefix-parsing wasn't
2245 also disabled).
2246 it() You may also specify any of the modifiers for the "+" or "-" rules
467688dc 2247 (below) in order to have the rules that are read in from the file
a5a26484 2248 default to having that modifier set. For instance, "merge,-/ .excl" would
0dfffb88
WD
2249 treat the contents of .excl as absolute-path excludes,
2250 while "dir-merge,s .filt" and ":sC" would each make all their
5a727522 2251 per-directory rules apply only on the sending side.
16e5de84
WD
2252)
2253
44d60d5f 2254The following modifiers are accepted after a "+" or "-":
dc1488ae 2255
b8a6dae0 2256itemization(
c575f8ce 2257 it() A bf(/) specifies that the include/exclude rule should be matched
82360c6b 2258 against the absolute pathname of the current item. For example,
a5a26484 2259 "-/ /etc/passwd" would exclude the passwd file any time the transfer
82360c6b
WD
2260 was sending files from the "/etc" directory, and "-/ subdir/foo"
2261 would always exclude "foo" when it is in a dir named "subdir", even
2262 if "foo" is at the root of the current transfer.
c575f8ce 2263 it() A bf(!) specifies that the include/exclude should take effect if
44d60d5f
WD
2264 the pattern fails to match. For instance, "-! */" would exclude all
2265 non-directories.
397a3443
WD
2266 it() A bf(C) is used to indicate that all the global CVS-exclude rules
2267 should be inserted as excludes in place of the "-C". No arg should
2268 follow.
0dfffb88
WD
2269 it() An bf(s) is used to indicate that the rule applies to the sending
2270 side. When a rule affects the sending side, it prevents files from
2271 being transferred. The default is for a rule to affect both sides
2272 unless bf(--delete-excluded) was specified, in which case default rules
2273 become sender-side only. See also the hide (H) and show (S) rules,
5a727522 2274 which are an alternate way to specify sending-side includes/excludes.
0dfffb88
WD
2275 it() An bf(r) is used to indicate that the rule applies to the receiving
2276 side. When a rule affects the receiving side, it prevents files from
2277 being deleted. See the bf(s) modifier for more info. See also the
2278 protect (P) and risk (R) rules, which are an alternate way to
2279 specify receiver-side includes/excludes.
c575f8ce
WD
2280 it() A bf(p) indicates that a rule is perishable, meaning that it is
2281 ignored in directories that are being deleted. For instance, the bf(-C)
2282 option's default rules that exclude things like "CVS" and "*.o" are
2283 marked as perishable, and will not prevent a directory that was removed
2284 on the source from being deleted on the destination.
0dfffb88 2285)
dc1488ae 2286
16e5de84
WD
2287Per-directory rules are inherited in all subdirectories of the directory
2288where the merge-file was found unless the 'n' modifier was used. Each
2289subdirectory's rules are prefixed to the inherited per-directory rules
2290from its parents, which gives the newest rules a higher priority than the
d91de046 2291inherited rules. The entire set of dir-merge rules are grouped together in
16e5de84 2292the spot where the merge-file was specified, so it is possible to override
d91de046 2293dir-merge rules via a rule that got specified earlier in the list of global
16e5de84
WD
2294rules. When the list-clearing rule ("!") is read from a per-directory
2295file, it only clears the inherited rules for the current merge file.
2296
d91de046 2297Another way to prevent a single rule from a dir-merge file from being inherited is to
16e5de84
WD
2298anchor it with a leading slash. Anchored rules in a per-directory
2299merge-file are relative to the merge-file's directory, so a pattern "/foo"
d91de046 2300would only match the file "foo" in the directory where the dir-merge filter
16e5de84
WD
2301file was found.
2302
faa82484 2303Here's an example filter file which you'd specify via bf(--filter=". file":)
16e5de84 2304
faa82484 2305quote(
d91de046 2306tt(merge /home/user/.global-filter)nl()
faa82484 2307tt(- *.gz)nl()
d91de046 2308tt(dir-merge .rules)nl()
faa82484
WD
2309tt(+ *.[ch])nl()
2310tt(- *.o)nl()
16e5de84
WD
2311)
2312
2313This will merge the contents of the /home/user/.global-filter file at the
2314start of the list and also turns the ".rules" filename into a per-directory
467688dc 2315filter file. All rules read in prior to the start of the directory scan
16e5de84
WD
2316follow the global anchoring rules (i.e. a leading slash matches at the root
2317of the transfer).
2318
2319If a per-directory merge-file is specified with a path that is a parent
2320directory of the first transfer directory, rsync will scan all the parent
2321dirs from that starting point to the transfer directory for the indicated
faa82484 2322per-directory file. For instance, here is a common filter (see bf(-F)):
16e5de84 2323
faa82484 2324quote(tt(--filter=': /.rsync-filter'))
16e5de84
WD
2325
2326That rule tells rsync to scan for the file .rsync-filter in all
2327directories from the root down through the parent directory of the
2328transfer prior to the start of the normal directory scan of the file in
2329the directories that are sent as a part of the transfer. (Note: for an
2330rsync daemon, the root is always the same as the module's "path".)
2331
2332Some examples of this pre-scanning for per-directory files:
2333
faa82484
WD
2334quote(
2335tt(rsync -avF /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
2336tt(rsync -av --filter=': ../../.rsync-filter' /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
2337tt(rsync -av --filter=': .rsync-filter' /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
16e5de84
WD
2338)
2339
2340The first two commands above will look for ".rsync-filter" in "/" and
2341"/src" before the normal scan begins looking for the file in "/src/path"
2342and its subdirectories. The last command avoids the parent-dir scan
2343and only looks for the ".rsync-filter" files in each directory that is
2344a part of the transfer.
2345
2346If you want to include the contents of a ".cvsignore" in your patterns,
d91de046
WD
2347you should use the rule ":C", which creates a dir-merge of the .cvsignore
2348file, but parsed in a CVS-compatible manner. You can
faa82484 2349use this to affect where the bf(--cvs-exclude) (bf(-C)) option's inclusion of the
d91de046 2350per-directory .cvsignore file gets placed into your rules by putting the
16e5de84 2351":C" wherever you like in your filter rules. Without this, rsync would
d91de046 2352add the dir-merge rule for the .cvsignore file at the end of all your other
16e5de84
WD
2353rules (giving it a lower priority than your command-line rules). For
2354example:
2355
faa82484
WD
2356quote(
2357tt(cat <<EOT | rsync -avC --filter='. -' a/ b)nl()
2358tt(+ foo.o)nl()
2359tt(:C)nl()
2360tt(- *.old)nl()
2361tt(EOT)nl()
2362tt(rsync -avC --include=foo.o -f :C --exclude='*.old' a/ b)nl()
16e5de84
WD
2363)
2364
2365Both of the above rsync commands are identical. Each one will merge all
2366the per-directory .cvsignore rules in the middle of the list rather than
2367at the end. This allows their dir-specific rules to supersede the rules
bafa4875
WD
2368that follow the :C instead of being subservient to all your rules. To
2369affect the other CVS exclude rules (i.e. the default list of exclusions,
2370the contents of $HOME/.cvsignore, and the value of $CVSIGNORE) you should
2371omit the bf(-C) command-line option and instead insert a "-C" rule into
4743f0f4 2372your filter rules; e.g. "bf(--filter=-C)".
16e5de84
WD
2373
2374manpagesection(LIST-CLEARING FILTER RULE)
2375
2376You can clear the current include/exclude list by using the "!" filter
2377rule (as introduced in the FILTER RULES section above). The "current"
2378list is either the global list of rules (if the rule is encountered while
2379parsing the filter options) or a set of per-directory rules (which are
2380inherited in their own sub-list, so a subdirectory can use this to clear
2381out the parent's rules).
2382
2383manpagesection(ANCHORING INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERNS)
2384
2385As mentioned earlier, global include/exclude patterns are anchored at the
2386"root of the transfer" (as opposed to per-directory patterns, which are
2387anchored at the merge-file's directory). If you think of the transfer as
2388a subtree of names that are being sent from sender to receiver, the
2389transfer-root is where the tree starts to be duplicated in the destination
2390directory. This root governs where patterns that start with a / match.
a4b6f305
WD
2391
2392Because the matching is relative to the transfer-root, changing the
faa82484 2393trailing slash on a source path or changing your use of the bf(--relative)
a4b6f305
WD
2394option affects the path you need to use in your matching (in addition to
2395changing how much of the file tree is duplicated on the destination
16e5de84 2396host). The following examples demonstrate this.
a4b6f305 2397
b5ebe6d9
WD
2398Let's say that we want to match two source files, one with an absolute
2399path of "/home/me/foo/bar", and one with a path of "/home/you/bar/baz".
2400Here is how the various command choices differ for a 2-source transfer:
a4b6f305 2401
faa82484
WD
2402quote(
2403 Example cmd: rsync -a /home/me /home/you /dest nl()
2404 +/- pattern: /me/foo/bar nl()
2405 +/- pattern: /you/bar/baz nl()
2406 Target file: /dest/me/foo/bar nl()
2407 Target file: /dest/you/bar/baz nl()
2408)
2409
2410quote(
2411 Example cmd: rsync -a /home/me/ /home/you/ /dest nl()
2412 +/- pattern: /foo/bar (note missing "me") nl()
2413 +/- pattern: /bar/baz (note missing "you") nl()
2414 Target file: /dest/foo/bar nl()
2415 Target file: /dest/bar/baz nl()
2416)
2417
2418quote(
2419 Example cmd: rsync -a --relative /home/me/ /home/you /dest nl()
2420 +/- pattern: /home/me/foo/bar (note full path) nl()
2421 +/- pattern: /home/you/bar/baz (ditto) nl()
2422 Target file: /dest/home/me/foo/bar nl()
2423 Target file: /dest/home/you/bar/baz nl()
2424)
2425
2426quote(
2427 Example cmd: cd /home; rsync -a --relative me/foo you/ /dest nl()
2428 +/- pattern: /me/foo/bar (starts at specified path) nl()
2429 +/- pattern: /you/bar/baz (ditto) nl()
2430 Target file: /dest/me/foo/bar nl()
2431 Target file: /dest/you/bar/baz nl()
a4b6f305
WD
2432)
2433
16e5de84 2434The easiest way to see what name you should filter is to just
faa82484
WD
2435look at the output when using bf(--verbose) and put a / in front of the name
2436(use the bf(--dry-run) option if you're not yet ready to copy any files).
d1cce1dd 2437
16e5de84 2438manpagesection(PER-DIRECTORY RULES AND DELETE)
43bd68e5 2439
16e5de84
WD
2440Without a delete option, per-directory rules are only relevant on the
2441sending side, so you can feel free to exclude the merge files themselves
2442without affecting the transfer. To make this easy, the 'e' modifier adds
2443this exclude for you, as seen in these two equivalent commands:
27b9a19b 2444
faa82484
WD
2445quote(
2446tt(rsync -av --filter=': .excl' --exclude=.excl host:src/dir /dest)nl()
2447tt(rsync -av --filter=':e .excl' host:src/dir /dest)nl()
43bd68e5
AT
2448)
2449
16e5de84
WD
2450However, if you want to do a delete on the receiving side AND you want some
2451files to be excluded from being deleted, you'll need to be sure that the
2452receiving side knows what files to exclude. The easiest way is to include
faa82484 2453the per-directory merge files in the transfer and use bf(--delete-after),
16e5de84
WD
2454because this ensures that the receiving side gets all the same exclude
2455rules as the sending side before it tries to delete anything:
43bd68e5 2456
faa82484 2457quote(tt(rsync -avF --delete-after host:src/dir /dest))
20af605e 2458
16e5de84
WD
2459However, if the merge files are not a part of the transfer, you'll need to
2460either specify some global exclude rules (i.e. specified on the command
2461line), or you'll need to maintain your own per-directory merge files on
2462the receiving side. An example of the first is this (assume that the
2463remote .rules files exclude themselves):
20af605e 2464
faa82484
WD
2465verb(rsync -av --filter=': .rules' --filter='. /my/extra.rules'
2466 --delete host:src/dir /dest)
20af605e 2467
16e5de84
WD
2468In the above example the extra.rules file can affect both sides of the
2469transfer, but (on the sending side) the rules are subservient to the rules
2470merged from the .rules files because they were specified after the
2471per-directory merge rule.
43bd68e5 2472
16e5de84
WD
2473In one final example, the remote side is excluding the .rsync-filter
2474files from the transfer, but we want to use our own .rsync-filter files
2475to control what gets deleted on the receiving side. To do this we must
2476specifically exclude the per-directory merge files (so that they don't get
2477deleted) and then put rules into the local files to control what else
2478should not get deleted. Like one of these commands:
2479
faa82484
WD
2480verb( rsync -av --filter=':e /.rsync-filter' --delete \
2481 host:src/dir /dest
2482 rsync -avFF --delete host:src/dir /dest)
43bd68e5 2483
6902ed17
MP
2484manpagesection(BATCH MODE)
2485
088aac85
DD
2486Batch mode can be used to apply the same set of updates to many
2487identical systems. Suppose one has a tree which is replicated on a
2488number of hosts. Now suppose some changes have been made to this
2489source tree and those changes need to be propagated to the other
2490hosts. In order to do this using batch mode, rsync is run with the
2491write-batch option to apply the changes made to the source tree to one
2492of the destination trees. The write-batch option causes the rsync
b9f592fb
WD
2493client to store in a "batch file" all the information needed to repeat
2494this operation against other, identical destination trees.
2495
2496To apply the recorded changes to another destination tree, run rsync
2497with the read-batch option, specifying the name of the same batch
2498file, and the destination tree. Rsync updates the destination tree
2499using the information stored in the batch file.
2500
2501For convenience, one additional file is creating when the write-batch
2502option is used. This file's name is created by appending
73e01568 2503".sh" to the batch filename. The .sh file contains
b9f592fb 2504a command-line suitable for updating a destination tree using that
49f4cfdf
WD
2505batch file. It can be executed using a Bourne (or Bourne-like) shell,
2506optionally
b9f592fb
WD
2507passing in an alternate destination tree pathname which is then used
2508instead of the original path. This is useful when the destination tree
2509path differs from the original destination tree path.
2510
2511Generating the batch file once saves having to perform the file
2512status, checksum, and data block generation more than once when
088aac85 2513updating multiple destination trees. Multicast transport protocols can
b9f592fb
WD
2514be used to transfer the batch update files in parallel to many hosts
2515at once, instead of sending the same data to every host individually.
088aac85 2516
4602eafa 2517Examples:
088aac85 2518
faa82484
WD
2519quote(
2520tt($ rsync --write-batch=foo -a host:/source/dir/ /adest/dir/)nl()
2521tt($ scp foo* remote:)nl()
2522tt($ ssh remote ./foo.sh /bdest/dir/)nl()
4602eafa
WD
2523)
2524
faa82484
WD
2525quote(
2526tt($ rsync --write-batch=foo -a /source/dir/ /adest/dir/)nl()
2527tt($ ssh remote rsync --read-batch=- -a /bdest/dir/ <foo)nl()
4602eafa
WD
2528)
2529
98f51bfb
WD
2530In these examples, rsync is used to update /adest/dir/ from /source/dir/
2531and the information to repeat this operation is stored in "foo" and
2532"foo.sh". The host "remote" is then updated with the batched data going
2533into the directory /bdest/dir. The differences between the two examples
2534reveals some of the flexibility you have in how you deal with batches:
2535
b8a6dae0 2536itemization(
98f51bfb
WD
2537 it() The first example shows that the initial copy doesn't have to be
2538 local -- you can push or pull data to/from a remote host using either the
2539 remote-shell syntax or rsync daemon syntax, as desired.
98f51bfb
WD
2540 it() The first example uses the created "foo.sh" file to get the right
2541 rsync options when running the read-batch command on the remote host.
98f51bfb
WD
2542 it() The second example reads the batch data via standard input so that
2543 the batch file doesn't need to be copied to the remote machine first.
2544 This example avoids the foo.sh script because it needed to use a modified
faa82484 2545 bf(--read-batch) option, but you could edit the script file if you wished to
98f51bfb 2546 make use of it (just be sure that no other option is trying to use
faa82484 2547 standard input, such as the "bf(--exclude-from=-)" option).
98f51bfb 2548)
088aac85
DD
2549
2550Caveats:
2551
98f51bfb 2552The read-batch option expects the destination tree that it is updating
088aac85
DD
2553to be identical to the destination tree that was used to create the
2554batch update fileset. When a difference between the destination trees
0b941479 2555is encountered the update might be discarded with a warning (if the file
7432ccf4
WD
2556appears to be up-to-date already) or the file-update may be attempted
2557and then, if the file fails to verify, the update discarded with an
2558error. This means that it should be safe to re-run a read-batch operation
59d73bf3 2559if the command got interrupted. If you wish to force the batched-update to
faa82484 2560always be attempted regardless of the file's size and date, use the bf(-I)
59d73bf3
WD
2561option (when reading the batch).
2562If an error occurs, the destination tree will probably be in a
7432ccf4 2563partially updated state. In that case, rsync can
088aac85
DD
2564be used in its regular (non-batch) mode of operation to fix up the
2565destination tree.
2566
b9f592fb 2567The rsync version used on all destinations must be at least as new as the
59d73bf3
WD
2568one used to generate the batch file. Rsync will die with an error if the
2569protocol version in the batch file is too new for the batch-reading rsync
0b941479
WD
2570to handle. See also the bf(--protocol) option for a way to have the
2571creating rsync generate a batch file that an older rsync can understand.
2572(Note that batch files changed format in version 2.6.3, so mixing versions
2573older than that with newer versions will not work.)
088aac85 2574
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WD
2575When reading a batch file, rsync will force the value of certain options
2576to match the data in the batch file if you didn't set them to the same
2577as the batch-writing command. Other options can (and should) be changed.
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WD
2578For instance bf(--write-batch) changes to bf(--read-batch),
2579bf(--files-from) is dropped, and the
2580bf(--filter)/bf(--include)/bf(--exclude) options are not needed unless
2581one of the bf(--delete) options is specified.
b9f592fb 2582
faa82484 2583The code that creates the BATCH.sh file transforms any filter/include/exclude
98f51bfb
WD
2584options into a single list that is appended as a "here" document to the
2585shell script file. An advanced user can use this to modify the exclude
faa82484 2586list if a change in what gets deleted by bf(--delete) is desired. A normal
98f51bfb 2587user can ignore this detail and just use the shell script as an easy way
faa82484 2588to run the appropriate bf(--read-batch) command for the batched data.
98f51bfb 2589
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WD
2590The original batch mode in rsync was based on "rsync+", but the latest
2591version uses a new implementation.
6902ed17 2592
eb06fa95
MP
2593manpagesection(SYMBOLIC LINKS)
2594
f28bd833 2595Three basic behaviors are possible when rsync encounters a symbolic
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MP
2596link in the source directory.
2597
2598By default, symbolic links are not transferred at all. A message
2599"skipping non-regular" file is emitted for any symlinks that exist.
2600
2601If bf(--links) is specified, then symlinks are recreated with the same
2602target on the destination. Note that bf(--archive) implies
2603bf(--links).
2604
2605If bf(--copy-links) is specified, then symlinks are "collapsed" by
2606copying their referent, rather than the symlink.
2607
2608rsync also distinguishes "safe" and "unsafe" symbolic links. An
2609example where this might be used is a web site mirror that wishes
2610ensure the rsync module they copy does not include symbolic links to
2611bf(/etc/passwd) in the public section of the site. Using
2612bf(--copy-unsafe-links) will cause any links to be copied as the file
2613they point to on the destination. Using bf(--safe-links) will cause
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WD
2614unsafe links to be omitted altogether. (Note that you must specify
2615bf(--links) for bf(--safe-links) to have any effect.)
eb06fa95 2616
7bd0cf5b 2617Symbolic links are considered unsafe if they are absolute symlinks
4743f0f4 2618(start with bf(/)), empty, or if they contain enough ".."
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MP
2619components to ascend from the directory being copied.
2620
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WD
2621Here's a summary of how the symlink options are interpreted. The list is
2622in order of precedence, so if your combination of options isn't mentioned,
2623use the first line that is a complete subset of your options:
2624
2625dit(bf(--copy-links)) Turn all symlinks into normal files (leaving no
2626symlinks for any other options to affect).
2627
2628dit(bf(--links --copy-unsafe-links)) Turn all unsafe symlinks into files
2629and duplicate all safe symlinks.
2630
2631dit(bf(--copy-unsafe-links)) Turn all unsafe symlinks into files, noisily
2632skip all safe symlinks.
2633
02184920 2634dit(bf(--links --safe-links)) Duplicate safe symlinks and skip unsafe
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WD
2635ones.
2636
2637dit(bf(--links)) Duplicate all symlinks.
2638
faa82484 2639manpagediagnostics()
d310a212 2640
14d43f1f 2641rsync occasionally produces error messages that may seem a little
d310a212 2642cryptic. The one that seems to cause the most confusion is "protocol
faa82484 2643version mismatch -- is your shell clean?".
d310a212
AT
2644
2645This message is usually caused by your startup scripts or remote shell
2646facility producing unwanted garbage on the stream that rsync is using
14d43f1f 2647for its transport. The way to diagnose this problem is to run your
d310a212
AT
2648remote shell like this:
2649
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WD
2650quote(tt(ssh remotehost /bin/true > out.dat))
2651
d310a212 2652then look at out.dat. If everything is working correctly then out.dat
2cfeab21 2653should be a zero length file. If you are getting the above error from
d310a212
AT
2654rsync then you will probably find that out.dat contains some text or
2655data. Look at the contents and try to work out what is producing
14d43f1f 2656it. The most common cause is incorrectly configured shell startup
d310a212
AT
2657scripts (such as .cshrc or .profile) that contain output statements
2658for non-interactive logins.
2659
16e5de84 2660If you are having trouble debugging filter patterns, then
faa82484 2661try specifying the bf(-vv) option. At this level of verbosity rsync will
e6c64e79
MP
2662show why each individual file is included or excluded.
2663
55b64e4b
MP
2664manpagesection(EXIT VALUES)
2665
2666startdit()
a73de5f3 2667dit(bf(0)) Success
faa82484
WD
2668dit(bf(1)) Syntax or usage error
2669dit(bf(2)) Protocol incompatibility
a73de5f3
WD
2670dit(bf(3)) Errors selecting input/output files, dirs
2671dit(bf(4)) Requested action not supported: an attempt
8212336a 2672was made to manipulate 64-bit files on a platform that cannot support
f28bd833 2673them; or an option was specified that is supported by the client and
8212336a 2674not by the server.
a73de5f3 2675dit(bf(5)) Error starting client-server protocol
124f349e 2676dit(bf(6)) Daemon unable to append to log-file
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WD
2677dit(bf(10)) Error in socket I/O
2678dit(bf(11)) Error in file I/O
2679dit(bf(12)) Error in rsync protocol data stream
2680dit(bf(13)) Errors with program diagnostics
2681dit(bf(14)) Error in IPC code
2682dit(bf(20)) Received SIGUSR1 or SIGINT
49f4cfdf 2683dit(bf(21)) Some error returned by code(waitpid())
faa82484 2684dit(bf(22)) Error allocating core memory buffers
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WD
2685dit(bf(23)) Partial transfer due to error
2686dit(bf(24)) Partial transfer due to vanished source files
124f349e 2687dit(bf(25)) The --max-delete limit stopped deletions
faa82484 2688dit(bf(30)) Timeout in data send/receive
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MP
2689enddit()
2690
de2fd20e
AT
2691manpagesection(ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES)
2692
2693startdit()
de2fd20e 2694dit(bf(CVSIGNORE)) The CVSIGNORE environment variable supplements any
faa82484 2695ignore patterns in .cvsignore files. See the bf(--cvs-exclude) option for
de2fd20e 2696more details.
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WD
2697dit(bf(RSYNC_ICONV)) Specify a default bf(--iconv) setting using this
2698environment variable.
de2fd20e 2699dit(bf(RSYNC_RSH)) The RSYNC_RSH environment variable allows you to
ea7f8108 2700override the default shell used as the transport for rsync. Command line
faa82484 2701options are permitted after the command name, just as in the bf(-e) option.
4c3b4b25
AT
2702dit(bf(RSYNC_PROXY)) The RSYNC_PROXY environment variable allows you to
2703redirect your rsync client to use a web proxy when connecting to a
2704rsync daemon. You should set RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair.
de2fd20e 2705dit(bf(RSYNC_PASSWORD)) Setting RSYNC_PASSWORD to the required
bb18e755 2706password allows you to run authenticated rsync connections to an rsync
de2fd20e
AT
2707daemon without user intervention. Note that this does not supply a
2708password to a shell transport such as ssh.
de2fd20e 2709dit(bf(USER) or bf(LOGNAME)) The USER or LOGNAME environment variables
5a727522 2710are used to determine the default username sent to an rsync daemon.
4b2f6a7c 2711If neither is set, the username defaults to "nobody".
14d43f1f 2712dit(bf(HOME)) The HOME environment variable is used to find the user's
de2fd20e 2713default .cvsignore file.
de2fd20e
AT
2714enddit()
2715
41059f75
AT
2716manpagefiles()
2717
30e8c8e1 2718/etc/rsyncd.conf or rsyncd.conf
41059f75
AT
2719
2720manpageseealso()
2721
49f4cfdf 2722bf(rsyncd.conf)(5)
41059f75 2723
41059f75
AT
2724manpagebugs()
2725
02184920 2726times are transferred as *nix time_t values
41059f75 2727
f28bd833 2728When transferring to FAT filesystems rsync may re-sync
38843171 2729unmodified files.
faa82484 2730See the comments on the bf(--modify-window) option.
38843171 2731
b5accaba 2732file permissions, devices, etc. are transferred as native numerical
41059f75
AT
2733values
2734
faa82484 2735see also the comments on the bf(--delete) option
41059f75 2736
b553a3dd 2737Please report bugs! See the web site at
38843171 2738url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/)
41059f75 2739
15997547
WD
2740manpagesection(VERSION)
2741
0c6d7952 2742This man page is current for version 2.6.9 of rsync.
15997547 2743
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WD
2744manpagesection(INTERNAL OPTIONS)
2745
2746The options bf(--server) and bf(--sender) are used internally by rsync,
2747and should never be typed by a user under normal circumstances. Some
2748awareness of these options may be needed in certain scenarios, such as
2749when setting up a login that can only run an rsync command. For instance,
2750the support directory of the rsync distribution has an example script
2751named rrsync (for restricted rsync) that can be used with a restricted
2752ssh login.
2753
41059f75
AT
2754manpagesection(CREDITS)
2755
2756rsync is distributed under the GNU public license. See the file
2757COPYING for details.
2758
41059f75 2759A WEB site is available at
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MP
2760url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/). The site
2761includes an FAQ-O-Matic which may cover questions unanswered by this
2762manual page.
9e3c856a
AT
2763
2764The primary ftp site for rsync is
2765url(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync)(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync).
41059f75
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2766
2767We would be delighted to hear from you if you like this program.
2768
9e3c856a
AT
2769This program uses the excellent zlib compression library written by
2770Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler.
41059f75
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2771
2772manpagesection(THANKS)
2773
2774Thanks to Richard Brent, Brendan Mackay, Bill Waite, Stephen Rothwell
7ff701e8
MP
2775and David Bell for helpful suggestions, patches and testing of rsync.
2776I've probably missed some people, my apologies if I have.
2777
ce5f2732 2778Especial thanks also to: David Dykstra, Jos Backus, Sebastian Krahmer,
98f51bfb 2779Martin Pool, Wayne Davison, J.W. Schultz.
41059f75
AT
2780
2781manpageauthor()
2782
ce5f2732
MP
2783rsync was originally written by Andrew Tridgell and Paul Mackerras.
2784Many people have later contributed to it.
3cd5eb3b 2785
a5d74a18 2786Mailing lists for support and development are available at
faa82484 2787url(http://lists.samba.org)(lists.samba.org)