| 1 | mailto(rsync-bugs@samba.org) |
| 2 | manpage(rsync)(1)(26 Jan 2003)()() |
| 3 | manpagename(rsync)(faster, flexible replacement for rcp) |
| 4 | manpagesynopsis() |
| 5 | |
| 6 | rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST:DEST |
| 7 | |
| 8 | rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST:SRC DEST |
| 9 | |
| 10 | rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... DEST |
| 11 | |
| 12 | rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST::SRC [DEST] |
| 13 | |
| 14 | rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST::DEST |
| 15 | |
| 16 | rsync [OPTION]... rsync://[USER@]HOST[:PORT]/SRC [DEST] |
| 17 | |
| 18 | rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... rsync://[USER@]HOST[:PORT]/DEST |
| 19 | |
| 20 | manpagedescription() |
| 21 | |
| 22 | rsync is a program that behaves in much the same way that rcp does, |
| 23 | but has many more options and uses the rsync remote-update protocol to |
| 24 | greatly speed up file transfers when the destination file already |
| 25 | exists. |
| 26 | |
| 27 | The rsync remote-update protocol allows rsync to transfer just the |
| 28 | differences between two sets of files across the network connection, using |
| 29 | an efficient checksum-search algorithm described in the technical |
| 30 | report that accompanies this package. |
| 31 | |
| 32 | Some of the additional features of rsync are: |
| 33 | |
| 34 | itemize( |
| 35 | it() support for copying links, devices, owners, groups and permissions |
| 36 | it() exclude and exclude-from options similar to GNU tar |
| 37 | it() a CVS exclude mode for ignoring the same files that CVS would ignore |
| 38 | it() can use any transparent remote shell, including rsh or ssh |
| 39 | it() does not require root privileges |
| 40 | it() pipelining of file transfers to minimize latency costs |
| 41 | it() support for anonymous or authenticated rsync servers (ideal for |
| 42 | mirroring) |
| 43 | ) |
| 44 | |
| 45 | manpagesection(GENERAL) |
| 46 | |
| 47 | There are eight different ways of using rsync. They are: |
| 48 | |
| 49 | itemize( |
| 50 | it() for copying local files. This is invoked when neither |
| 51 | source nor destination path contains a : separator |
| 52 | |
| 53 | it() for copying from the local machine to a remote machine using |
| 54 | a remote shell program as the transport (such as rsh or |
| 55 | ssh). This is invoked when the destination path contains a |
| 56 | single : separator. |
| 57 | |
| 58 | it() for copying from a remote machine to the local machine |
| 59 | using a remote shell program. This is invoked when the source |
| 60 | contains a : separator. |
| 61 | |
| 62 | it() for copying from a remote rsync server to the local |
| 63 | machine. This is invoked when the source path contains a :: |
| 64 | separator or a rsync:// URL. |
| 65 | |
| 66 | it() for copying from the local machine to a remote rsync |
| 67 | server. This is invoked when the destination path contains a :: |
| 68 | separator or a rsync:// URL. |
| 69 | |
| 70 | it() for copying from a remote machine using a remote shell |
| 71 | program as the transport, using rsync server on the remote |
| 72 | machine. This is invoked when the source path contains a :: |
| 73 | separator and the --rsh=COMMAND (aka "-e COMMAND") option is |
| 74 | also provided. |
| 75 | |
| 76 | it() for copying from the local machine to a remote machine |
| 77 | using a remote shell program as the transport, using rsync |
| 78 | server on the remote machine. This is invoked when the |
| 79 | destination path contains a :: separator and the |
| 80 | --rsh=COMMMAND option is also provided. |
| 81 | |
| 82 | it() for listing files on a remote machine. This is done the |
| 83 | same way as rsync transfers except that you leave off the |
| 84 | local destination. |
| 85 | ) |
| 86 | |
| 87 | Note that in all cases (other than listing) at least one of the source |
| 88 | and destination paths must be local. |
| 89 | |
| 90 | manpagesection(SETUP) |
| 91 | |
| 92 | See the file README for installation instructions. |
| 93 | |
| 94 | Once installed, you can use rsync to any machine that you can access via |
| 95 | a remote shell (as well as some that you can access using the rsync |
| 96 | daemon-mode protocol). For remote transfers, rsync typically uses rsh |
| 97 | for its communications, but it may have been configured to use a |
| 98 | different remote shell by default, such as ssh. |
| 99 | |
| 100 | You can also specify any remote shell you like, either by using the -e |
| 101 | command line option, or by setting the RSYNC_RSH environment variable. |
| 102 | |
| 103 | One common substitute is to use ssh, which offers a high degree of |
| 104 | security. |
| 105 | |
| 106 | Note that rsync must be installed on both the source and destination |
| 107 | machines. |
| 108 | |
| 109 | manpagesection(USAGE) |
| 110 | |
| 111 | You use rsync in the same way you use rcp. You must specify a source |
| 112 | and a destination, one of which may be remote. |
| 113 | |
| 114 | Perhaps the best way to explain the syntax is some examples: |
| 115 | |
| 116 | quote(rsync *.c foo:src/) |
| 117 | |
| 118 | this would transfer all files matching the pattern *.c from the |
| 119 | current directory to the directory src on the machine foo. If any of |
| 120 | the files already exist on the remote system then the rsync |
| 121 | remote-update protocol is used to update the file by sending only the |
| 122 | differences. See the tech report for details. |
| 123 | |
| 124 | quote(rsync -avz foo:src/bar /data/tmp) |
| 125 | |
| 126 | this would recursively transfer all files from the directory src/bar on the |
| 127 | machine foo into the /data/tmp/bar directory on the local machine. The |
| 128 | files are transferred in "archive" mode, which ensures that symbolic |
| 129 | links, devices, attributes, permissions, ownerships etc are preserved |
| 130 | in the transfer. Additionally, compression will be used to reduce the |
| 131 | size of data portions of the transfer. |
| 132 | |
| 133 | quote(rsync -avz foo:src/bar/ /data/tmp) |
| 134 | |
| 135 | a trailing slash on the source changes this behavior to transfer |
| 136 | all files from the directory src/bar on the machine foo into the |
| 137 | /data/tmp/. A trailing / on a source name means "copy the |
| 138 | contents of this directory". Without a trailing slash it means "copy |
| 139 | the directory". This difference becomes particularly important when |
| 140 | using the --delete option. |
| 141 | |
| 142 | You can also use rsync in local-only mode, where both the source and |
| 143 | destination don't have a ':' in the name. In this case it behaves like |
| 144 | an improved copy command. |
| 145 | |
| 146 | quote(rsync somehost.mydomain.com::) |
| 147 | |
| 148 | this would list all the anonymous rsync modules available on the host |
| 149 | somehost.mydomain.com. (See the following section for more details.) |
| 150 | |
| 151 | |
| 152 | manpagesection(CONNECTING TO AN RSYNC SERVER) |
| 153 | |
| 154 | It is also possible to use rsync without a remote shell as the |
| 155 | transport. In this case you will connect to a remote rsync server |
| 156 | running on TCP port 873. |
| 157 | |
| 158 | You may establish the connection via a web proxy by setting the |
| 159 | environment variable RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair pointing to |
| 160 | your web proxy. Note that your web proxy's configuration must allow |
| 161 | proxying to port 873. |
| 162 | |
| 163 | Using rsync in this way is the same as using it with a remote shell except |
| 164 | that: |
| 165 | |
| 166 | itemize( |
| 167 | it() you use a double colon :: instead of a single colon to |
| 168 | separate the hostname from the path or a rsync:// URL. |
| 169 | |
| 170 | it() the remote server may print a message of the day when you |
| 171 | connect. |
| 172 | |
| 173 | it() if you specify no path name on the remote server then the |
| 174 | list of accessible paths on the server will be shown. |
| 175 | |
| 176 | it() if you specify no local destination then a listing of the |
| 177 | specified files on the remote server is provided. |
| 178 | ) |
| 179 | |
| 180 | Some paths on the remote server may require authentication. If so then |
| 181 | you will receive a password prompt when you connect. You can avoid the |
| 182 | password prompt by setting the environment variable RSYNC_PASSWORD to |
| 183 | the password you want to use or using the --password-file option. This |
| 184 | may be useful when scripting rsync. |
| 185 | |
| 186 | WARNING: On some systems environment variables are visible to all |
| 187 | users. On those systems using --password-file is recommended. |
| 188 | |
| 189 | manpagesection(CONNECTING TO AN RSYNC SERVER OVER A REMOTE SHELL PROGRAM) |
| 190 | |
| 191 | It is sometimes useful to be able to set up file transfers using rsync |
| 192 | server capabilities on the remote machine, while still using rsh or |
| 193 | ssh for transport. This is especially useful when you want to connect |
| 194 | to a remote machine via ssh (for encryption or to get through a |
| 195 | firewall), but you still want to have access to the rsync server |
| 196 | features (see RUNNING AN RSYNC SERVER OVER A REMOTE SHELL PROGRAM, |
| 197 | below). |
| 198 | |
| 199 | From the user's perspective, using rsync in this way is the same as |
| 200 | using it to connect to an rsync server, except that you must |
| 201 | explicitly set the remote shell program on the command line with |
| 202 | --rsh=COMMAND. (Setting RSYNC_RSH in the environment will not turn on |
| 203 | this functionality.) |
| 204 | |
| 205 | In order to distinguish between the remote-shell user and the rsync |
| 206 | server user, you can use '-l user' on your remote-shell command: |
| 207 | |
| 208 | quote(rsync -av --rsh="ssh -l ssh-user" rsync-user@host::module[/path] local-path) |
| 209 | |
| 210 | The "ssh-user" will be used at the ssh level; the "rsync-user" will be |
| 211 | used to check against the rsyncd.conf on the remote host. |
| 212 | |
| 213 | manpagesection(RUNNING AN RSYNC SERVER) |
| 214 | |
| 215 | An rsync server is configured using a config file. Please see the |
| 216 | rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more information. By default the configuration |
| 217 | file is called /etc/rsyncd.conf, unless rsync is running over a remote |
| 218 | shell program and is not running as root; in that case, the default name |
| 219 | is rsyncd.conf in the current directory on the remote computer |
| 220 | (typically $HOME). |
| 221 | |
| 222 | manpagesection(RUNNING AN RSYNC SERVER OVER A REMOTE SHELL PROGRAM) |
| 223 | |
| 224 | See the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for full information on the rsync |
| 225 | server configuration file. |
| 226 | |
| 227 | Several configuration options will not be available unless the remote |
| 228 | user is root (e.g. chroot, setuid/setgid, etc.). There is no need to |
| 229 | configure inetd or the services map to include the rsync server port |
| 230 | if you run an rsync server only via a remote shell program. |
| 231 | |
| 232 | To run an rsync server out of a single-use ssh key, use the |
| 233 | "command=em(COMMAND)" syntax in the remote user's |
| 234 | authorized_keys entry, where command would be |
| 235 | |
| 236 | quote(rsync --server --daemon .) |
| 237 | |
| 238 | NOTE: rsync's argument parsing expects the trailing ".", so make sure |
| 239 | that it's there. If you want to use a rsyncd.conf(5)-style |
| 240 | configuration file other than the default, you can added a |
| 241 | --config option to the em(command): |
| 242 | |
| 243 | quote(rsync --server --daemon --config=em(file) .) |
| 244 | |
| 245 | manpagesection(EXAMPLES) |
| 246 | |
| 247 | Here are some examples of how I use rsync. |
| 248 | |
| 249 | To backup my wife's home directory, which consists of large MS Word |
| 250 | files and mail folders, I use a cron job that runs |
| 251 | |
| 252 | quote(rsync -Cavz . arvidsjaur:backup) |
| 253 | |
| 254 | each night over a PPP connection to a duplicate directory on my machine |
| 255 | "arvidsjaur". |
| 256 | |
| 257 | To synchronize my samba source trees I use the following Makefile |
| 258 | targets: |
| 259 | |
| 260 | quote( get:nl() |
| 261 | rsync -avuzb --exclude '*~' samba:samba/ . |
| 262 | |
| 263 | put:nl() |
| 264 | rsync -Cavuzb . samba:samba/ |
| 265 | |
| 266 | sync: get put) |
| 267 | |
| 268 | this allows me to sync with a CVS directory at the other end of the |
| 269 | connection. I then do cvs operations on the remote machine, which saves a |
| 270 | lot of time as the remote cvs protocol isn't very efficient. |
| 271 | |
| 272 | I mirror a directory between my "old" and "new" ftp sites with the |
| 273 | command |
| 274 | |
| 275 | quote(rsync -az -e ssh --delete ~ftp/pub/samba/ nimbus:"~ftp/pub/tridge/samba") |
| 276 | |
| 277 | this is launched from cron every few hours. |
| 278 | |
| 279 | manpagesection(OPTIONS SUMMARY) |
| 280 | |
| 281 | Here is a short summary of the options available in rsync. Please refer |
| 282 | to the detailed description below for a complete description. |
| 283 | |
| 284 | verb( |
| 285 | -v, --verbose increase verbosity |
| 286 | -q, --quiet decrease verbosity |
| 287 | -c, --checksum always checksum |
| 288 | -a, --archive archive mode, equivalent to -rlptgoD |
| 289 | -r, --recursive recurse into directories |
| 290 | -R, --relative use relative path names |
| 291 | --no-relative turn off --relative |
| 292 | --no-implied-dirs don't send implied dirs with -R |
| 293 | -b, --backup make backups (default ~ suffix) |
| 294 | --backup-dir make backups into this directory |
| 295 | --suffix=SUFFIX define backup suffix |
| 296 | -u, --update update only (don't overwrite newer files) |
| 297 | -l, --links copy symlinks as symlinks |
| 298 | -L, --copy-links copy the referent of symlinks |
| 299 | --copy-unsafe-links copy links outside the source tree |
| 300 | --safe-links ignore links outside the destination tree |
| 301 | -H, --hard-links preserve hard links |
| 302 | -p, --perms preserve permissions |
| 303 | -o, --owner preserve owner (root only) |
| 304 | -g, --group preserve group |
| 305 | -D, --devices preserve devices (root only) |
| 306 | -t, --times preserve times |
| 307 | -S, --sparse handle sparse files efficiently |
| 308 | -n, --dry-run show what would have been transferred |
| 309 | -W, --whole-file copy whole files, no incremental checks |
| 310 | --no-whole-file turn off --whole-file |
| 311 | -x, --one-file-system don't cross filesystem boundaries |
| 312 | -B, --block-size=SIZE checksum blocking size (default 700) |
| 313 | -e, --rsh=COMMAND specify the remote shell to use |
| 314 | --rsync-path=PATH specify path to rsync on the remote machine |
| 315 | --existing only update files that already exist |
| 316 | --ignore-existing ignore files that already exist on the receiving side |
| 317 | --delete delete files that don't exist on the sending side |
| 318 | --delete-excluded also delete excluded files on the receiving side |
| 319 | --delete-after delete after transferring, not before |
| 320 | --ignore-errors delete even if there are IO errors |
| 321 | --max-delete=NUM don't delete more than NUM files |
| 322 | --partial keep partially transferred files |
| 323 | --force force deletion of directories even if not empty |
| 324 | --numeric-ids don't map uid/gid values by user/group name |
| 325 | --timeout=TIME set IO timeout in seconds |
| 326 | -I, --ignore-times don't exclude files that match length and time |
| 327 | --size-only only use file size when determining if a file should be transferred |
| 328 | --modify-window=NUM Timestamp window (seconds) for file match (default=0) |
| 329 | -T --temp-dir=DIR create temporary files in directory DIR |
| 330 | --compare-dest=DIR also compare destination files relative to DIR |
| 331 | --link-dest=DIR create hardlinks to DIR for unchanged files |
| 332 | -P equivalent to --partial --progress |
| 333 | -z, --compress compress file data |
| 334 | -C, --cvs-exclude auto ignore files in the same way CVS does |
| 335 | --exclude=PATTERN exclude files matching PATTERN |
| 336 | --exclude-from=FILE exclude patterns listed in FILE |
| 337 | --include=PATTERN don't exclude files matching PATTERN |
| 338 | --include-from=FILE don't exclude patterns listed in FILE |
| 339 | --files-from=FILE read FILE for list of source-file names |
| 340 | -0 --from0 file names we read are separated by nulls, not newlines |
| 341 | --version print version number |
| 342 | --daemon run as a rsync daemon |
| 343 | --no-detach do not detach from the parent |
| 344 | --address=ADDRESS bind to the specified address |
| 345 | --config=FILE specify alternate rsyncd.conf file |
| 346 | --port=PORT specify alternate rsyncd port number |
| 347 | --blocking-io use blocking IO for the remote shell |
| 348 | --no-blocking-io turn off --blocking-io |
| 349 | --stats give some file transfer stats |
| 350 | --progress show progress during transfer |
| 351 | --log-format=FORMAT log file transfers using specified format |
| 352 | --password-file=FILE get password from FILE |
| 353 | --bwlimit=KBPS limit I/O bandwidth, KBytes per second |
| 354 | --read-batch=PREFIX read batch fileset starting with PREFIX |
| 355 | --write-batch=PREFIX write batch fileset starting with PREFIX |
| 356 | -h, --help show this help screen |
| 357 | |
| 358 | |
| 359 | ) |
| 360 | |
| 361 | manpageoptions() |
| 362 | |
| 363 | rsync uses the GNU long options package. Many of the command line |
| 364 | options have two variants, one short and one long. These are shown |
| 365 | below, separated by commas. Some options only have a long variant. |
| 366 | The '=' for options that take a parameter is optional; whitespace |
| 367 | can be used instead. |
| 368 | |
| 369 | startdit() |
| 370 | dit(bf(-h, --help)) Print a short help page describing the options |
| 371 | available in rsync |
| 372 | |
| 373 | dit(bf(--version)) print the rsync version number and exit |
| 374 | |
| 375 | dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information you |
| 376 | are given during the transfer. By default, rsync works silently. A |
| 377 | single -v will give you information about what files are being |
| 378 | transferred and a brief summary at the end. Two -v flags will give you |
| 379 | information on what files are being skipped and slightly more |
| 380 | information at the end. More than two -v flags should only be used if |
| 381 | you are debugging rsync. |
| 382 | |
| 383 | dit(bf(-q, --quiet)) This option decreases the amount of information you |
| 384 | are given during the transfer, notably suppressing information messages |
| 385 | from the remote server. This flag is useful when invoking rsync from |
| 386 | cron. |
| 387 | |
| 388 | dit(bf(-I, --ignore-times)) Normally rsync will skip any files that are |
| 389 | already the same length and have the same time-stamp. This option turns |
| 390 | off this behavior. |
| 391 | |
| 392 | dit(bf(--size-only)) Normally rsync will skip any files that are |
| 393 | already the same length and have the same time-stamp. With the |
| 394 | --size-only option files will be skipped if they have the same size, |
| 395 | regardless of timestamp. This is useful when starting to use rsync |
| 396 | after using another mirroring system which may not preserve timestamps |
| 397 | exactly. |
| 398 | |
| 399 | dit(bf(--modify-window)) When comparing two timestamps rsync treats |
| 400 | the timestamps as being equal if they are within the value of |
| 401 | modify_window. This is normally zero, but you may find it useful to |
| 402 | set this to a larger value in some situations. In particular, when |
| 403 | transferring to Windows FAT filesystems which cannot represent times |
| 404 | with a 1 second resolution --modify-window=1 is useful. |
| 405 | |
| 406 | dit(bf(-c, --checksum)) This forces the sender to checksum all files using |
| 407 | a 128-bit MD4 checksum before transfer. The checksum is then |
| 408 | explicitly checked on the receiver and any files of the same name |
| 409 | which already exist and have the same checksum and size on the |
| 410 | receiver are skipped. This option can be quite slow. |
| 411 | |
| 412 | dit(bf(-a, --archive)) This is equivalent to -rlptgoD. It is a quick |
| 413 | way of saying you want recursion and want to preserve almost |
| 414 | everything. |
| 415 | |
| 416 | Note however that bf(-a) bf(does not preserve hardlinks), because |
| 417 | finding multiply-linked files is expensive. You must separately |
| 418 | specify bf(-H). |
| 419 | |
| 420 | dit(bf(-r, --recursive)) This tells rsync to copy directories |
| 421 | recursively. If you don't specify this then rsync won't copy |
| 422 | directories at all. |
| 423 | |
| 424 | dit(bf(-R, --relative)) Use relative paths. This means that the full path |
| 425 | names specified on the command line are sent to the server rather than |
| 426 | just the last parts of the filenames. This is particularly useful when |
| 427 | you want to send several different directories at the same time. For |
| 428 | example, if you used the command |
| 429 | |
| 430 | verb(rsync foo/bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/) |
| 431 | |
| 432 | then this would create a file called foo.c in /tmp/ on the remote |
| 433 | machine. If instead you used |
| 434 | |
| 435 | verb(rsync -R foo/bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/) |
| 436 | |
| 437 | then a file called /tmp/foo/bar/foo.c would be created on the remote |
| 438 | machine -- the full path name is preserved. |
| 439 | |
| 440 | dit(bf(--no-relative)) Turn off the --relative option. This is only |
| 441 | needed if you want to use --files-from without its implied --relative |
| 442 | file processing. |
| 443 | |
| 444 | dit(bf(--no-implied-dirs)) When combined with the --relative option, the |
| 445 | implied directories in each path are not explicitly duplicated as part |
| 446 | of the transfer. This makes the transfer more optimal and also allows |
| 447 | the two sides to have non-matching symlinks in the implied part of the |
| 448 | path. For instance, if you transfer the file "/path/foo/file" with -R, |
| 449 | the default is for rsync to ensure that "/path" and "/path/foo" on the |
| 450 | destination exactly match the directories/symlinks of the source. Using |
| 451 | the --no-implied-dirs option would omit both of these implied dirs, |
| 452 | which means that if "/path" was a real directory on one machine and a |
| 453 | symlink of the other machine, rsync would not try to change this. |
| 454 | |
| 455 | dit(bf(-b, --backup)) With this option preexisting destination files are |
| 456 | renamed with a ~ extension as each file is transferred. You can |
| 457 | control the backup suffix using the --suffix option. |
| 458 | |
| 459 | dit(bf(--backup-dir=DIR)) In combination with the --backup option, this |
| 460 | tells rsync to store all backups in the specified directory. This is |
| 461 | very useful for incremental backups. You can additionally |
| 462 | specify a backup suffix using the --suffix option |
| 463 | (otherwise the files backed up in the specified directory |
| 464 | will keep their original filenames). |
| 465 | |
| 466 | dit(bf(--suffix=SUFFIX)) This option allows you to override the default |
| 467 | backup suffix used with the -b option. The default is a ~. |
| 468 | If --backup-dir and --suffix are both specified, |
| 469 | the SUFFIX is appended to the filename even in the backup directory. |
| 470 | |
| 471 | dit(bf(-u, --update)) This forces rsync to skip any files for which the |
| 472 | destination file already exists and has a date later than the source |
| 473 | file. |
| 474 | |
| 475 | dit(bf(-l, --links)) When symlinks are encountered, recreate the |
| 476 | symlink on the destination. |
| 477 | |
| 478 | dit(bf(-L, --copy-links)) When symlinks are encountered, the file that |
| 479 | they point to is copied, rather than the symlink. |
| 480 | |
| 481 | dit(bf(--copy-unsafe-links)) This tells rsync to copy the referent of |
| 482 | symbolic links that point outside the source tree. Absolute symlinks |
| 483 | are also treated like ordinary files, and so are any symlinks in the |
| 484 | source path itself when --relative is used. |
| 485 | |
| 486 | dit(bf(--safe-links)) This tells rsync to ignore any symbolic links |
| 487 | which point outside the destination tree. All absolute symlinks are |
| 488 | also ignored. Using this option in conjunction with --relative may |
| 489 | give unexpected results. |
| 490 | |
| 491 | dit(bf(-H, --hard-links)) This tells rsync to recreate hard links on |
| 492 | the remote system to be the same as the local system. Without this |
| 493 | option hard links are treated like regular files. |
| 494 | |
| 495 | Note that rsync can only detect hard links if both parts of the link |
| 496 | are in the list of files being sent. |
| 497 | |
| 498 | This option can be quite slow, so only use it if you need it. |
| 499 | |
| 500 | dit(bf(-W, --whole-file)) With this option the incremental rsync algorithm |
| 501 | is not used and the whole file is sent as-is instead. The transfer may be |
| 502 | faster if this option is used when the bandwidth between the source and |
| 503 | target machines is higher than the bandwidth to disk (especially when the |
| 504 | "disk" is actually a networked file system). This is the default when both |
| 505 | the source and target are on the local machine. |
| 506 | |
| 507 | dit(bf(--no-whole-file)) Turn off --whole-file, for use when it is the |
| 508 | default. |
| 509 | |
| 510 | dit(bf(-p, --perms)) This option causes rsync to set the destination |
| 511 | permissions to be the same as the source permissions. |
| 512 | |
| 513 | Without this option, each new file gets its permissions set based on the |
| 514 | source file's permissions and the umask at the receiving end, while all |
| 515 | other files (including updated files) retain their existing permissions |
| 516 | (which is the same behavior as other file-copy utilities, such as cp). |
| 517 | |
| 518 | dit(bf(-o, --owner)) This option causes rsync to set the owner of the |
| 519 | destination file to be the same as the source file. On most systems, |
| 520 | only the super-user can set file ownership. Note that if the remote system |
| 521 | is a daemon using chroot, the --numeric-ids option is implied because the |
| 522 | remote system cannot get access to the usernames from /etc/passwd. |
| 523 | |
| 524 | dit(bf(-g, --group)) This option causes rsync to set the group of the |
| 525 | destination file to be the same as the source file. If the receiving |
| 526 | program is not running as the super-user, only groups that the |
| 527 | receiver is a member of will be preserved (by group name, not group id |
| 528 | number). |
| 529 | |
| 530 | dit(bf(-D, --devices)) This option causes rsync to transfer character and |
| 531 | block device information to the remote system to recreate these |
| 532 | devices. This option is only available to the super-user. |
| 533 | |
| 534 | dit(bf(-t, --times)) This tells rsync to transfer modification times along |
| 535 | with the files and update them on the remote system. Note that if this |
| 536 | option is not used, the optimization that excludes files that have not been |
| 537 | modified cannot be effective; in other words, a missing -t or -a will |
| 538 | cause the next transfer to behave as if it used -I, and all files will have |
| 539 | their checksums compared and show up in log messages even if they haven't |
| 540 | changed. |
| 541 | |
| 542 | dit(bf(-n, --dry-run)) This tells rsync to not do any file transfers, |
| 543 | instead it will just report the actions it would have taken. |
| 544 | |
| 545 | dit(bf(-S, --sparse)) Try to handle sparse files efficiently so they take |
| 546 | up less space on the destination. |
| 547 | |
| 548 | NOTE: Don't use this option when the destination is a Solaris "tmpfs" |
| 549 | filesystem. It doesn't seem to handle seeks over null regions |
| 550 | correctly and ends up corrupting the files. |
| 551 | |
| 552 | dit(bf(-x, --one-file-system)) This tells rsync not to cross filesystem |
| 553 | boundaries when recursing. This is useful for transferring the |
| 554 | contents of only one filesystem. |
| 555 | |
| 556 | dit(bf(--existing)) This tells rsync not to create any new files - |
| 557 | only update files that already exist on the destination. |
| 558 | |
| 559 | dit(bf(--ignore-existing)) |
| 560 | This tells rsync not to update files that already exist on |
| 561 | the destination. |
| 562 | |
| 563 | dit(bf(--max-delete=NUM)) This tells rsync not to delete more than NUM |
| 564 | files or directories. This is useful when mirroring very large trees |
| 565 | to prevent disasters. |
| 566 | |
| 567 | dit(bf(--delete)) This tells rsync to delete any files on the receiving |
| 568 | side that aren't on the sending side. Files that are excluded from |
| 569 | transfer are excluded from being deleted unless you use --delete-excluded. |
| 570 | |
| 571 | This option has no effect if directory recursion is not selected. |
| 572 | |
| 573 | This option can be dangerous if used incorrectly! It is a very good idea |
| 574 | to run first using the dry run option (-n) to see what files would be |
| 575 | deleted to make sure important files aren't listed. |
| 576 | |
| 577 | If the sending side detects any IO errors then the deletion of any |
| 578 | files at the destination will be automatically disabled. This is to |
| 579 | prevent temporary filesystem failures (such as NFS errors) on the |
| 580 | sending side causing a massive deletion of files on the |
| 581 | destination. You can override this with the --ignore-errors option. |
| 582 | |
| 583 | dit(bf(--delete-excluded)) In addition to deleting the files on the |
| 584 | receiving side that are not on the sending side, this tells rsync to also |
| 585 | delete any files on the receiving side that are excluded (see --exclude). |
| 586 | Implies --delete. |
| 587 | |
| 588 | dit(bf(--delete-after)) By default rsync does file deletions before |
| 589 | transferring files to try to ensure that there is sufficient space on |
| 590 | the receiving filesystem. If you want to delete after transferring |
| 591 | then use the --delete-after switch. Implies --delete. |
| 592 | |
| 593 | dit(bf(--ignore-errors)) Tells --delete to go ahead and delete files |
| 594 | even when there are IO errors. |
| 595 | |
| 596 | dit(bf(--force)) This options tells rsync to delete directories even if |
| 597 | they are not empty when they are to be replaced by non-directories. This |
| 598 | is only relevant without --delete because deletions are now done depth-first. |
| 599 | Requires the --recursive option (which is implied by -a) to have any effect. |
| 600 | |
| 601 | dit(bf(-B , --block-size=BLOCKSIZE)) This controls the block size used in |
| 602 | the rsync algorithm. See the technical report for details. |
| 603 | |
| 604 | dit(bf(-e, --rsh=COMMAND)) This option allows you to choose an alternative |
| 605 | remote shell program to use for communication between the local and |
| 606 | remote copies of rsync. Typically, rsync is configured to use rsh by |
| 607 | default, but you may prefer to use ssh because of its high security. |
| 608 | |
| 609 | If this option is used with bf([user@]host::module/path), then the |
| 610 | remote shell em(COMMMAND) will be used to run an rsync server on the |
| 611 | remote host, and all data will be transmitted through that remote |
| 612 | shell connection, rather than through a direct socket connection to a |
| 613 | running rsync server on the remote host. See the section "CONNECTING |
| 614 | TO AN RSYNC SERVER OVER A REMOTE SHELL PROGRAM" above. |
| 615 | |
| 616 | Command-line arguments are permitted in COMMAND provided that COMMAND is |
| 617 | presented to rsync as a single argument. For example: |
| 618 | |
| 619 | quote(-e "ssh -p 2234") |
| 620 | |
| 621 | (Note that ssh users can alternately customize site-specific connect |
| 622 | options in their .ssh/config file.) |
| 623 | |
| 624 | You can also choose the remote shell program using the RSYNC_RSH |
| 625 | environment variable, which accepts the same range of values as -e. |
| 626 | |
| 627 | See also the --blocking-io option which is affected by this option. |
| 628 | |
| 629 | dit(bf(--rsync-path=PATH)) Use this to specify the path to the copy of |
| 630 | rsync on the remote machine. Useful when it's not in your path. Note |
| 631 | that this is the full path to the binary, not just the directory that |
| 632 | the binary is in. |
| 633 | |
| 634 | dit(bf(-C, --cvs-exclude)) This is a useful shorthand for excluding a |
| 635 | broad range of files that you often don't want to transfer between |
| 636 | systems. It uses the same algorithm that CVS uses to determine if |
| 637 | a file should be ignored. |
| 638 | |
| 639 | The exclude list is initialized to: |
| 640 | |
| 641 | quote(RCS/ SCCS/ CVS/ .svn/ CVS.adm RCSLOG cvslog.* tags TAGS .make.state |
| 642 | .nse_depinfo *~ #* .#* ,* *.old *.bak *.BAK *.orig *.rej .del-* |
| 643 | *.a *.o *.obj *.so *.Z *.elc *.ln core) |
| 644 | |
| 645 | then files listed in a $HOME/.cvsignore are added to the list and any |
| 646 | files listed in the CVSIGNORE environment variable (space delimited). |
| 647 | |
| 648 | Finally, any file is ignored if it is in the same directory as a |
| 649 | .cvsignore file and matches one of the patterns listed therein. See |
| 650 | the bf(cvs(1)) manual for more information. |
| 651 | |
| 652 | dit(bf(--exclude=PATTERN)) This option allows you to selectively exclude |
| 653 | certain files from the list of files to be transferred. This is most |
| 654 | useful in combination with a recursive transfer. |
| 655 | |
| 656 | You may use as many --exclude options on the command line as you like |
| 657 | to build up the list of files to exclude. |
| 658 | |
| 659 | See the EXCLUDE PATTERNS section for information on the syntax of |
| 660 | this option. |
| 661 | |
| 662 | dit(bf(--exclude-from=FILE)) This option is similar to the --exclude |
| 663 | option, but instead it adds all exclude patterns listed in the file |
| 664 | FILE to the exclude list. Blank lines in FILE and lines starting with |
| 665 | ';' or '#' are ignored. |
| 666 | If em(FILE) is bf(-) the list will be read from standard input. |
| 667 | |
| 668 | dit(bf(--include=PATTERN)) This option tells rsync to not exclude the |
| 669 | specified pattern of filenames. This is useful as it allows you to |
| 670 | build up quite complex exclude/include rules. |
| 671 | |
| 672 | See the EXCLUDE PATTERNS section for information on the syntax of |
| 673 | this option. |
| 674 | |
| 675 | dit(bf(--include-from=FILE)) This specifies a list of include patterns |
| 676 | from a file. |
| 677 | If em(FILE) is bf(-) the list will be read from standard input. |
| 678 | |
| 679 | dit(bf(--files-from=FILE)) Using this option allows you to specify the |
| 680 | exact list of files to transfer (as read from the specified FILE or "-" |
| 681 | for stdin). It also tweaks the default behavior of rsync to make |
| 682 | transferring just the specified files and directories easier. For |
| 683 | instance, the --relative option is enabled by default when this option |
| 684 | is used (use --no-relative if you want to turn that off), all |
| 685 | directories specified in the list are created on the destination (rather |
| 686 | than being noisily skipped without -r), and the -a (--archive) option's |
| 687 | behavior does not imply -r (--recursive) -- specify it explicitly, if |
| 688 | you want it. |
| 689 | |
| 690 | The file names that are read from the FILE are all relative to the |
| 691 | source dir -- any leading slashes are removed and no ".." references are |
| 692 | allowed to go higher than the source dir. For example, take this |
| 693 | command: |
| 694 | |
| 695 | quote(rsync -a --files-from=/tmp/foo /usr remote:/backup) |
| 696 | |
| 697 | If /tmp/foo contains the string "bin" (or even "/bin"), the /usr/bin |
| 698 | directory will be created as /backup/bin on the remote host (but the |
| 699 | contents of the /usr/bin dir would not be sent unless you specified -r |
| 700 | or the names were explicitly listed in /tmp/foo). Also keep in mind |
| 701 | that the effect of the (enabled by default) --relative option is to |
| 702 | duplicate only the path info that is read from the file -- it does not |
| 703 | force the duplication of the source-spec path (/usr in this case). |
| 704 | |
| 705 | In addition, the --files-from file can be read from the remote host |
| 706 | instead of the local host if you specify a "host:" in front of the file |
| 707 | (the host must match one end of the transfer). As a short-cut, you can |
| 708 | specify just a prefix of ":" to mean "use the remote end of the |
| 709 | transfer". For example: |
| 710 | |
| 711 | quote(rsync -a --files-from=:/path/file-list src:/ /tmp/copy) |
| 712 | |
| 713 | This would copy all the files specified in the /path/file-list file that |
| 714 | was located on the remote "src" host. |
| 715 | |
| 716 | dit(bf(-0, --from0)) This tells rsync that the filenames it reads from a |
| 717 | file are terminated by a null ('\0') character, not a NL, CR, or CR+LF. |
| 718 | This affects --exclude-from, --include-from, and --files-from. |
| 719 | |
| 720 | dit(bf(-T, --temp-dir=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use DIR as a |
| 721 | scratch directory when creating temporary copies of the files |
| 722 | transferred on the receiving side. The default behavior is to create |
| 723 | the temporary files in the receiving directory. |
| 724 | |
| 725 | dit(bf(--compare-dest=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use DIR on |
| 726 | the destination machine as an additional directory to compare destination |
| 727 | files against when doing transfers if the files are missing in the |
| 728 | destination directory. This is useful for doing transfers to a new |
| 729 | destination while leaving existing files intact, and then doing a |
| 730 | flash-cutover when all files have been successfully transferred (for |
| 731 | example by moving directories around and removing the old directory, |
| 732 | although this skips files that haven't changed; see also --link-dest). |
| 733 | This option increases the usefulness of --partial because partially |
| 734 | transferred files will remain in the new temporary destination until they |
| 735 | have a chance to be completed. If DIR is a relative path, it is relative |
| 736 | to the destination directory. |
| 737 | |
| 738 | dit(bf(--link-dest=DIR)) This option behaves like bf(--compare-dest) but |
| 739 | also will create hard links from em(DIR) to the destination directory for |
| 740 | unchanged files. Files with changed ownership or permissions will not be |
| 741 | linked. |
| 742 | Like bf(--compare-dest) if DIR is a relative path, it is relative |
| 743 | to the destination directory. |
| 744 | |
| 745 | dit(bf(-z, --compress)) With this option, rsync compresses any data from |
| 746 | the files that it sends to the destination machine. This |
| 747 | option is useful on slow connections. The compression method used is the |
| 748 | same method that gzip uses. |
| 749 | |
| 750 | Note this this option typically achieves better compression ratios |
| 751 | that can be achieved by using a compressing remote shell, or a |
| 752 | compressing transport, as it takes advantage of the implicit |
| 753 | information sent for matching data blocks. |
| 754 | |
| 755 | dit(bf(--numeric-ids)) With this option rsync will transfer numeric group |
| 756 | and user ids rather than using user and group names and mapping them |
| 757 | at both ends. |
| 758 | |
| 759 | By default rsync will use the user name and group name to determine |
| 760 | what ownership to give files. The special uid 0 and the special group |
| 761 | 0 are never mapped via user/group names even if the --numeric-ids |
| 762 | option is not specified. |
| 763 | |
| 764 | If the source system is a daemon using chroot, or if a user or group |
| 765 | name does not exist on the destination system, then the numeric id |
| 766 | from the source system is used instead. |
| 767 | |
| 768 | dit(bf(--timeout=TIMEOUT)) This option allows you to set a maximum IO |
| 769 | timeout in seconds. If no data is transferred for the specified time |
| 770 | then rsync will exit. The default is 0, which means no timeout. |
| 771 | |
| 772 | dit(bf(--daemon)) This tells rsync that it is to run as a daemon. The |
| 773 | daemon may be accessed using the bf(host::module) or |
| 774 | bf(rsync://host/module/) syntax. |
| 775 | |
| 776 | If standard input is a socket then rsync will assume that it is being |
| 777 | run via inetd, otherwise it will detach from the current terminal and |
| 778 | become a background daemon. The daemon will read the config file |
| 779 | (rsyncd.conf) on each connect made by a client and respond to |
| 780 | requests accordingly. See the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more |
| 781 | details. |
| 782 | |
| 783 | dit(bf(--no-detach)) When running as a daemon, this option instructs |
| 784 | rsync to not detach itself and become a background process. This |
| 785 | option is required when running as a service on Cygwin, and may also |
| 786 | be useful when rsync is supervised by a program such as |
| 787 | bf(daemontools) or AIX's bf(System Resource Controller). |
| 788 | bf(--no-detach) is also recommended when rsync is run under a |
| 789 | debugger. This option has no effect if rsync is run from inetd or |
| 790 | sshd. |
| 791 | |
| 792 | dit(bf(--address)) By default rsync will bind to the wildcard address |
| 793 | when run as a daemon with the --daemon option or when connecting to a |
| 794 | rsync server. The --address option allows you to specify a specific IP |
| 795 | address (or hostname) to bind to. This makes virtual hosting possible |
| 796 | in conjunction with the --config option. |
| 797 | |
| 798 | dit(bf(--config=FILE)) This specifies an alternate config file than |
| 799 | the default. This is only relevant when --daemon is specified. |
| 800 | The default is /etc/rsyncd.conf unless the daemon is running over |
| 801 | a remote shell program and the remote user is not root; in that case |
| 802 | the default is rsyncd.conf in the current directory (typically $HOME). |
| 803 | |
| 804 | dit(bf(--port=PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number to use |
| 805 | rather than the default port 873. |
| 806 | |
| 807 | dit(bf(--blocking-io)) This tells rsync to use blocking IO when launching |
| 808 | a remote shell transport. If -e or --rsh are not specified or are set to |
| 809 | the default "rsh", this defaults to blocking IO, otherwise it defaults to |
| 810 | non-blocking IO. You may find the --blocking-io option is needed for some |
| 811 | remote shells that can't handle non-blocking IO. (Note that ssh prefers |
| 812 | non-blocking IO.) |
| 813 | |
| 814 | dit(bf(--no-blocking-io)) Turn off --blocking-io, for use when it is the |
| 815 | default. |
| 816 | |
| 817 | dit(bf(--log-format=FORMAT)) This allows you to specify exactly what the |
| 818 | rsync client logs to stdout on a per-file basis. The log format is |
| 819 | specified using the same format conventions as the log format option in |
| 820 | rsyncd.conf. |
| 821 | |
| 822 | dit(bf(--stats)) This tells rsync to print a verbose set of statistics |
| 823 | on the file transfer, allowing you to tell how effective the rsync |
| 824 | algorithm is for your data. |
| 825 | |
| 826 | dit(bf(--partial)) By default, rsync will delete any partially |
| 827 | transferred file if the transfer is interrupted. In some circumstances |
| 828 | it is more desirable to keep partially transferred files. Using the |
| 829 | --partial option tells rsync to keep the partial file which should |
| 830 | make a subsequent transfer of the rest of the file much faster. |
| 831 | |
| 832 | dit(bf(--progress)) This option tells rsync to print information |
| 833 | showing the progress of the transfer. This gives a bored user |
| 834 | something to watch. |
| 835 | |
| 836 | This option is normally combined with -v. Using this option without |
| 837 | the -v option will produce weird results on your display. |
| 838 | |
| 839 | dit(bf(-P)) The -P option is equivalent to --partial --progress. I |
| 840 | found myself typing that combination quite often so I created an |
| 841 | option to make it easier. |
| 842 | |
| 843 | dit(bf(--password-file)) This option allows you to provide a password |
| 844 | in a file for accessing a remote rsync server. Note that this option |
| 845 | is only useful when accessing a rsync server using the built in |
| 846 | transport, not when using a remote shell as the transport. The file |
| 847 | must not be world readable. It should contain just the password as a |
| 848 | single line. |
| 849 | |
| 850 | dit(bf(--bwlimit=KBPS)) This option allows you to specify a maximum |
| 851 | transfer rate in kilobytes per second. This option is most effective when |
| 852 | using rsync with large files (several megabytes and up). Due to the nature |
| 853 | of rsync transfers, blocks of data are sent, then if rsync determines the |
| 854 | transfer was too fast, it will wait before sending the next data block. The |
| 855 | result is an average transfer rate equalling the specified limit. A value |
| 856 | of zero specifies no limit. |
| 857 | |
| 858 | dit(bf(--write-batch=PREFIX)) Generate a set of files that can be |
| 859 | transferred as a batch update. Each filename in the set starts with |
| 860 | PREFIX. See the "BATCH MODE" section for details. |
| 861 | |
| 862 | dit(bf(--read-batch=PREFIX)) Apply a previously generated change batch, |
| 863 | using the fileset whose filenames start with PREFIX. See the "BATCH |
| 864 | MODE" section for details. |
| 865 | |
| 866 | enddit() |
| 867 | |
| 868 | manpagesection(EXCLUDE PATTERNS) |
| 869 | |
| 870 | The exclude and include patterns specified to rsync allow for flexible |
| 871 | selection of which files to transfer and which files to skip. |
| 872 | |
| 873 | rsync builds an ordered list of include/exclude options as specified on |
| 874 | the command line. Rsync checks each file and directory |
| 875 | name against each exclude/include pattern in turn. The first matching |
| 876 | pattern is acted on. If it is an exclude pattern, then that file is |
| 877 | skipped. If it is an include pattern then that filename is not |
| 878 | skipped. If no matching include/exclude pattern is found then the |
| 879 | filename is not skipped. |
| 880 | |
| 881 | The filenames matched against the exclude/include patterns |
| 882 | are relative to the destination directory, or "top |
| 883 | directory", so patterns should not include the path elements |
| 884 | of the source or destination directories. The only way in |
| 885 | which a pattern will match the absolute path of a file or |
| 886 | directory is if the source path is the root directory. |
| 887 | |
| 888 | Note that when used with -r (which is implied by -a), every subcomponent of |
| 889 | every path is visited from top down, so include/exclude patterns get |
| 890 | applied recursively to each subcomponent. |
| 891 | |
| 892 | Note also that the --include and --exclude options take one pattern |
| 893 | each. To add multiple patterns use the --include-from and |
| 894 | --exclude-from options or multiple --include and --exclude options. |
| 895 | |
| 896 | The patterns can take several forms. The rules are: |
| 897 | |
| 898 | itemize( |
| 899 | |
| 900 | it() if the pattern starts with a / then it is matched against the |
| 901 | start of the filename, otherwise it is matched against the end of |
| 902 | the filename. |
| 903 | This is the equivalent of a leading ^ in regular expressions. |
| 904 | Thus "/foo" would match a file called "foo" at the top of the |
| 905 | transferred tree. |
| 906 | On the other hand, "foo" would match any file called "foo" |
| 907 | anywhere in the tree because the algorithm is applied recursively from |
| 908 | top down; it behaves as if each path component gets a turn at being the |
| 909 | end of the file name. |
| 910 | The leading / does not make the pattern an absolute pathname. |
| 911 | |
| 912 | it() if the pattern ends with a / then it will only match a |
| 913 | directory, not a file, link or device. |
| 914 | |
| 915 | it() if the pattern contains a wildcard character from the set |
| 916 | *?[ then expression matching is applied using the shell filename |
| 917 | matching rules. Otherwise a simple string match is used. |
| 918 | |
| 919 | it() if the pattern includes a double asterisk "**" then all wildcards in |
| 920 | the pattern will match slashes, otherwise they will stop at slashes. |
| 921 | |
| 922 | it() if the pattern contains a / (not counting a trailing /) or a "**" |
| 923 | then it is matched against the full filename, including any leading |
| 924 | directory. If the pattern doesn't contain a / or a "**", then it is |
| 925 | matched only against the final component of the filename. Again, |
| 926 | remember that the algorithm is applied recursively so "full filename" can |
| 927 | actually be any portion of a path. |
| 928 | |
| 929 | it() if the pattern starts with "+ " (a plus followed by a space) |
| 930 | then it is always considered an include pattern, even if specified as |
| 931 | part of an exclude option. The "+ " part is discarded before matching. |
| 932 | |
| 933 | it() if the pattern starts with "- " (a minus followed by a space) |
| 934 | then it is always considered an exclude pattern, even if specified as |
| 935 | part of an include option. The "- " part is discarded before matching. |
| 936 | |
| 937 | it() if the pattern is a single exclamation mark ! then the current |
| 938 | include/exclude list is reset, removing all previously defined patterns. |
| 939 | ) |
| 940 | |
| 941 | The +/- rules are most useful in a list that was read from a file, allowing |
| 942 | you to have a single exclude list that contains both include and exclude |
| 943 | options. |
| 944 | |
| 945 | If you end an exclude list with --exclude '*', note that since the |
| 946 | algorithm is applied recursively that unless you explicitly include |
| 947 | parent directories of files you want to include then the algorithm |
| 948 | will stop at the parent directories and never see the files below |
| 949 | them. To include all directories, use --include '*/' before the |
| 950 | --exclude '*'. |
| 951 | |
| 952 | Here are some exclude/include examples: |
| 953 | |
| 954 | itemize( |
| 955 | it() --exclude "*.o" would exclude all filenames matching *.o |
| 956 | it() --exclude "/foo" would exclude a file called foo in the top directory |
| 957 | it() --exclude "foo/" would exclude any directory called foo |
| 958 | it() --exclude "/foo/*/bar" would exclude any file called bar two |
| 959 | levels below a directory called foo in the top directory |
| 960 | it() --exclude "/foo/**/bar" would exclude any file called bar two |
| 961 | or more levels below a directory called foo in the top directory |
| 962 | it() --include "*/" --include "*.c" --exclude "*" would include all |
| 963 | directories and C source files |
| 964 | it() --include "foo/" --include "foo/bar.c" --exclude "*" would include |
| 965 | only foo/bar.c (the foo/ directory must be explicitly included or |
| 966 | it would be excluded by the "*") |
| 967 | ) |
| 968 | |
| 969 | manpagesection(BATCH MODE) |
| 970 | |
| 971 | bf(Note:) Batch mode should be considered experimental in this version |
| 972 | of rsync. The interface or behaviour may change before it stabilizes. |
| 973 | |
| 974 | Batch mode can be used to apply the same set of updates to many |
| 975 | identical systems. Suppose one has a tree which is replicated on a |
| 976 | number of hosts. Now suppose some changes have been made to this |
| 977 | source tree and those changes need to be propagated to the other |
| 978 | hosts. In order to do this using batch mode, rsync is run with the |
| 979 | write-batch option to apply the changes made to the source tree to one |
| 980 | of the destination trees. The write-batch option causes the rsync |
| 981 | client to store the information needed to repeat this operation against |
| 982 | other destination trees in a batch update fileset (see below). The |
| 983 | filename of each file in the fileset starts with a prefix specified by |
| 984 | the user as an argument to the write-batch option. This fileset is |
| 985 | then copied to each remote host, where rsync is run with the read-batch |
| 986 | option, again specifying the same prefix, and the destination tree. |
| 987 | Rsync updates the destination tree using the information stored in the |
| 988 | batch update fileset. |
| 989 | |
| 990 | The fileset consists of 4 files: |
| 991 | |
| 992 | itemize( |
| 993 | it() bf(<prefix>.rsync_argvs) command-line arguments |
| 994 | it() bf(<prefix>.rsync_flist) rsync internal file metadata |
| 995 | it() bf(<prefix>.rsync_csums) rsync checksums |
| 996 | it() bf(<prefix>.rsync_delta) data blocks for file update & change |
| 997 | ) |
| 998 | |
| 999 | The .rsync_argvs file contains a command-line suitable for updating a |
| 1000 | destination tree using that batch update fileset. It can be executed |
| 1001 | using a Bourne(-like) shell, optionally passing in an alternate |
| 1002 | destination tree pathname which is then used instead of the original |
| 1003 | path. This is useful when the destination tree path differs from the |
| 1004 | original destination tree path. |
| 1005 | |
| 1006 | Generating the batch update fileset once saves having to perform the |
| 1007 | file status, checksum and data block generation more than once when |
| 1008 | updating multiple destination trees. Multicast transport protocols can |
| 1009 | be used to transfer the batch update files in parallel to many hosts at |
| 1010 | once, instead of sending the same data to every host individually. |
| 1011 | |
| 1012 | Example: |
| 1013 | |
| 1014 | verb( |
| 1015 | $ rsync --write_batch=pfx -a /source/dir/ /adest/dir/ |
| 1016 | $ rcp pfx.rsync_* remote: |
| 1017 | $ rsh remote rsync --read_batch=pfx -a /bdest/dir/ |
| 1018 | # or alternatively |
| 1019 | $ rsh remote ./pfx.rsync_argvs /bdest/dir/ |
| 1020 | ) |
| 1021 | |
| 1022 | In this example, rsync is used to update /adest/dir/ with /source/dir/ |
| 1023 | and the information to repeat this operation is stored in the files |
| 1024 | pfx.rsync_*. These files are then copied to the machine named "remote". |
| 1025 | Rsync is then invoked on "remote" to update /bdest/dir/ the same way as |
| 1026 | /adest/dir/. The last line shows the rsync_argvs file being used to |
| 1027 | invoke rsync. |
| 1028 | |
| 1029 | Caveats: |
| 1030 | |
| 1031 | The read-batch option expects the destination tree it is meant to update |
| 1032 | to be identical to the destination tree that was used to create the |
| 1033 | batch update fileset. When a difference between the destination trees |
| 1034 | is encountered the update will fail at that point, leaving the |
| 1035 | destination tree in a partially updated state. In that case, rsync can |
| 1036 | be used in its regular (non-batch) mode of operation to fix up the |
| 1037 | destination tree. |
| 1038 | |
| 1039 | The rsync version used on all destinations should be identical to the |
| 1040 | one used on the original destination. |
| 1041 | |
| 1042 | The -z/--compress option does not work in batch mode and yields a usage |
| 1043 | error. A separate compression tool can be used instead to reduce the |
| 1044 | size of the batch update files for transport to the destination. |
| 1045 | |
| 1046 | The -n/--dryrun option does not work in batch mode and yields a runtime |
| 1047 | error. |
| 1048 | |
| 1049 | See bf(http://www.ils.unc.edu/i2dsi/unc_rsync+.html) for papers and technical |
| 1050 | reports. |
| 1051 | |
| 1052 | manpagesection(SYMBOLIC LINKS) |
| 1053 | |
| 1054 | Three basic behaviours are possible when rsync encounters a symbolic |
| 1055 | link in the source directory. |
| 1056 | |
| 1057 | By default, symbolic links are not transferred at all. A message |
| 1058 | "skipping non-regular" file is emitted for any symlinks that exist. |
| 1059 | |
| 1060 | If bf(--links) is specified, then symlinks are recreated with the same |
| 1061 | target on the destination. Note that bf(--archive) implies |
| 1062 | bf(--links). |
| 1063 | |
| 1064 | If bf(--copy-links) is specified, then symlinks are "collapsed" by |
| 1065 | copying their referent, rather than the symlink. |
| 1066 | |
| 1067 | rsync also distinguishes "safe" and "unsafe" symbolic links. An |
| 1068 | example where this might be used is a web site mirror that wishes |
| 1069 | ensure the rsync module they copy does not include symbolic links to |
| 1070 | bf(/etc/passwd) in the public section of the site. Using |
| 1071 | bf(--copy-unsafe-links) will cause any links to be copied as the file |
| 1072 | they point to on the destination. Using bf(--safe-links) will cause |
| 1073 | unsafe links to be ommitted altogether. |
| 1074 | |
| 1075 | Symbolic links are considered unsafe if they are absolute symlinks |
| 1076 | (start with bf(/)), empty, or if they contain enough bf("..") |
| 1077 | components to ascend from the directory being copied. |
| 1078 | |
| 1079 | manpagesection(DIAGNOSTICS) |
| 1080 | |
| 1081 | rsync occasionally produces error messages that may seem a little |
| 1082 | cryptic. The one that seems to cause the most confusion is "protocol |
| 1083 | version mismatch - is your shell clean?". |
| 1084 | |
| 1085 | This message is usually caused by your startup scripts or remote shell |
| 1086 | facility producing unwanted garbage on the stream that rsync is using |
| 1087 | for its transport. The way to diagnose this problem is to run your |
| 1088 | remote shell like this: |
| 1089 | |
| 1090 | verb( |
| 1091 | rsh remotehost /bin/true > out.dat |
| 1092 | ) |
| 1093 | |
| 1094 | then look at out.dat. If everything is working correctly then out.dat |
| 1095 | should be a zero length file. If you are getting the above error from |
| 1096 | rsync then you will probably find that out.dat contains some text or |
| 1097 | data. Look at the contents and try to work out what is producing |
| 1098 | it. The most common cause is incorrectly configured shell startup |
| 1099 | scripts (such as .cshrc or .profile) that contain output statements |
| 1100 | for non-interactive logins. |
| 1101 | |
| 1102 | If you are having trouble debugging include and exclude patterns, then |
| 1103 | try specifying the -vv option. At this level of verbosity rsync will |
| 1104 | show why each individual file is included or excluded. |
| 1105 | |
| 1106 | manpagesection(EXIT VALUES) |
| 1107 | |
| 1108 | startdit() |
| 1109 | dit(bf(RERR_SYNTAX 1)) Syntax or usage error |
| 1110 | dit(bf(RERR_PROTOCOL 2)) Protocol incompatibility |
| 1111 | dit(bf(RERR_FILESELECT 3)) Errors selecting input/output files, dirs |
| 1112 | |
| 1113 | dit(bf(RERR_UNSUPPORTED 4)) Requested action not supported: an attempt |
| 1114 | was made to manipulate 64-bit files on a platform that cannot support |
| 1115 | them; or an option was speciifed that is supported by the client and |
| 1116 | not by the server. |
| 1117 | |
| 1118 | dit(bf(RERR_SOCKETIO 10)) Error in socket IO |
| 1119 | dit(bf(RERR_FILEIO 11)) Error in file IO |
| 1120 | dit(bf(RERR_STREAMIO 12)) Error in rsync protocol data stream |
| 1121 | dit(bf(RERR_MESSAGEIO 13)) Errors with program diagnostics |
| 1122 | dit(bf(RERR_IPC 14)) Error in IPC code |
| 1123 | dit(bf(RERR_SIGNAL 20)) Received SIGUSR1 or SIGINT |
| 1124 | dit(bf(RERR_WAITCHILD 21)) Some error returned by waitpid() |
| 1125 | dit(bf(RERR_MALLOC 22)) Error allocating core memory buffers |
| 1126 | dit(bf(RERR_TIMEOUT 30)) Timeout in data send/receive |
| 1127 | enddit() |
| 1128 | |
| 1129 | manpagesection(ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES) |
| 1130 | |
| 1131 | startdit() |
| 1132 | |
| 1133 | dit(bf(CVSIGNORE)) The CVSIGNORE environment variable supplements any |
| 1134 | ignore patterns in .cvsignore files. See the --cvs-exclude option for |
| 1135 | more details. |
| 1136 | |
| 1137 | dit(bf(RSYNC_RSH)) The RSYNC_RSH environment variable allows you to |
| 1138 | override the default shell used as the transport for rsync. Command line |
| 1139 | options are permitted after the command name, just as in the -e option. |
| 1140 | |
| 1141 | dit(bf(RSYNC_PROXY)) The RSYNC_PROXY environment variable allows you to |
| 1142 | redirect your rsync client to use a web proxy when connecting to a |
| 1143 | rsync daemon. You should set RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair. |
| 1144 | |
| 1145 | dit(bf(RSYNC_PASSWORD)) Setting RSYNC_PASSWORD to the required |
| 1146 | password allows you to run authenticated rsync connections to a rsync |
| 1147 | daemon without user intervention. Note that this does not supply a |
| 1148 | password to a shell transport such as ssh. |
| 1149 | |
| 1150 | dit(bf(USER) or bf(LOGNAME)) The USER or LOGNAME environment variables |
| 1151 | are used to determine the default username sent to a rsync server. |
| 1152 | |
| 1153 | dit(bf(HOME)) The HOME environment variable is used to find the user's |
| 1154 | default .cvsignore file. |
| 1155 | |
| 1156 | enddit() |
| 1157 | |
| 1158 | manpagefiles() |
| 1159 | |
| 1160 | /etc/rsyncd.conf or rsyncd.conf |
| 1161 | |
| 1162 | manpageseealso() |
| 1163 | |
| 1164 | rsyncd.conf(5) |
| 1165 | |
| 1166 | manpagediagnostics() |
| 1167 | |
| 1168 | manpagebugs() |
| 1169 | |
| 1170 | times are transferred as unix time_t values |
| 1171 | |
| 1172 | When transferring to FAT filesystmes rsync may resync |
| 1173 | unmodified files. |
| 1174 | See the comments on the --modify-window option. |
| 1175 | |
| 1176 | file permissions, devices etc are transferred as native numerical |
| 1177 | values |
| 1178 | |
| 1179 | see also the comments on the --delete option |
| 1180 | |
| 1181 | Please report bugs! See the website at |
| 1182 | url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/) |
| 1183 | |
| 1184 | manpagesection(CREDITS) |
| 1185 | |
| 1186 | rsync is distributed under the GNU public license. See the file |
| 1187 | COPYING for details. |
| 1188 | |
| 1189 | A WEB site is available at |
| 1190 | url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/). The site |
| 1191 | includes an FAQ-O-Matic which may cover questions unanswered by this |
| 1192 | manual page. |
| 1193 | |
| 1194 | The primary ftp site for rsync is |
| 1195 | url(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync)(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync). |
| 1196 | |
| 1197 | We would be delighted to hear from you if you like this program. |
| 1198 | |
| 1199 | This program uses the excellent zlib compression library written by |
| 1200 | Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler. |
| 1201 | |
| 1202 | manpagesection(THANKS) |
| 1203 | |
| 1204 | Thanks to Richard Brent, Brendan Mackay, Bill Waite, Stephen Rothwell |
| 1205 | and David Bell for helpful suggestions, patches and testing of rsync. |
| 1206 | I've probably missed some people, my apologies if I have. |
| 1207 | |
| 1208 | Especial thanks also to: David Dykstra, Jos Backus, Sebastian Krahmer. |
| 1209 | |
| 1210 | |
| 1211 | manpageauthor() |
| 1212 | |
| 1213 | rsync was written by Andrew Tridgell <tridge@samba.org> and Paul |
| 1214 | Mackerras. |
| 1215 | |
| 1216 | rsync is now maintained by Martin Pool <mbp@samba.org>. |
| 1217 | |
| 1218 | Mailing lists for support and development are available at |
| 1219 | url(http://lists.samba.org)(lists.samba.org) |
| 1220 | |
| 1221 | If you suspect you have found a security vulnerability in rsync, |
| 1222 | please send it directly to Martin Pool and Andrew Tridgell. For other |
| 1223 | enquiries, please use the mailing list. |