1 mailto(rsync-bugs@samba.org)
2 manpage(rsync)(1)(28 Jul 2005)()()
3 manpagename(rsync)(faster, flexible replacement for rcp)
6 rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST:DEST
8 rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST:SRC [DEST]
10 rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... DEST
12 rsync [OPTION]... [USER@]HOST::SRC [DEST]
14 rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... [USER@]HOST::DEST
16 rsync [OPTION]... rsync://[USER@]HOST[:PORT]/SRC [DEST]
18 rsync [OPTION]... SRC [SRC]... rsync://[USER@]HOST[:PORT]/DEST
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 is being
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.
32 Some of the additional features of rsync are:
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 ssh or rsh
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 daemons (ideal for
45 manpagesection(GENERAL)
47 Rsync copies files either to or from a remote host, or locally on the
48 current host (it does not support copying files between two remote hosts).
50 There are two different ways for rsync to contact a remote system: using a
51 remote-shell program as the transport (such as ssh or rsh) or contacting an
52 rsync daemon directly via TCP. The remote-shell transport is used whenever
53 the source or destination path contains a single colon (:) separator after
54 a host specification. Contacting an rsync daemon directly happens when the
55 source or destination path contains a double colon (::) separator after a
56 host specification, OR when an rsync:// URL is specified (see also the
57 "USING RSYNC-DAEMON FEATURES VIA A REMOTE-SHELL CONNECTION" section for
58 an exception to this latter rule).
60 As a special case, if a remote source is specified without a destination,
61 the remote files are listed in an output format similar to "ls -l".
63 As expected, if neither the source or destination path specify a remote
64 host, the copy occurs locally (see also the bf(--list-only) option).
68 See the file README for installation instructions.
70 Once installed, you can use rsync to any machine that you can access via
71 a remote shell (as well as some that you can access using the rsync
72 daemon-mode protocol). For remote transfers, a modern rsync uses ssh
73 for its communications, but it may have been configured to use a
74 different remote shell by default, such as rsh or remsh.
76 You can also specify any remote shell you like, either by using the bf(-e)
77 command line option, or by setting the RSYNC_RSH environment variable.
79 One common substitute is to use ssh, which offers a high degree of
82 Note that rsync must be installed on both the source and destination
87 You use rsync in the same way you use rcp. You must specify a source
88 and a destination, one of which may be remote.
90 Perhaps the best way to explain the syntax is with some examples:
92 quote(tt(rsync -t *.c foo:src/))
94 This would transfer all files matching the pattern *.c from the
95 current directory to the directory src on the machine foo. If any of
96 the files already exist on the remote system then the rsync
97 remote-update protocol is used to update the file by sending only the
98 differences. See the tech report for details.
100 quote(tt(rsync -avz foo:src/bar /data/tmp))
102 This would recursively transfer all files from the directory src/bar on the
103 machine foo into the /data/tmp/bar directory on the local machine. The
104 files are transferred in "archive" mode, which ensures that symbolic
105 links, devices, attributes, permissions, ownerships, etc. are preserved
106 in the transfer. Additionally, compression will be used to reduce the
107 size of data portions of the transfer.
109 quote(tt(rsync -avz foo:src/bar/ /data/tmp))
111 A trailing slash on the source changes this behavior to avoid creating an
112 additional directory level at the destination. You can think of a trailing
113 / on a source as meaning "copy the contents of this directory" as opposed
114 to "copy the directory by name", but in both cases the attributes of the
115 containing directory are transferred to the containing directory on the
116 destination. In other words, each of the following commands copies the
117 files in the same way, including their setting of the attributes of
121 tt(rsync -av /src/foo /dest)nl()
122 tt(rsync -av /src/foo/ /dest/foo)nl()
125 Note also that host and module references don't require a trailing slash to
126 copy the contents of the default directory. For example, both of these
127 copy the remote directory's contents into "/dest":
130 tt(rsync -av host: /dest)nl()
131 tt(rsync -av host::module /dest)nl()
134 You can also use rsync in local-only mode, where both the source and
135 destination don't have a ':' in the name. In this case it behaves like
136 an improved copy command.
138 Finally, you can list all the (listable) modules available from a
139 particular rsync daemon by leaving off the module name:
141 quote(tt(rsync somehost.mydomain.com::))
143 See the following section for more details.
145 manpagesection(ADVANCED USAGE)
147 The syntax for requesting multiple files from a remote host involves using
148 quoted spaces in the SRC. Some examples:
150 quote(tt(rsync host::'modname/dir1/file1 modname/dir2/file2' /dest))
152 This would copy file1 and file2 into /dest from an rsync daemon. Each
153 additional arg must include the same "modname/" prefix as the first one,
154 and must be preceded by a single space. All other spaces are assumed
155 to be a part of the filenames.
157 quote(tt(rsync -av host:'dir1/file1 dir2/file2' /dest))
159 This would copy file1 and file2 into /dest using a remote shell. This
160 word-splitting is done by the remote shell, so if it doesn't work it means
161 that the remote shell isn't configured to split its args based on
162 whitespace (a very rare setting, but not unknown). If you need to transfer
163 a filename that contains whitespace, you'll need to either escape the
164 whitespace in a way that the remote shell will understand, or use wildcards
165 in place of the spaces. Two examples of this are:
168 tt(rsync -av host:'file\ name\ with\ spaces' /dest)nl()
169 tt(rsync -av host:file?name?with?spaces /dest)nl()
172 This latter example assumes that your shell passes through unmatched
173 wildcards. If it complains about "no match", put the name in quotes.
175 manpagesection(CONNECTING TO AN RSYNC DAEMON)
177 It is also possible to use rsync without a remote shell as the transport.
178 In this case you will directly connect to a remote rsync daemon, typically
179 using TCP port 873. (This obviously requires the daemon to be running on
180 the remote system, so refer to the STARTING AN RSYNC DAEMON TO ACCEPT
181 CONNECTIONS section below for information on that.)
183 Using rsync in this way is the same as using it with a remote shell except
187 it() you either use a double colon :: instead of a single colon to
188 separate the hostname from the path, or you use an rsync:// URL.
189 it() the first word after the :: is a module name.
190 it() the remote daemon may print a message of the day when you
192 it() if you specify no path name on the remote daemon then the
193 list of accessible paths on the daemon will be shown.
194 it() if you specify no local destination then a listing of the
195 specified files on the remote daemon is provided.
198 An example that copies all the files in a remote module named "src":
200 verb( rsync -av host::src /dest)
202 Some modules on the remote daemon may require authentication. If so,
203 you will receive a password prompt when you connect. You can avoid the
204 password prompt by setting the environment variable RSYNC_PASSWORD to
205 the password you want to use or using the bf(--password-file) option. This
206 may be useful when scripting rsync.
208 WARNING: On some systems environment variables are visible to all
209 users. On those systems using bf(--password-file) is recommended.
211 You may establish the connection via a web proxy by setting the
212 environment variable RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair pointing to
213 your web proxy. Note that your web proxy's configuration must support
214 proxy connections to port 873.
216 manpagesection(USING RSYNC-DAEMON FEATURES VIA A REMOTE-SHELL CONNECTION)
218 It is sometimes useful to use various features of an rsync daemon (such as
219 named modules) without actually allowing any new socket connections into a
220 system (other than what is already required to allow remote-shell access).
221 Rsync supports connecting to a host using a remote shell and then spawning
222 a single-use "daemon" server that expects to read its config file in the
223 home dir of the remote user. This can be useful if you want to encrypt a
224 daemon-style transfer's data, but since the daemon is started up fresh by
225 the remote user, you may not be able to use features such as chroot or
226 change the uid used by the daemon. (For another way to encrypt a daemon
227 transfer, consider using ssh to tunnel a local port to a remote machine and
228 configure a normal rsync daemon on that remote host to only allow
229 connections from "localhost".)
231 From the user's perspective, a daemon transfer via a remote-shell
232 connection uses nearly the same command-line syntax as a normal
233 rsync-daemon transfer, with the only exception being that you must
234 explicitly set the remote shell program on the command-line with the
235 bf(--rsh=COMMAND) option. (Setting the RSYNC_RSH in the environment
236 will not turn on this functionality.) For example:
238 verb( rsync -av --rsh=ssh host::module /dest)
240 If you need to specify a different remote-shell user, keep in mind that the
241 user@ prefix in front of the host is specifying the rsync-user value (for a
242 module that requires user-based authentication). This means that you must
243 give the '-l user' option to ssh when specifying the remote-shell:
245 verb( rsync -av -e "ssh -l ssh-user" rsync-user@host::module /dest)
247 The "ssh-user" will be used at the ssh level; the "rsync-user" will be
248 used to log-in to the "module".
250 manpagesection(STARTING AN RSYNC DAEMON TO ACCEPT CONNECTIONS)
252 In order to connect to an rsync daemon, the remote system needs to have a
253 daemon already running (or it needs to have configured something like inetd
254 to spawn an rsync daemon for incoming connections on a particular port).
255 For full information on how to start a daemon that will handling incoming
256 socket connections, see the rsyncd.conf(5) man page -- that is the config
257 file for the daemon, and it contains the full details for how to run the
258 daemon (including stand-alone and inetd configurations).
260 If you're using one of the remote-shell transports for the transfer, there is
261 no need to manually start an rsync daemon.
263 manpagesection(EXAMPLES)
265 Here are some examples of how I use rsync.
267 To backup my wife's home directory, which consists of large MS Word
268 files and mail folders, I use a cron job that runs
270 quote(tt(rsync -Cavz . arvidsjaur:backup))
272 each night over a PPP connection to a duplicate directory on my machine
275 To synchronize my samba source trees I use the following Makefile
279 rsync -avuzb --exclude '*~' samba:samba/ .
281 rsync -Cavuzb . samba:samba/
284 this allows me to sync with a CVS directory at the other end of the
285 connection. I then do CVS operations on the remote machine, which saves a
286 lot of time as the remote CVS protocol isn't very efficient.
288 I mirror a directory between my "old" and "new" ftp sites with the
291 tt(rsync -az -e ssh --delete ~ftp/pub/samba nimbus:"~ftp/pub/tridge")
293 This is launched from cron every few hours.
295 manpagesection(OPTIONS SUMMARY)
297 Here is a short summary of the options available in rsync. Please refer
298 to the detailed description below for a complete description. verb(
299 -v, --verbose increase verbosity
300 -q, --quiet suppress non-error messages
301 -c, --checksum skip based on checksum, not mod-time & size
302 -a, --archive archive mode; same as -rlptgoD (no -H)
303 -r, --recursive recurse into directories
304 -R, --relative use relative path names
305 --no-relative turn off --relative
306 --no-implied-dirs don't send implied dirs with -R
307 -b, --backup make backups (see --suffix & --backup-dir)
308 --backup-dir=DIR make backups into hierarchy based in DIR
309 --suffix=SUFFIX backup suffix (default ~ w/o --backup-dir)
310 -u, --update skip files that are newer on the receiver
311 --inplace update destination files in-place
312 --append append data onto shorter files
313 -d, --dirs transfer directories without recursing
314 -l, --links copy symlinks as symlinks
315 -L, --copy-links transform symlink into referent file/dir
316 --copy-unsafe-links only "unsafe" symlinks are transformed
317 --safe-links ignore symlinks that point outside the tree
318 -H, --hard-links preserve hard links
319 -K, --keep-dirlinks treat symlinked dir on receiver as dir
320 -p, --perms preserve permissions
321 -o, --owner preserve owner (root only)
322 -g, --group preserve group
323 -D, --devices preserve devices (root only)
324 -t, --times preserve times
325 -O, --omit-dir-times omit directories when preserving times
326 -S, --sparse handle sparse files efficiently
327 -n, --dry-run show what would have been transferred
328 -W, --whole-file copy files whole (without rsync algorithm)
329 --no-whole-file always use incremental rsync algorithm
330 -x, --one-file-system don't cross filesystem boundaries
331 -B, --block-size=SIZE force a fixed checksum block-size
332 -e, --rsh=COMMAND specify the remote shell to use
333 --rsync-path=PROGRAM specify the rsync to run on remote machine
334 --existing only update files that already exist
335 --ignore-existing ignore files that already exist on receiver
336 --remove-sent-files sent files/symlinks are removed from sender
337 --del an alias for --delete-during
338 --delete delete files that don't exist on sender
339 --delete-before receiver deletes before transfer (default)
340 --delete-during receiver deletes during xfer, not before
341 --delete-after receiver deletes after transfer, not before
342 --delete-excluded also delete excluded files on receiver
343 --ignore-errors delete even if there are I/O errors
344 --force force deletion of dirs even if not empty
345 --max-delete=NUM don't delete more than NUM files
346 --max-size=SIZE don't transfer any file larger than SIZE
347 --partial keep partially transferred files
348 --partial-dir=DIR put a partially transferred file into DIR
349 --delay-updates put all updated files into place at end
350 --numeric-ids don't map uid/gid values by user/group name
351 --timeout=TIME set I/O timeout in seconds
352 -I, --ignore-times don't skip files that match size and time
353 --size-only skip files that match in size
354 --modify-window=NUM compare mod-times with reduced accuracy
355 -T, --temp-dir=DIR create temporary files in directory DIR
356 -y, --fuzzy find similar file for basis if no dest file
357 --compare-dest=DIR also compare received files relative to DIR
358 --copy-dest=DIR ... and include copies of unchanged files
359 --link-dest=DIR hardlink to files in DIR when unchanged
360 -z, --compress compress file data during the transfer
361 -C, --cvs-exclude auto-ignore files in the same way CVS does
362 -f, --filter=RULE add a file-filtering RULE
363 -F same as --filter='dir-merge /.rsync-filter'
364 repeated: --filter='- .rsync-filter'
365 --exclude=PATTERN exclude files matching PATTERN
366 --exclude-from=FILE read exclude patterns from FILE
367 --include=PATTERN don't exclude files matching PATTERN
368 --include-from=FILE read include patterns from FILE
369 --files-from=FILE read list of source-file names from FILE
370 -0, --from0 all *from/filter files are delimited by 0s
371 --address=ADDRESS bind address for outgoing socket to daemon
372 --port=PORT specify double-colon alternate port number
373 --blocking-io use blocking I/O for the remote shell
374 --no-blocking-io turn off blocking I/O when it is default
375 --stats give some file-transfer stats
376 --progress show progress during transfer
377 -P same as --partial --progress
378 -i, --itemize-changes output a change-summary for all updates
379 --log-format=FORMAT output filenames using the specified format
380 --password-file=FILE read password from FILE
381 --list-only list the files instead of copying them
382 --bwlimit=KBPS limit I/O bandwidth; KBytes per second
383 --write-batch=FILE write a batched update to FILE
384 --only-write-batch=FILE like --write-batch but w/o updating dest
385 --read-batch=FILE read a batched update from FILE
386 --protocol=NUM force an older protocol version to be used
387 --checksum-seed=NUM set block/file checksum seed (advanced)
388 -4, --ipv4 prefer IPv4
389 -6, --ipv6 prefer IPv6
390 --version print version number
391 -h, --help show this help screen)
393 Rsync can also be run as a daemon, in which case the following options are
395 --daemon run as an rsync daemon
396 --address=ADDRESS bind to the specified address
397 --bwlimit=KBPS limit I/O bandwidth; KBytes per second
398 --config=FILE specify alternate rsyncd.conf file
399 --no-detach do not detach from the parent
400 --port=PORT listen on alternate port number
401 -v, --verbose increase verbosity
402 -4, --ipv4 prefer IPv4
403 -6, --ipv6 prefer IPv6
404 -h, --help show this help screen)
408 rsync uses the GNU long options package. Many of the command line
409 options have two variants, one short and one long. These are shown
410 below, separated by commas. Some options only have a long variant.
411 The '=' for options that take a parameter is optional; whitespace
415 dit(bf(-h, --help)) Print a short help page describing the options
418 dit(bf(--version)) print the rsync version number and exit.
420 dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information you
421 are given during the transfer. By default, rsync works silently. A
422 single bf(-v) will give you information about what files are being
423 transferred and a brief summary at the end. Two bf(-v) flags will give you
424 information on what files are being skipped and slightly more
425 information at the end. More than two bf(-v) flags should only be used if
426 you are debugging rsync.
428 Note that the names of the transferred files that are output are done using
429 a default bf(--log-format) of "%n%L", which tells you just the name of the
430 file and, if the item is a link, where it points. At the single bf(-v)
431 level of verbosity, this does not mention when a file gets its attributes
432 changed. If you ask for an itemized list of changed attributes (either
433 bf(--itemize-changes) or adding "%i" to the bf(--log-format) setting), the
434 output (on the client) increases to mention all items that are changed in
435 any way. See the bf(--log-format) option for more details.
437 dit(bf(-q, --quiet)) This option decreases the amount of information you
438 are given during the transfer, notably suppressing information messages
439 from the remote server. This flag is useful when invoking rsync from
442 dit(bf(-I, --ignore-times)) Normally rsync will skip any files that are
443 already the same size and have the same modification time-stamp.
444 This option turns off this "quick check" behavior.
446 dit(bf(--size-only)) Normally rsync will not transfer any files that are
447 already the same size and have the same modification time-stamp. With the
448 bf(--size-only) option, files will not be transferred if they have the same size,
449 regardless of timestamp. This is useful when starting to use rsync
450 after using another mirroring system which may not preserve timestamps
453 dit(bf(--modify-window)) When comparing two timestamps, rsync treats the
454 timestamps as being equal if they differ by no more than the modify-window
455 value. This is normally 0 (for an exact match), but you may find it useful
456 to set this to a larger value in some situations. In particular, when
457 transferring to or from an MS Windows FAT filesystem (which represents
458 times with a 2-second resolution), bf(--modify-window=1) is useful
459 (allowing times to differ by up to 1 second).
461 dit(bf(-c, --checksum)) This forces the sender to checksum all files using
462 a 128-bit MD4 checksum before transfer. The checksum is then
463 explicitly checked on the receiver and any files of the same name
464 which already exist and have the same checksum and size on the
465 receiver are not transferred. This option can be quite slow.
467 dit(bf(-a, --archive)) This is equivalent to bf(-rlptgoD). It is a quick
468 way of saying you want recursion and want to preserve almost
469 everything. The only exception to this is if bf(--files-from) was
470 specified, in which case bf(-r) is not implied.
472 Note that bf(-a) bf(does not preserve hardlinks), because
473 finding multiply-linked files is expensive. You must separately
476 dit(bf(-r, --recursive)) This tells rsync to copy directories
477 recursively. See also bf(--dirs) (bf(-d)).
479 dit(bf(-R, --relative)) Use relative paths. This means that the full path
480 names specified on the command line are sent to the server rather than
481 just the last parts of the filenames. This is particularly useful when
482 you want to send several different directories at the same time. For
483 example, if you used this command:
485 quote(tt( rsync -av /foo/bar/baz.c remote:/tmp/))
487 ... this would create a file called baz.c in /tmp/ on the remote
488 machine. If instead you used
490 quote(tt( rsync -avR /foo/bar/baz.c remote:/tmp/))
492 then a file called /tmp/foo/bar/baz.c would be created on the remote
493 machine -- the full path name is preserved. To limit the amount of
494 path information that is sent, you have a couple options: (1) With
495 a modern rsync on the sending side (beginning with 2.6.7), you can
496 insert a dot dir into the source path, like this:
498 quote(tt( rsync -avR /foo/./bar/baz.c remote:/tmp/))
500 That would create /tmp/bar/baz.c on the remote machine. (Note that the
501 dot dir must followed by a slash, so "/foo/." would not be abbreviated.)
502 (2) For older rsync versions, you would need to use a chdir to limit the
503 source path. For example, when pushing files:
505 quote(tt( (cd /foo; rsync -avR bar/baz.c remote:/tmp/) ))
507 (Note that the parens put the two commands into a sub-shell, so that the
508 "cd" command doesn't remain in effect for future commands.)
509 If you're pulling files, use this idiom (which doesn't work with an
513 tt( rsync -avR --rsync-path="cd /foo; rsync" \ )nl()
514 tt( remote:bar/baz.c /tmp/)
517 dit(bf(--no-relative)) Turn off the bf(--relative) option. This is only
518 needed if you want to use bf(--files-from) without its implied bf(--relative)
521 dit(bf(--no-implied-dirs)) When combined with the bf(--relative) option, the
522 implied directories in each path are not explicitly duplicated as part
523 of the transfer. This makes the transfer more optimal and also allows
524 the two sides to have non-matching symlinks in the implied part of the
525 path. For instance, if you transfer the file "/path/foo/file" with bf(-R),
526 the default is for rsync to ensure that "/path" and "/path/foo" on the
527 destination exactly match the directories/symlinks of the source. Using
528 the bf(--no-implied-dirs) option would omit both of these implied dirs,
529 which means that if "/path" was a real directory on one machine and a
530 symlink of the other machine, rsync would not try to change this.
532 dit(bf(-b, --backup)) With this option, preexisting destination files are
533 renamed as each file is transferred or deleted. You can control where the
534 backup file goes and what (if any) suffix gets appended using the
535 bf(--backup-dir) and bf(--suffix) options.
536 Note that if you don't specify bf(--backup-dir), the bf(--omit-dir-times)
537 option will be enabled.
539 dit(bf(--backup-dir=DIR)) In combination with the bf(--backup) option, this
540 tells rsync to store all backups in the specified directory. This is
541 very useful for incremental backups. You can additionally
542 specify a backup suffix using the bf(--suffix) option
543 (otherwise the files backed up in the specified directory
544 will keep their original filenames).
546 dit(bf(--suffix=SUFFIX)) This option allows you to override the default
547 backup suffix used with the bf(--backup) (bf(-b)) option. The default suffix is a ~
548 if no -bf(-backup-dir) was specified, otherwise it is an empty string.
550 dit(bf(-u, --update)) This forces rsync to skip any files which exist on
551 the destination and have a modified time that is newer than the source
552 file. (If an existing destination file has a modify time equal to the
553 source file's, it will be updated if the sizes are different.)
555 In the current implementation of bf(--update), a difference of file format
556 between the sender and receiver is always
557 considered to be important enough for an update, no matter what date
558 is on the objects. In other words, if the source has a directory or a
559 symlink where the destination has a file, the transfer would occur
560 regardless of the timestamps. This might change in the future (feel
561 free to comment on this on the mailing list if you have an opinion).
563 dit(bf(--inplace)) This causes rsync not to create a new copy of the file
564 and then move it into place. Instead rsync will overwrite the existing
565 file, meaning that the rsync algorithm can't accomplish the full amount of
566 network reduction it might be able to otherwise (since it does not yet try
567 to sort data matches). One exception to this is if you combine the option
568 with bf(--backup), since rsync is smart enough to use the backup file as the
569 basis file for the transfer.
571 This option is useful for transfer of large files with block-based changes
572 or appended data, and also on systems that are disk bound, not network
575 The option implies bf(--partial) (since an interrupted transfer does not delete
576 the file), but conflicts with bf(--partial-dir) and bf(--delay-updates).
577 Prior to rsync 2.6.4 bf(--inplace) was also incompatible with bf(--compare-dest)
580 WARNING: The file's data will be in an inconsistent state during the
581 transfer (and possibly afterward if the transfer gets interrupted), so you
582 should not use this option to update files that are in use. Also note that
583 rsync will be unable to update a file in-place that is not writable by the
586 dit(bf(--append)) This causes rsync to update a file by appending data onto
587 the end of the file, which presumes that the data that already exists on
588 the receiving side is identical with the start of the file on the sending
589 side. If that is not true, the file will fail the checksum test, and the
590 resend will do a normal bf(--inplace) update to correct the mismatch. Any
591 file on the receiving side that is longer than a file on the sending side
592 is skipped. Implies bf(--inplace).
594 dit(bf(-d, --dirs)) Tell the sending side to include any directories that
595 are encountered. Unlike bf(--recursive), a directory's contents are not copied
596 unless the directory was specified on the command-line as either "." or a
597 name with a trailing slash (e.g. "foo/"). Without this option or the
598 bf(--recursive) option, rsync will skip all directories it encounters (and
599 output a message to that effect for each one).
601 dit(bf(-l, --links)) When symlinks are encountered, recreate the
602 symlink on the destination.
604 dit(bf(-L, --copy-links)) When symlinks are encountered, the file that
605 they point to (the referent) is copied, rather than the symlink. In older
606 versions of rsync, this option also had the side-effect of telling the
607 receiving side to follow symlinks, such as symlinks to directories. In a
608 modern rsync such as this one, you'll need to specify bf(--keep-dirlinks) (bf(-K))
609 to get this extra behavior. The only exception is when sending files to
610 an rsync that is too old to understand bf(-K) -- in that case, the bf(-L) option
611 will still have the side-effect of bf(-K) on that older receiving rsync.
613 dit(bf(--copy-unsafe-links)) This tells rsync to copy the referent of
614 symbolic links that point outside the copied tree. Absolute symlinks
615 are also treated like ordinary files, and so are any symlinks in the
616 source path itself when bf(--relative) is used.
618 dit(bf(--safe-links)) This tells rsync to ignore any symbolic links
619 which point outside the copied tree. All absolute symlinks are
620 also ignored. Using this option in conjunction with bf(--relative) may
621 give unexpected results.
623 dit(bf(-H, --hard-links)) This tells rsync to recreate hard links on
624 the remote system to be the same as the local system. Without this
625 option hard links are treated like regular files.
627 Note that rsync can only detect hard links if both parts of the link
628 are in the list of files being sent.
630 This option can be quite slow, so only use it if you need it.
632 dit(bf(-K, --keep-dirlinks)) On the receiving side, if a symlink is
633 pointing to a directory, it will be treated as matching a directory
636 dit(bf(-W, --whole-file)) With this option the incremental rsync algorithm
637 is not used and the whole file is sent as-is instead. The transfer may be
638 faster if this option is used when the bandwidth between the source and
639 destination machines is higher than the bandwidth to disk (especially when the
640 "disk" is actually a networked filesystem). This is the default when both
641 the source and destination are specified as local paths.
643 dit(bf(--no-whole-file)) Turn off bf(--whole-file), for use when it is the
646 dit(bf(-p, --perms)) This option causes rsync to set the destination
647 permissions to be the same as the source permissions.
649 Without this option, all existing files (including updated files) retain
650 their existing permissions, while each new file gets its permissions set
651 based on the source file's permissions, but masked by the receiving end's
653 (which is the same behavior as other file-copy utilities, such as cp).
655 dit(bf(-o, --owner)) This option causes rsync to set the owner of the
656 destination file to be the same as the source file. On most systems,
657 only the super-user can set file ownership. By default, the preservation
658 is done by name, but may fall back to using the ID number in some
659 circumstances. See the bf(--numeric-ids) option for a full discussion.
661 dit(bf(-g, --group)) This option causes rsync to set the group of the
662 destination file to be the same as the source file. If the receiving
663 program is not running as the super-user, only groups that the
664 receiver is a member of will be preserved. By default, the preservation
665 is done by name, but may fall back to using the ID number in some
666 circumstances. See the bf(--numeric-ids) option for a full discussion.
668 dit(bf(-D, --devices)) This option causes rsync to transfer character and
669 block device information to the remote system to recreate these
670 devices. This option is only available to the super-user.
672 dit(bf(-t, --times)) This tells rsync to transfer modification times along
673 with the files and update them on the remote system. Note that if this
674 option is not used, the optimization that excludes files that have not been
675 modified cannot be effective; in other words, a missing bf(-t) or bf(-a) will
676 cause the next transfer to behave as if it used bf(-I), causing all files to be
677 updated (though the rsync algorithm will make the update fairly efficient
678 if the files haven't actually changed, you're much better off using bf(-t)).
680 dit(bf(-O, --omit-dir-times)) This tells rsync to omit directories when
681 it is preserving modification times (see bf(--times)). If NFS is sharing
682 the directories on the receiving side, it is a good idea to use bf(-O).
683 This option is inferred if you use bf(--backup) without bf(--backup-dir).
685 dit(bf(-n, --dry-run)) This tells rsync to not do any file transfers,
686 instead it will just report the actions it would have taken.
688 dit(bf(-S, --sparse)) Try to handle sparse files efficiently so they take
689 up less space on the destination.
691 NOTE: Don't use this option when the destination is a Solaris "tmpfs"
692 filesystem. It doesn't seem to handle seeks over null regions
693 correctly and ends up corrupting the files.
695 dit(bf(-x, --one-file-system)) This tells rsync not to cross filesystem
696 boundaries when recursing. This is useful for transferring the
697 contents of only one filesystem.
699 dit(bf(--existing)) This tells rsync not to create any new files --
700 only update files that already exist on the destination.
702 dit(bf(--ignore-existing))
703 This tells rsync not to update files that already exist on
706 dit(bf(--remove-sent-files)) This tells rsync to remove from the sending
707 side the files and/or symlinks that are newly created or whose content is
708 updated on the receiving side. Directories and devices are not removed,
709 nor are files/symlinks whose attributes are merely changed.
711 dit(bf(--delete)) This tells rsync to delete extraneous files from the
712 receiving side (ones that aren't on the sending side), but only for the
713 directories that are being synchronized. You must have asked rsync to
714 send the whole directory (e.g. "dir" or "dir/") without using a wildcard
715 for the directory's contents (e.g. "dir/*") since the wildcard is expanded
716 by the shell and rsync thus gets a request to transfer individual files, not
717 the files' parent directory. Files that are excluded from transfer are
718 also excluded from being deleted unless you use the bf(--delete-excluded)
719 option or mark the rules as only matching on the sending side (see the
720 include/exclude modifiers in the FILTER RULES section).
722 This option has no effect unless directory recursion is enabled.
724 This option can be dangerous if used incorrectly! It is a very good idea
725 to run first using the bf(--dry-run) option (bf(-n)) to see what files would be
726 deleted to make sure important files aren't listed.
728 If the sending side detects any I/O errors, then the deletion of any
729 files at the destination will be automatically disabled. This is to
730 prevent temporary filesystem failures (such as NFS errors) on the
731 sending side causing a massive deletion of files on the
732 destination. You can override this with the bf(--ignore-errors) option.
734 The bf(--delete) option may be combined with one of the --delete-WHEN options
735 without conflict, as well as bf(--delete-excluded). However, if none of the
736 --delete-WHEN options are specified, rsync will currently choose the
737 bf(--delete-before) algorithm. A future version may change this to choose the
738 bf(--delete-during) algorithm. See also bf(--delete-after).
740 dit(bf(--delete-before)) Request that the file-deletions on the receiving
741 side be done before the transfer starts. This is the default if bf(--delete)
742 or bf(--delete-excluded) is specified without one of the --delete-WHEN options.
743 See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
745 Deleting before the transfer is helpful if the filesystem is tight for space
746 and removing extraneous files would help to make the transfer possible.
747 However, it does introduce a delay before the start of the transfer,
748 and this delay might cause the transfer to timeout (if bf(--timeout) was
751 dit(bf(--delete-during, --del)) Request that the file-deletions on the
752 receiving side be done incrementally as the transfer happens. This is
753 a faster method than choosing the before- or after-transfer algorithm,
754 but it is only supported beginning with rsync version 2.6.4.
755 See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
757 dit(bf(--delete-after)) Request that the file-deletions on the receiving
758 side be done after the transfer has completed. This is useful if you
759 are sending new per-directory merge files as a part of the transfer and
760 you want their exclusions to take effect for the delete phase of the
762 See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
764 dit(bf(--delete-excluded)) In addition to deleting the files on the
765 receiving side that are not on the sending side, this tells rsync to also
766 delete any files on the receiving side that are excluded (see bf(--exclude)).
767 See the FILTER RULES section for a way to make individual exclusions behave
768 this way on the receiver, and for a way to protect files from
769 bf(--delete-excluded).
770 See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
772 dit(bf(--ignore-errors)) Tells bf(--delete) to go ahead and delete files
773 even when there are I/O errors.
775 dit(bf(--force)) This options tells rsync to delete directories even if
776 they are not empty when they are to be replaced by non-directories. This
777 is only relevant without bf(--delete) because deletions are now done depth-first.
778 Requires the bf(--recursive) option (which is implied by bf(-a)) to have any effect.
780 dit(bf(--max-delete=NUM)) This tells rsync not to delete more than NUM
781 files or directories (NUM must be non-zero).
782 This is useful when mirroring very large trees to prevent disasters.
784 dit(bf(--max-size=SIZE)) This tells rsync to avoid transferring any
785 file that is larger than the specified SIZE. The SIZE value can be
786 suffixed with a letter to indicate a size multiplier (K, M, or G) and
787 may be a fractional value (e.g. "bf(--max-size=1.5m)").
789 dit(bf(-B, --block-size=BLOCKSIZE)) This forces the block size used in
790 the rsync algorithm to a fixed value. It is normally selected based on
791 the size of each file being updated. See the technical report for details.
793 dit(bf(-e, --rsh=COMMAND)) This option allows you to choose an alternative
794 remote shell program to use for communication between the local and
795 remote copies of rsync. Typically, rsync is configured to use ssh by
796 default, but you may prefer to use rsh on a local network.
798 If this option is used with bf([user@]host::module/path), then the
799 remote shell em(COMMAND) will be used to run an rsync daemon on the
800 remote host, and all data will be transmitted through that remote
801 shell connection, rather than through a direct socket connection to a
802 running rsync daemon on the remote host. See the section "USING
803 RSYNC-DAEMON FEATURES VIA A REMOTE-SHELL CONNECTION" above.
805 Command-line arguments are permitted in COMMAND provided that COMMAND is
806 presented to rsync as a single argument. For example:
808 quote(tt( -e "ssh -p 2234"))
810 (Note that ssh users can alternately customize site-specific connect
811 options in their .ssh/config file.)
813 You can also choose the remote shell program using the RSYNC_RSH
814 environment variable, which accepts the same range of values as bf(-e).
816 See also the bf(--blocking-io) option which is affected by this option.
818 dit(bf(--rsync-path=PROGRAM)) Use this to specify what program is to be run
819 on the remote machine to start-up rsync. Often used when rsync is not in
820 the default remote-shell's path (e.g. --rsync-path=/usr/local/bin/rsync).
821 Note that PROGRAM is run with the help of a shell, so it can be any
822 program, script, or command sequence you'd care to run, so long as it does
823 not corrupt the standard-in & standard-out that rsync is using to
826 One tricky example is to set a different default directory on the remote
827 machine for use with the bf(--relative) option. For instance:
829 quote(tt( rsync -avR --rsync-path="cd /a/b && rsync" hst:c/d /e/))
831 dit(bf(-C, --cvs-exclude)) This is a useful shorthand for excluding a
832 broad range of files that you often don't want to transfer between
833 systems. It uses the same algorithm that CVS uses to determine if
834 a file should be ignored.
836 The exclude list is initialized to:
838 quote(quote(tt(RCS SCCS CVS CVS.adm RCSLOG cvslog.* tags TAGS .make.state
839 .nse_depinfo *~ #* .#* ,* _$* *$ *.old *.bak *.BAK *.orig *.rej
840 .del-* *.a *.olb *.o *.obj *.so *.exe *.Z *.elc *.ln core .svn/)))
842 then files listed in a $HOME/.cvsignore are added to the list and any
843 files listed in the CVSIGNORE environment variable (all cvsignore names
844 are delimited by whitespace).
846 Finally, any file is ignored if it is in the same directory as a
847 .cvsignore file and matches one of the patterns listed therein. Unlike
848 rsync's filter/exclude files, these patterns are split on whitespace.
849 See the bf(cvs(1)) manual for more information.
851 If you're combining bf(-C) with your own bf(--filter) rules, you should
852 note that these CVS excludes are appended at the end of your own rules,
853 regardless of where the bf(-C) was placed on the command-line. This makes them
854 a lower priority than any rules you specified explicitly. If you want to
855 control where these CVS excludes get inserted into your filter rules, you
856 should omit the bf(-C) as a command-line option and use a combination of
857 bf(--filter=:C) and bf(--filter=-C) (either on your command-line or by
858 putting the ":C" and "-C" rules into a filter file with your other rules).
859 The first option turns on the per-directory scanning for the .cvsignore
860 file. The second option does a one-time import of the CVS excludes
863 dit(bf(-f, --filter=RULE)) This option allows you to add rules to selectively
864 exclude certain files from the list of files to be transferred. This is
865 most useful in combination with a recursive transfer.
867 You may use as many bf(--filter) options on the command line as you like
868 to build up the list of files to exclude.
870 See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
872 dit(bf(-F)) The bf(-F) option is a shorthand for adding two bf(--filter) rules to
873 your command. The first time it is used is a shorthand for this rule:
875 quote(tt( --filter=': /.rsync-filter'))
877 This tells rsync to look for per-directory .rsync-filter files that have
878 been sprinkled through the hierarchy and use their rules to filter the
879 files in the transfer. If bf(-F) is repeated, it is a shorthand for this
882 quote(tt( --filter='- .rsync-filter'))
884 This filters out the .rsync-filter files themselves from the transfer.
886 See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on how these options
889 dit(bf(--exclude=PATTERN)) This option is a simplified form of the
890 bf(--filter) option that defaults to an exclude rule and does not allow
891 the full rule-parsing syntax of normal filter rules.
893 See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
895 dit(bf(--exclude-from=FILE)) This option is similar to the bf(--exclude)
896 option, but instead it adds all exclude patterns listed in the file
897 FILE to the exclude list. Blank lines in FILE and lines starting with
898 ';' or '#' are ignored.
899 If em(FILE) is bf(-) the list will be read from standard input.
901 dit(bf(--include=PATTERN)) This option is a simplified form of the
902 bf(--filter) option that defaults to an include rule and does not allow
903 the full rule-parsing syntax of normal filter rules.
905 See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
907 dit(bf(--include-from=FILE)) This specifies a list of include patterns
909 If em(FILE) is "-" the list will be read from standard input.
911 dit(bf(--files-from=FILE)) Using this option allows you to specify the
912 exact list of files to transfer (as read from the specified FILE or "-"
913 for standard input). It also tweaks the default behavior of rsync to make
914 transferring just the specified files and directories easier:
917 it() The bf(--relative) (bf(-R)) option is implied, which preserves the path
918 information that is specified for each item in the file (use
919 bf(--no-relative) if you want to turn that off).
920 it() The bf(--dirs) (bf(-d)) option is implied, which will create directories
921 specified in the list on the destination rather than noisily skipping
923 it() The bf(--archive) (bf(-a)) option's behavior does not imply bf(--recursive)
924 (bf(-r)), so specify it explicitly, if you want it.
927 The file names that are read from the FILE are all relative to the
928 source dir -- any leading slashes are removed and no ".." references are
929 allowed to go higher than the source dir. For example, take this
932 quote(tt( rsync -a --files-from=/tmp/foo /usr remote:/backup))
934 If /tmp/foo contains the string "bin" (or even "/bin"), the /usr/bin
935 directory will be created as /backup/bin on the remote host. If it
936 contains "bin/" (note the trailing slash), the immediate contents of
937 the directory would also be sent (without needing to be explicitly
938 mentioned in the file -- this began in version 2.6.4). In both cases,
939 if the bf(-r) option was enabled, that dir's entire hierarchy would
940 also be transferred (keep in mind that bf(-r) needs to be specified
941 explicitly with bf(--files-from), since it is not implied by bf(-a)).
943 that the effect of the (enabled by default) bf(--relative) option is to
944 duplicate only the path info that is read from the file -- it does not
945 force the duplication of the source-spec path (/usr in this case).
947 In addition, the bf(--files-from) file can be read from the remote host
948 instead of the local host if you specify a "host:" in front of the file
949 (the host must match one end of the transfer). As a short-cut, you can
950 specify just a prefix of ":" to mean "use the remote end of the
951 transfer". For example:
953 quote(tt( rsync -a --files-from=:/path/file-list src:/ /tmp/copy))
955 This would copy all the files specified in the /path/file-list file that
956 was located on the remote "src" host.
958 dit(bf(-0, --from0)) This tells rsync that the rules/filenames it reads from a
959 file are terminated by a null ('\0') character, not a NL, CR, or CR+LF.
960 This affects bf(--exclude-from), bf(--include-from), bf(--files-from), and any
961 merged files specified in a bf(--filter) rule.
962 It does not affect bf(--cvs-exclude) (since all names read from a .cvsignore
963 file are split on whitespace).
965 dit(bf(-T, --temp-dir=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use DIR as a
966 scratch directory when creating temporary copies of the files
967 transferred on the receiving side. The default behavior is to create
968 the temporary files in the receiving directory.
970 dit(bf(-y, --fuzzy)) This option tells rsync that it should look for a
971 basis file for any destination file that is missing. The current algorithm
972 looks in the same directory as the destination file for either a file that
973 has an identical size and modified-time, or a similarly-named file. If
974 found, rsync uses the fuzzy basis file to try to speed up the transfer.
976 Note that the use of the bf(--delete) option might get rid of any potential
977 fuzzy-match files, so either use bf(--delete-after) or specify some
978 filename exclusions if you need to prevent this.
980 dit(bf(--compare-dest=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use em(DIR) on
981 the destination machine as an additional hierarchy to compare destination
982 files against doing transfers (if the files are missing in the destination
983 directory). If a file is found in em(DIR) that is identical to the
984 sender's file, the file will NOT be transferred to the destination
985 directory. This is useful for creating a sparse backup of just files that
986 have changed from an earlier backup.
988 Beginning in version 2.6.4, multiple bf(--compare-dest) directories may be
989 provided, which will cause rsync to search the list in the order specified
991 If a match is found that differs only in attributes, a local copy is made
992 and the attributes updated.
993 If a match is not found, a basis file from one of the em(DIR)s will be
994 selected to try to speed up the transfer.
996 If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
997 See also bf(--copy-dest) and bf(--link-dest).
999 dit(bf(--copy-dest=DIR)) This option behaves like bf(--compare-dest), but
1000 rsync will also copy unchanged files found in em(DIR) to the destination
1001 directory using a local copy.
1002 This is useful for doing transfers to a new destination while leaving
1003 existing files intact, and then doing a flash-cutover when all files have
1004 been successfully transferred.
1006 Multiple bf(--copy-dest) directories may be provided, which will cause
1007 rsync to search the list in the order specified for an unchanged file.
1008 If a match is not found, a basis file from one of the em(DIR)s will be
1009 selected to try to speed up the transfer.
1011 If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
1012 See also bf(--compare-dest) and bf(--link-dest).
1014 dit(bf(--link-dest=DIR)) This option behaves like bf(--copy-dest), but
1015 unchanged files are hard linked from em(DIR) to the destination directory.
1016 The files must be identical in all preserved attributes (e.g. permissions,
1017 possibly ownership) in order for the files to be linked together.
1020 quote(tt( rsync -av --link-dest=$PWD/prior_dir host:src_dir/ new_dir/))
1022 Beginning in version 2.6.4, multiple bf(--link-dest) directories may be
1023 provided, which will cause rsync to search the list in the order specified
1025 If a match is found that differs only in attributes, a local copy is made
1026 and the attributes updated.
1027 If a match is not found, a basis file from one of the em(DIR)s will be
1028 selected to try to speed up the transfer.
1030 If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
1031 See also bf(--compare-dest) and bf(--copy-dest).
1033 Note that rsync versions prior to 2.6.1 had a bug that could prevent
1034 bf(--link-dest) from working properly for a non-root user when bf(-o) was specified
1035 (or implied by bf(-a)). You can work-around this bug by avoiding the bf(-o) option
1036 when sending to an old rsync.
1038 dit(bf(-z, --compress)) With this option, rsync compresses the file data
1039 as it is sent to the destination machine, which reduces the amount of data
1040 being transmitted -- something that is useful over a slow connection.
1042 Note this this option typically achieves better compression ratios that can
1043 be achieved by using a compressing remote shell or a compressing transport
1044 because it takes advantage of the implicit information in the matching data
1045 blocks that are not explicitly sent over the connection.
1047 dit(bf(--numeric-ids)) With this option rsync will transfer numeric group
1048 and user IDs rather than using user and group names and mapping them
1051 By default rsync will use the username and groupname to determine
1052 what ownership to give files. The special uid 0 and the special group
1053 0 are never mapped via user/group names even if the bf(--numeric-ids)
1054 option is not specified.
1056 If a user or group has no name on the source system or it has no match
1057 on the destination system, then the numeric ID
1058 from the source system is used instead. See also the comments on the
1059 "use chroot" setting in the rsyncd.conf manpage for information on how
1060 the chroot setting affects rsync's ability to look up the names of the
1061 users and groups and what you can do about it.
1063 dit(bf(--timeout=TIMEOUT)) This option allows you to set a maximum I/O
1064 timeout in seconds. If no data is transferred for the specified time
1065 then rsync will exit. The default is 0, which means no timeout.
1067 dit(bf(--address)) By default rsync will bind to the wildcard address when
1068 connecting to an rsync daemon. The bf(--address) option allows you to
1069 specify a specific IP address (or hostname) to bind to. See also this
1070 option in the bf(--daemon) mode section.
1072 dit(bf(--port=PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number to use
1073 rather than the default of 873. This is only needed if you are using the
1074 double-colon (::) syntax to connect with an rsync daemon (since the URL
1075 syntax has a way to specify the port as a part of the URL). See also this
1076 option in the bf(--daemon) mode section.
1078 dit(bf(--blocking-io)) This tells rsync to use blocking I/O when launching
1079 a remote shell transport. If the remote shell is either rsh or remsh,
1080 rsync defaults to using
1081 blocking I/O, otherwise it defaults to using non-blocking I/O. (Note that
1082 ssh prefers non-blocking I/O.)
1084 dit(bf(--no-blocking-io)) Turn off bf(--blocking-io), for use when it is the
1087 dit(bf(-i, --itemize-changes)) Requests a simple itemized list of the
1088 changes that are being made to each file, including attribute changes.
1089 This is exactly the same as specifying bf(--log-format='%i %n%L').
1091 The "%i" escape has a cryptic output that is 9 letters long. The general
1092 format is like the string bf(UXcstpoga)), where bf(U) is replaced by the
1093 kind of update being done, bf(X) is replaced by the file-type, and the
1094 other letters represent attributes that may be output if they are being
1097 The update types that replace the bf(U) are as follows:
1100 it() A bf(<) means that a file is being transferred to the remote host
1102 it() A bf(>) means that a file is being transferred to the local host
1104 it() A bf(c) means that a local change/creation is occurring for the item
1105 (such as the creation of a directory or the changing of a symlink, etc.).
1106 it() A bf(h) means that the item is a hard-link to another item (requires
1108 it() A bf(.) means that the item is not being updated (though it might
1109 have attributes that are being modified).
1112 The file-types that replace the bf(X) are: bf(f) for a file, a bf(d) for a
1113 directory, an bf(L) for a symlink, and a bf(D) for a device.
1115 The other letters in the string above are the actual letters that
1116 will be output if the associated attribute for the item is being updated or
1117 a "." for no change. Three exceptions to this are: (1) a newly created
1118 item replaces each letter with a "+", (2) an identical item replaces the
1119 dots with spaces, and (3) an unknown attribute replaces each letter with
1120 a "?" (this can happen when talking to an older rsync).
1122 The attribute that is associated with each letter is as follows:
1125 it() A bf(c) means the checksum of the file is different and will be
1126 updated by the file transfer (requires bf(--checksum)).
1127 it() A bf(s) means the size of the file is different and will be updated
1128 by the file transfer.
1129 it() A bf(t) means the modification time is different and is being updated
1130 to the sender's value (requires bf(--times)). An alternate value of bf(T)
1131 means that the time will be set to the transfer time, which happens
1132 anytime a symlink is transferred, or when a file or device is transferred
1133 without bf(--times).
1134 it() A bf(p) means the permissions are different and are being updated to
1135 the sender's value (requires bf(--perms)).
1136 it() An bf(o) means the owner is different and is being updated to the
1137 sender's value (requires bf(--owner) and root privileges).
1138 it() A bf(g) means the group is different and is being updated to the
1139 sender's value (requires bf(--group) and the authority to set the group).
1140 it() The bf(a) is reserved for a future enhanced version that supports
1141 extended file attributes, such as ACLs.
1144 One other output is possible: when deleting files, the "%i" will output
1145 the string "*deleting" for each item that is being removed (assuming that
1146 you are talking to a recent enough rsync that it logs deletions instead of
1147 outputting them as a verbose message).
1149 dit(bf(--log-format=FORMAT)) This allows you to specify exactly what the
1150 rsync client outputs to the user on a per-file basis. The format is a text
1151 string containing embedded single-character escape sequences prefixed with
1152 a percent (%) character. For a list of the possible escape characters, see
1153 the "log format" setting in the rsyncd.conf manpage. (Note that this
1154 option does not affect what a daemon logs to its logfile.)
1156 Specifying this option will mention each file, dir, etc. that gets updated
1157 in a significant way (a transferred file, a recreated symlink/device, or a
1158 touched directory) unless the itemized-changes escape (%i) is included in
1159 the string, in which case the logging of names increases to mention any
1160 item that is changed in any way (as long as the receiving side is at least
1161 2.6.4). See the bf(--itemized-changes) option for a description of the
1164 The bf(--verbose) option implies a format of "%n%L", but you can use
1165 bf(--log-format) without bv(--verbose) if you like, or you can override
1166 the format of its per-file output using this option.
1168 Rsync will output the log-format string prior to a file's transfer unless
1169 one of the transfer-statistic escapes is requested, in which case the
1170 logging is done at the end of the file's transfer. When this late logging
1171 is in effect and bf(--progress) is also specified, rsync will also output
1172 the name of the file being transferred prior to its progress information
1173 (followed, of course, by the log-format output).
1175 dit(bf(--stats)) This tells rsync to print a verbose set of statistics
1176 on the file transfer, allowing you to tell how effective the rsync
1177 algorithm is for your data.
1179 dit(bf(--partial)) By default, rsync will delete any partially
1180 transferred file if the transfer is interrupted. In some circumstances
1181 it is more desirable to keep partially transferred files. Using the
1182 bf(--partial) option tells rsync to keep the partial file which should
1183 make a subsequent transfer of the rest of the file much faster.
1185 dit(bf(--partial-dir=DIR)) A better way to keep partial files than the
1186 bf(--partial) option is to specify a em(DIR) that will be used to hold the
1187 partial data (instead of writing it out to the destination file).
1188 On the next transfer, rsync will use a file found in this
1189 dir as data to speed up the resumption of the transfer and then deletes it
1190 after it has served its purpose.
1191 Note that if bf(--whole-file) is specified (or implied), any partial-dir
1192 file that is found for a file that is being updated will simply be removed
1194 rsync is sending files without using the incremental rsync algorithm).
1196 Rsync will create the em(DIR) if it is missing (just the last dir -- not
1197 the whole path). This makes it easy to use a relative path (such as
1198 "bf(--partial-dir=.rsync-partial)") to have rsync create the
1199 partial-directory in the destination file's directory when needed, and then
1200 remove it again when the partial file is deleted.
1202 If the partial-dir value is not an absolute path, rsync will also add a directory
1203 bf(--exclude) of this value at the end of all your existing excludes. This
1204 will prevent partial-dir files from being transferred and also prevent the
1205 untimely deletion of partial-dir items on the receiving side. An example:
1206 the above bf(--partial-dir) option would add an "bf(--exclude=.rsync-partial/)"
1207 rule at the end of any other filter rules. Note that if you are
1208 supplying your own filter rules, you may need to manually insert a
1209 rule for this directory exclusion somewhere higher up in the list so that
1210 it has a high enough priority to be effective (e.g., if your rules specify
1211 a trailing bf(--exclude='*') rule, the auto-added rule would never be
1214 IMPORTANT: the bf(--partial-dir) should not be writable by other users or it
1215 is a security risk. E.g. AVOID "/tmp".
1217 You can also set the partial-dir value the RSYNC_PARTIAL_DIR environment
1218 variable. Setting this in the environment does not force bf(--partial) to be
1219 enabled, but rather it effects where partial files go when bf(--partial) is
1220 specified. For instance, instead of using bf(--partial-dir=.rsync-tmp)
1221 along with bf(--progress), you could set RSYNC_PARTIAL_DIR=.rsync-tmp in your
1222 environment and then just use the bf(-P) option to turn on the use of the
1223 .rsync-tmp dir for partial transfers. The only time that the bf(--partial)
1224 option does not look for this environment value is (1) when bf(--inplace) was
1225 specified (since bf(--inplace) conflicts with bf(--partial-dir)), or (2) when
1226 bf(--delay-updates) was specified (see below).
1228 For the purposes of the daemon-config's "refuse options" setting,
1229 bf(--partial-dir) does em(not) imply bf(--partial). This is so that a
1230 refusal of the bf(--partial) option can be used to disallow the overwriting
1231 of destination files with a partial transfer, while still allowing the
1232 safer idiom provided by bf(--partial-dir).
1234 dit(bf(--delay-updates)) This option puts the temporary file from each
1235 updated file into a holding directory until the end of the
1236 transfer, at which time all the files are renamed into place in rapid
1237 succession. This attempts to make the updating of the files a little more
1238 atomic. By default the files are placed into a directory named ".~tmp~" in
1239 each file's destination directory, but you can override this by specifying
1240 the bf(--partial-dir) option. (Note that RSYNC_PARTIAL_DIR has no effect
1241 on this value, nor is bf(--partial-dir) considered to be implied for the
1242 purposes of the daemon-config's "refuse options" setting.)
1243 Conflicts with bf(--inplace).
1245 This option uses more memory on the receiving side (one bit per file
1246 transferred) and also requires enough free disk space on the receiving
1247 side to hold an additional copy of all the updated files. Note also that
1248 you should not use an absolute path to bf(--partial-dir) unless there is no
1249 chance of any of the files in the transfer having the same name (since all
1250 the updated files will be put into a single directory if the path is
1253 See also the "atomic-rsync" perl script in the "support" subdir for an
1254 update algorithm that is even more atomic (it uses bf(--link-dest) and a
1255 parallel hierarchy of files).
1257 dit(bf(--progress)) This option tells rsync to print information
1258 showing the progress of the transfer. This gives a bored user
1260 Implies bf(--verbose) if it wasn't already specified.
1262 When the file is transferring, the data looks like this:
1264 verb( 782448 63% 110.64kB/s 0:00:04)
1266 This tells you the current file size, the percentage of the transfer that
1267 is complete, the current calculated file-completion rate (including both
1268 data over the wire and data being matched locally), and the estimated time
1269 remaining in this transfer.
1271 After a file is complete, the data looks like this:
1273 verb( 1238099 100% 146.38kB/s 0:00:08 (5, 57.1% of 396))
1275 This tells you the final file size, that it's 100% complete, the final
1276 transfer rate for the file, the amount of elapsed time it took to transfer
1277 the file, and the addition of a total-transfer summary in parentheses.
1278 These additional numbers tell you how many files have been updated, and
1279 what percent of the total number of files has been scanned.
1281 dit(bf(-P)) The bf(-P) option is equivalent to bf(--partial) bf(--progress). Its
1282 purpose is to make it much easier to specify these two options for a long
1283 transfer that may be interrupted.
1285 dit(bf(--password-file)) This option allows you to provide a password
1286 in a file for accessing a remote rsync daemon. Note that this option
1287 is only useful when accessing an rsync daemon using the built in
1288 transport, not when using a remote shell as the transport. The file
1289 must not be world readable. It should contain just the password as a
1292 dit(bf(--list-only)) This option will cause the source files to be listed
1293 instead of transferred. This option is inferred if there is no destination
1294 specified, so you don't usually need to use it explicitly. However, it can
1295 come in handy for a user that wants to avoid the "bf(-r --exclude='/*/*')"
1296 options that rsync might use as a compatibility kluge when generating a
1297 non-recursive listing, or to list the files that are involved in a local
1298 copy (since the destination path is not optional for a local copy, you
1299 must specify this option explicitly and still include a destination).
1301 dit(bf(--bwlimit=KBPS)) This option allows you to specify a maximum
1302 transfer rate in kilobytes per second. This option is most effective when
1303 using rsync with large files (several megabytes and up). Due to the nature
1304 of rsync transfers, blocks of data are sent, then if rsync determines the
1305 transfer was too fast, it will wait before sending the next data block. The
1306 result is an average transfer rate equaling the specified limit. A value
1307 of zero specifies no limit.
1309 dit(bf(--write-batch=FILE)) Record a file that can later be applied to
1310 another identical destination with bf(--read-batch). See the "BATCH MODE"
1311 section for details, and also the bf(--only-write-batch) option.
1313 dit(bf(--only-write-batch=FILE)) Works like bf(--write-batch), except that
1314 no updates are made on the destination system when creating the batch.
1315 This lets you transport the changes to the destination system via some
1316 other means and then apply the changes via bf(--read-batch).
1318 Note that you can feel free to write the batch directly to some portable
1319 media: if this media fills to capacity before the end of the transfer, you
1320 can just apply that partial transfer to the destination and repeat the
1321 whole process to get the rest of the changes (as long as you don't mind a
1322 partially updated destination system while the multi-update cycle is
1325 Also note that you only save bandwidth when pushing changes to a remote
1326 system because this allows the batched data to be diverted from the sender
1327 into the batch file without having to flow over the wire to the receiver
1328 (when pulling, the sender is remote, and thus can't write the batch).
1330 dit(bf(--read-batch=FILE)) Apply all of the changes stored in FILE, a
1331 file previously generated by bf(--write-batch).
1332 If em(FILE) is "-" the batch data will be read from standard input.
1333 See the "BATCH MODE" section for details.
1335 dit(bf(--protocol=NUM)) Force an older protocol version to be used. This
1336 is useful for creating a batch file that is compatible with an older
1337 version of rsync. For instance, if rsync 2.6.4 is being used with the
1338 bf(--write-batch) option, but rsync 2.6.3 is what will be used to run the
1339 bf(--read-batch) option, you should use "--protocol=28" when creating the
1340 batch file to force the older protocol version to be used in the batch
1341 file (assuming you can't upgrade the rsync on the reading system).
1343 dit(bf(-4, --ipv4) or bf(-6, --ipv6)) Tells rsync to prefer IPv4/IPv6
1344 when creating sockets. This only affects sockets that rsync has direct
1345 control over, such as the outgoing socket when directly contacting an
1346 rsync daemon. See also these options in the bf(--daemon) mode section.
1348 dit(bf(--checksum-seed=NUM)) Set the MD4 checksum seed to the integer
1349 NUM. This 4 byte checksum seed is included in each block and file
1350 MD4 checksum calculation. By default the checksum seed is generated
1351 by the server and defaults to the current time(). This option
1352 is used to set a specific checksum seed, which is useful for
1353 applications that want repeatable block and file checksums, or
1354 in the case where the user wants a more random checksum seed.
1355 Note that setting NUM to 0 causes rsync to use the default of time()
1359 manpagesection(DAEMON OPTIONS)
1361 The options allowed when starting an rsync daemon are as follows:
1364 dit(bf(--daemon)) This tells rsync that it is to run as a daemon. The
1365 daemon you start running may be accessed using an rsync client using
1366 the bf(host::module) or bf(rsync://host/module/) syntax.
1368 If standard input is a socket then rsync will assume that it is being
1369 run via inetd, otherwise it will detach from the current terminal and
1370 become a background daemon. The daemon will read the config file
1371 (rsyncd.conf) on each connect made by a client and respond to
1372 requests accordingly. See the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more
1375 dit(bf(--address)) By default rsync will bind to the wildcard address when
1376 run as a daemon with the bf(--daemon) option. The bf(--address) option
1377 allows you to specify a specific IP address (or hostname) to bind to. This
1378 makes virtual hosting possible in conjunction with the bf(--config) option.
1379 See also the "address" global option in the rsyncd.conf manpage.
1381 dit(bf(--bwlimit=KBPS)) This option allows you to specify a maximum
1382 transfer rate in kilobytes per second for the data the daemon sends.
1383 The client can still specify a smaller bf(--bwlimit) value, but their
1384 requested value will be rounded down if they try to exceed it. See the
1385 client version of this option (above) for some extra details.
1387 dit(bf(--config=FILE)) This specifies an alternate config file than
1388 the default. This is only relevant when bf(--daemon) is specified.
1389 The default is /etc/rsyncd.conf unless the daemon is running over
1390 a remote shell program and the remote user is not root; in that case
1391 the default is rsyncd.conf in the current directory (typically $HOME).
1393 dit(bf(--no-detach)) When running as a daemon, this option instructs
1394 rsync to not detach itself and become a background process. This
1395 option is required when running as a service on Cygwin, and may also
1396 be useful when rsync is supervised by a program such as
1397 bf(daemontools) or AIX's bf(System Resource Controller).
1398 bf(--no-detach) is also recommended when rsync is run under a
1399 debugger. This option has no effect if rsync is run from inetd or
1402 dit(bf(--port=PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number for the
1403 daemon to listen on rather than the default of 873. See also the "port"
1404 global option in the rsyncd.conf manpage.
1406 dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information the
1407 daemon logs during its startup phase. After the client connects, the
1408 daemon's verbosity level will be controlled by the options that the client
1409 used and the "max verbosity" setting in the module's config section.
1411 dit(bf(-4, --ipv4) or bf(-6, --ipv6)) Tells rsync to prefer IPv4/IPv6
1412 when creating the incoming sockets that the rsync daemon will use to
1413 listen for connections. One of these options may be required in older
1414 versions of Linux to work around an IPv6 bug in the kernel (if you see
1415 an "address already in use" error when nothing else is using the port,
1416 try specifying bf(--ipv6) or bf(--ipv4) when starting the daemon).
1418 dit(bf(-h, --help)) When specified after bf(--daemon), print a short help
1419 page describing the options available for starting an rsync daemon.
1422 manpagesection(FILTER RULES)
1424 The filter rules allow for flexible selection of which files to transfer
1425 (include) and which files to skip (exclude). The rules either directly
1426 specify include/exclude patterns or they specify a way to acquire more
1427 include/exclude patterns (e.g. to read them from a file).
1429 As the list of files/directories to transfer is built, rsync checks each
1430 name to be transferred against the list of include/exclude patterns in
1431 turn, and the first matching pattern is acted on: if it is an exclude
1432 pattern, then that file is skipped; if it is an include pattern then that
1433 filename is not skipped; if no matching pattern is found, then the
1434 filename is not skipped.
1436 Rsync builds an ordered list of filter rules as specified on the
1437 command-line. Filter rules have the following syntax:
1440 tt(RULE [PATTERN_OR_FILENAME])nl()
1441 tt(RULE,MODIFIERS [PATTERN_OR_FILENAME])nl()
1444 You have your choice of using either short or long RULE names, as described
1445 below. If you use a short-named rule, the ',' separating the RULE from the
1446 MODIFIERS is optional. The PATTERN or FILENAME that follows (when present)
1447 must come after either a single space or an underscore (_).
1448 Here are the available rule prefixes:
1451 bf(exclude, -) specifies an exclude pattern. nl()
1452 bf(include, +) specifies an include pattern. nl()
1453 bf(merge, .) specifies a merge-file to read for more rules. nl()
1454 bf(dir-merge, :) specifies a per-directory merge-file. nl()
1455 bf(hide, H) specifies a pattern for hiding files from the transfer. nl()
1456 bf(show, S) files that match the pattern are not hidden. nl()
1457 bf(protect, P) specifies a pattern for protecting files from deletion. nl()
1458 bf(risk, R) files that match the pattern are not protected. nl()
1459 bf(clear, !) clears the current include/exclude list (takes no arg) nl()
1462 When rules are being read from a file, empty lines are ignored, as are
1463 comment lines that start with a "#".
1465 Note that the bf(--include)/bf(--exclude) command-line options do not allow the
1466 full range of rule parsing as described above -- they only allow the
1467 specification of include/exclude patterns plus a "!" token to clear the
1468 list (and the normal comment parsing when rules are read from a file).
1470 does not begin with "- " (dash, space) or "+ " (plus, space), then the
1471 rule will be interpreted as if "+ " (for an include option) or "- " (for
1472 an exclude option) were prefixed to the string. A bf(--filter) option, on
1473 the other hand, must always contain either a short or long rule name at the
1476 Note also that the bf(--filter), bf(--include), and bf(--exclude) options take one
1477 rule/pattern each. To add multiple ones, you can repeat the options on
1478 the command-line, use the merge-file syntax of the bf(--filter) option, or
1479 the bf(--include-from)/bf(--exclude-from) options.
1481 manpagesection(INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERN RULES)
1483 You can include and exclude files by specifying patterns using the "+",
1484 "-", etc. filter rules (as introduced in the FILTER RULES section above).
1485 The include/exclude rules each specify a pattern that is matched against
1486 the names of the files that are going to be transferred. These patterns
1487 can take several forms:
1490 it() if the pattern starts with a / then it is anchored to a
1491 particular spot in the hierarchy of files, otherwise it is matched
1492 against the end of the pathname. This is similar to a leading ^ in
1493 regular expressions.
1494 Thus "/foo" would match a file called "foo" at either the "root of the
1495 transfer" (for a global rule) or in the merge-file's directory (for a
1496 per-directory rule).
1497 An unqualified "foo" would match any file or directory named "foo"
1498 anywhere in the tree because the algorithm is applied recursively from
1500 top down; it behaves as if each path component gets a turn at being the
1501 end of the file name. Even the unanchored "sub/foo" would match at
1502 any point in the hierarchy where a "foo" was found within a directory
1503 named "sub". See the section on ANCHORING INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERNS for
1504 a full discussion of how to specify a pattern that matches at the root
1506 it() if the pattern ends with a / then it will only match a
1507 directory, not a file, link, or device.
1508 it() if the pattern contains a wildcard character from the set
1509 *?[ then expression matching is applied using the shell filename
1510 matching rules. Otherwise a simple string match is used.
1511 it() the double asterisk pattern "**" will match slashes while a
1512 single asterisk pattern "*" will stop at slashes.
1513 it() if the pattern contains a / (not counting a trailing /) or a "**"
1514 then it is matched against the full pathname, including any leading
1515 directories. If the pattern doesn't contain a / or a "**", then it is
1516 matched only against the final component of the filename.
1517 (Remember that the algorithm is applied recursively so "full filename"
1518 can actually be any portion of a path from the starting directory on
1522 Note that, when using the bf(--recursive) (bf(-r)) option (which is implied by
1523 bf(-a)), every subcomponent of every path is visited from the top down, so
1524 include/exclude patterns get applied recursively to each subcomponent's
1525 full name (e.g. to include "/foo/bar/baz" the subcomponents "/foo" and
1526 "/foo/bar" must not be excluded).
1527 The exclude patterns actually short-circuit the directory traversal stage
1528 when rsync finds the files to send. If a pattern excludes a particular
1529 parent directory, it can render a deeper include pattern ineffectual
1530 because rsync did not descend through that excluded section of the
1531 hierarchy. This is particularly important when using a trailing '*' rule.
1532 For instance, this won't work:
1535 tt(+ /some/path/this-file-will-not-be-found)nl()
1536 tt(+ /file-is-included)nl()
1540 This fails because the parent directory "some" is excluded by the '*'
1541 rule, so rsync never visits any of the files in the "some" or "some/path"
1542 directories. One solution is to ask for all directories in the hierarchy
1543 to be included by using a single rule: "+ */" (put it somewhere before the
1544 "- *" rule). Another solution is to add specific include rules for all
1545 the parent dirs that need to be visited. For instance, this set of rules
1550 tt(+ /some/path/)nl()
1551 tt(+ /some/path/this-file-is-found)nl()
1552 tt(+ /file-also-included)nl()
1556 Here are some examples of exclude/include matching:
1559 it() "- *.o" would exclude all filenames matching *.o
1560 it() "- /foo" would exclude a file called foo in the transfer-root directory
1561 it() "- foo/" would exclude any directory called foo
1562 it() "- /foo/*/bar" would exclude any file called bar two
1563 levels below a directory called foo in the transfer-root directory
1564 it() "- /foo/**/bar" would exclude any file called bar two
1565 or more levels below a directory called foo in the transfer-root directory
1566 it() The combination of "+ */", "+ *.c", and "- *" would include all
1567 directories and C source files but nothing else.
1568 it() The combination of "+ foo/", "+ foo/bar.c", and "- *" would include
1569 only the foo directory and foo/bar.c (the foo directory must be
1570 explicitly included or it would be excluded by the "*")
1573 manpagesection(MERGE-FILE FILTER RULES)
1575 You can merge whole files into your filter rules by specifying either a
1576 merge (.) or a dir-merge (:) filter rule (as introduced in the FILTER RULES
1579 There are two kinds of merged files -- single-instance ('.') and
1580 per-directory (':'). A single-instance merge file is read one time, and
1581 its rules are incorporated into the filter list in the place of the "."
1582 rule. For per-directory merge files, rsync will scan every directory that
1583 it traverses for the named file, merging its contents when the file exists
1584 into the current list of inherited rules. These per-directory rule files
1585 must be created on the sending side because it is the sending side that is
1586 being scanned for the available files to transfer. These rule files may
1587 also need to be transferred to the receiving side if you want them to
1588 affect what files don't get deleted (see PER-DIRECTORY RULES AND DELETE
1594 tt(merge /etc/rsync/default.rules)nl()
1595 tt(. /etc/rsync/default.rules)nl()
1596 tt(dir-merge .per-dir-filter)nl()
1597 tt(dir-merge,n- .non-inherited-per-dir-excludes)nl()
1598 tt(:n- .non-inherited-per-dir-excludes)nl()
1601 The following modifiers are accepted after a merge or dir-merge rule:
1604 it() A bf(-) specifies that the file should consist of only exclude
1605 patterns, with no other rule-parsing except for in-file comments.
1606 it() A bf(+) specifies that the file should consist of only include
1607 patterns, with no other rule-parsing except for in-file comments.
1608 it() A bf(C) is a way to specify that the file should be read in a
1609 CVS-compatible manner. This turns on 'n', 'w', and '-', but also
1610 allows the list-clearing token (!) to be specified. If no filename is
1611 provided, ".cvsignore" is assumed.
1612 it() A bf(e) will exclude the merge-file name from the transfer; e.g.
1613 "dir-merge,e .rules" is like "dir-merge .rules" and "- .rules".
1614 it() An bf(n) specifies that the rules are not inherited by subdirectories.
1615 it() A bf(w) specifies that the rules are word-split on whitespace instead
1616 of the normal line-splitting. This also turns off comments. Note: the
1617 space that separates the prefix from the rule is treated specially, so
1618 "- foo + bar" is parsed as two rules (assuming that prefix-parsing wasn't
1620 it() You may also specify any of the modifiers for the "+" or "-" rules
1621 (below) in order to have the rules that are read-in from the file
1622 default to having that modifier set. For instance, "merge,-/ .excl" would
1623 treat the contents of .excl as absolute-path excludes,
1624 while "dir-merge,s .filt" and ":sC" would each make all their
1625 per-directory rules apply only on the sending side.
1628 The following modifiers are accepted after a "+" or "-":
1631 it() A "/" specifies that the include/exclude should be treated as an
1632 absolute path, relative to the root of the filesystem. For example,
1633 "-/ /etc/passwd" would exclude the passwd file any time the transfer
1634 was sending files from the "/etc" directory.
1635 it() A "!" specifies that the include/exclude should take effect if
1636 the pattern fails to match. For instance, "-! */" would exclude all
1638 it() A bf(C) is used to indicate that all the global CVS-exclude rules
1639 should be inserted as excludes in place of the "-C". No arg should
1641 it() An bf(s) is used to indicate that the rule applies to the sending
1642 side. When a rule affects the sending side, it prevents files from
1643 being transferred. The default is for a rule to affect both sides
1644 unless bf(--delete-excluded) was specified, in which case default rules
1645 become sender-side only. See also the hide (H) and show (S) rules,
1646 which are an alternate way to specify sending-side includes/excludes.
1647 it() An bf(r) is used to indicate that the rule applies to the receiving
1648 side. When a rule affects the receiving side, it prevents files from
1649 being deleted. See the bf(s) modifier for more info. See also the
1650 protect (P) and risk (R) rules, which are an alternate way to
1651 specify receiver-side includes/excludes.
1654 Per-directory rules are inherited in all subdirectories of the directory
1655 where the merge-file was found unless the 'n' modifier was used. Each
1656 subdirectory's rules are prefixed to the inherited per-directory rules
1657 from its parents, which gives the newest rules a higher priority than the
1658 inherited rules. The entire set of dir-merge rules are grouped together in
1659 the spot where the merge-file was specified, so it is possible to override
1660 dir-merge rules via a rule that got specified earlier in the list of global
1661 rules. When the list-clearing rule ("!") is read from a per-directory
1662 file, it only clears the inherited rules for the current merge file.
1664 Another way to prevent a single rule from a dir-merge file from being inherited is to
1665 anchor it with a leading slash. Anchored rules in a per-directory
1666 merge-file are relative to the merge-file's directory, so a pattern "/foo"
1667 would only match the file "foo" in the directory where the dir-merge filter
1670 Here's an example filter file which you'd specify via bf(--filter=". file":)
1673 tt(merge /home/user/.global-filter)nl()
1675 tt(dir-merge .rules)nl()
1680 This will merge the contents of the /home/user/.global-filter file at the
1681 start of the list and also turns the ".rules" filename into a per-directory
1682 filter file. All rules read-in prior to the start of the directory scan
1683 follow the global anchoring rules (i.e. a leading slash matches at the root
1686 If a per-directory merge-file is specified with a path that is a parent
1687 directory of the first transfer directory, rsync will scan all the parent
1688 dirs from that starting point to the transfer directory for the indicated
1689 per-directory file. For instance, here is a common filter (see bf(-F)):
1691 quote(tt(--filter=': /.rsync-filter'))
1693 That rule tells rsync to scan for the file .rsync-filter in all
1694 directories from the root down through the parent directory of the
1695 transfer prior to the start of the normal directory scan of the file in
1696 the directories that are sent as a part of the transfer. (Note: for an
1697 rsync daemon, the root is always the same as the module's "path".)
1699 Some examples of this pre-scanning for per-directory files:
1702 tt(rsync -avF /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
1703 tt(rsync -av --filter=': ../../.rsync-filter' /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
1704 tt(rsync -av --filter=': .rsync-filter' /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
1707 The first two commands above will look for ".rsync-filter" in "/" and
1708 "/src" before the normal scan begins looking for the file in "/src/path"
1709 and its subdirectories. The last command avoids the parent-dir scan
1710 and only looks for the ".rsync-filter" files in each directory that is
1711 a part of the transfer.
1713 If you want to include the contents of a ".cvsignore" in your patterns,
1714 you should use the rule ":C", which creates a dir-merge of the .cvsignore
1715 file, but parsed in a CVS-compatible manner. You can
1716 use this to affect where the bf(--cvs-exclude) (bf(-C)) option's inclusion of the
1717 per-directory .cvsignore file gets placed into your rules by putting the
1718 ":C" wherever you like in your filter rules. Without this, rsync would
1719 add the dir-merge rule for the .cvsignore file at the end of all your other
1720 rules (giving it a lower priority than your command-line rules). For
1724 tt(cat <<EOT | rsync -avC --filter='. -' a/ b)nl()
1729 tt(rsync -avC --include=foo.o -f :C --exclude='*.old' a/ b)nl()
1732 Both of the above rsync commands are identical. Each one will merge all
1733 the per-directory .cvsignore rules in the middle of the list rather than
1734 at the end. This allows their dir-specific rules to supersede the rules
1735 that follow the :C instead of being subservient to all your rules. To
1736 affect the other CVS exclude rules (i.e. the default list of exclusions,
1737 the contents of $HOME/.cvsignore, and the value of $CVSIGNORE) you should
1738 omit the bf(-C) command-line option and instead insert a "-C" rule into
1739 your filter rules; e.g. "--filter=-C".
1741 manpagesection(LIST-CLEARING FILTER RULE)
1743 You can clear the current include/exclude list by using the "!" filter
1744 rule (as introduced in the FILTER RULES section above). The "current"
1745 list is either the global list of rules (if the rule is encountered while
1746 parsing the filter options) or a set of per-directory rules (which are
1747 inherited in their own sub-list, so a subdirectory can use this to clear
1748 out the parent's rules).
1750 manpagesection(ANCHORING INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERNS)
1752 As mentioned earlier, global include/exclude patterns are anchored at the
1753 "root of the transfer" (as opposed to per-directory patterns, which are
1754 anchored at the merge-file's directory). If you think of the transfer as
1755 a subtree of names that are being sent from sender to receiver, the
1756 transfer-root is where the tree starts to be duplicated in the destination
1757 directory. This root governs where patterns that start with a / match.
1759 Because the matching is relative to the transfer-root, changing the
1760 trailing slash on a source path or changing your use of the bf(--relative)
1761 option affects the path you need to use in your matching (in addition to
1762 changing how much of the file tree is duplicated on the destination
1763 host). The following examples demonstrate this.
1765 Let's say that we want to match two source files, one with an absolute
1766 path of "/home/me/foo/bar", and one with a path of "/home/you/bar/baz".
1767 Here is how the various command choices differ for a 2-source transfer:
1770 Example cmd: rsync -a /home/me /home/you /dest nl()
1771 +/- pattern: /me/foo/bar nl()
1772 +/- pattern: /you/bar/baz nl()
1773 Target file: /dest/me/foo/bar nl()
1774 Target file: /dest/you/bar/baz nl()
1778 Example cmd: rsync -a /home/me/ /home/you/ /dest nl()
1779 +/- pattern: /foo/bar (note missing "me") nl()
1780 +/- pattern: /bar/baz (note missing "you") nl()
1781 Target file: /dest/foo/bar nl()
1782 Target file: /dest/bar/baz nl()
1786 Example cmd: rsync -a --relative /home/me/ /home/you /dest nl()
1787 +/- pattern: /home/me/foo/bar (note full path) nl()
1788 +/- pattern: /home/you/bar/baz (ditto) nl()
1789 Target file: /dest/home/me/foo/bar nl()
1790 Target file: /dest/home/you/bar/baz nl()
1794 Example cmd: cd /home; rsync -a --relative me/foo you/ /dest nl()
1795 +/- pattern: /me/foo/bar (starts at specified path) nl()
1796 +/- pattern: /you/bar/baz (ditto) nl()
1797 Target file: /dest/me/foo/bar nl()
1798 Target file: /dest/you/bar/baz nl()
1801 The easiest way to see what name you should filter is to just
1802 look at the output when using bf(--verbose) and put a / in front of the name
1803 (use the bf(--dry-run) option if you're not yet ready to copy any files).
1805 manpagesection(PER-DIRECTORY RULES AND DELETE)
1807 Without a delete option, per-directory rules are only relevant on the
1808 sending side, so you can feel free to exclude the merge files themselves
1809 without affecting the transfer. To make this easy, the 'e' modifier adds
1810 this exclude for you, as seen in these two equivalent commands:
1813 tt(rsync -av --filter=': .excl' --exclude=.excl host:src/dir /dest)nl()
1814 tt(rsync -av --filter=':e .excl' host:src/dir /dest)nl()
1817 However, if you want to do a delete on the receiving side AND you want some
1818 files to be excluded from being deleted, you'll need to be sure that the
1819 receiving side knows what files to exclude. The easiest way is to include
1820 the per-directory merge files in the transfer and use bf(--delete-after),
1821 because this ensures that the receiving side gets all the same exclude
1822 rules as the sending side before it tries to delete anything:
1824 quote(tt(rsync -avF --delete-after host:src/dir /dest))
1826 However, if the merge files are not a part of the transfer, you'll need to
1827 either specify some global exclude rules (i.e. specified on the command
1828 line), or you'll need to maintain your own per-directory merge files on
1829 the receiving side. An example of the first is this (assume that the
1830 remote .rules files exclude themselves):
1832 verb(rsync -av --filter=': .rules' --filter='. /my/extra.rules'
1833 --delete host:src/dir /dest)
1835 In the above example the extra.rules file can affect both sides of the
1836 transfer, but (on the sending side) the rules are subservient to the rules
1837 merged from the .rules files because they were specified after the
1838 per-directory merge rule.
1840 In one final example, the remote side is excluding the .rsync-filter
1841 files from the transfer, but we want to use our own .rsync-filter files
1842 to control what gets deleted on the receiving side. To do this we must
1843 specifically exclude the per-directory merge files (so that they don't get
1844 deleted) and then put rules into the local files to control what else
1845 should not get deleted. Like one of these commands:
1847 verb( rsync -av --filter=':e /.rsync-filter' --delete \
1849 rsync -avFF --delete host:src/dir /dest)
1851 manpagesection(BATCH MODE)
1853 Batch mode can be used to apply the same set of updates to many
1854 identical systems. Suppose one has a tree which is replicated on a
1855 number of hosts. Now suppose some changes have been made to this
1856 source tree and those changes need to be propagated to the other
1857 hosts. In order to do this using batch mode, rsync is run with the
1858 write-batch option to apply the changes made to the source tree to one
1859 of the destination trees. The write-batch option causes the rsync
1860 client to store in a "batch file" all the information needed to repeat
1861 this operation against other, identical destination trees.
1863 To apply the recorded changes to another destination tree, run rsync
1864 with the read-batch option, specifying the name of the same batch
1865 file, and the destination tree. Rsync updates the destination tree
1866 using the information stored in the batch file.
1868 For convenience, one additional file is creating when the write-batch
1869 option is used. This file's name is created by appending
1870 ".sh" to the batch filename. The .sh file contains
1871 a command-line suitable for updating a destination tree using that
1872 batch file. It can be executed using a Bourne(-like) shell, optionally
1873 passing in an alternate destination tree pathname which is then used
1874 instead of the original path. This is useful when the destination tree
1875 path differs from the original destination tree path.
1877 Generating the batch file once saves having to perform the file
1878 status, checksum, and data block generation more than once when
1879 updating multiple destination trees. Multicast transport protocols can
1880 be used to transfer the batch update files in parallel to many hosts
1881 at once, instead of sending the same data to every host individually.
1886 tt($ rsync --write-batch=foo -a host:/source/dir/ /adest/dir/)nl()
1887 tt($ scp foo* remote:)nl()
1888 tt($ ssh remote ./foo.sh /bdest/dir/)nl()
1892 tt($ rsync --write-batch=foo -a /source/dir/ /adest/dir/)nl()
1893 tt($ ssh remote rsync --read-batch=- -a /bdest/dir/ <foo)nl()
1896 In these examples, rsync is used to update /adest/dir/ from /source/dir/
1897 and the information to repeat this operation is stored in "foo" and
1898 "foo.sh". The host "remote" is then updated with the batched data going
1899 into the directory /bdest/dir. The differences between the two examples
1900 reveals some of the flexibility you have in how you deal with batches:
1903 it() The first example shows that the initial copy doesn't have to be
1904 local -- you can push or pull data to/from a remote host using either the
1905 remote-shell syntax or rsync daemon syntax, as desired.
1906 it() The first example uses the created "foo.sh" file to get the right
1907 rsync options when running the read-batch command on the remote host.
1908 it() The second example reads the batch data via standard input so that
1909 the batch file doesn't need to be copied to the remote machine first.
1910 This example avoids the foo.sh script because it needed to use a modified
1911 bf(--read-batch) option, but you could edit the script file if you wished to
1912 make use of it (just be sure that no other option is trying to use
1913 standard input, such as the "bf(--exclude-from=-)" option).
1918 The read-batch option expects the destination tree that it is updating
1919 to be identical to the destination tree that was used to create the
1920 batch update fileset. When a difference between the destination trees
1921 is encountered the update might be discarded with a warning (if the file
1922 appears to be up-to-date already) or the file-update may be attempted
1923 and then, if the file fails to verify, the update discarded with an
1924 error. This means that it should be safe to re-run a read-batch operation
1925 if the command got interrupted. If you wish to force the batched-update to
1926 always be attempted regardless of the file's size and date, use the bf(-I)
1927 option (when reading the batch).
1928 If an error occurs, the destination tree will probably be in a
1929 partially updated state. In that case, rsync can
1930 be used in its regular (non-batch) mode of operation to fix up the
1933 The rsync version used on all destinations must be at least as new as the
1934 one used to generate the batch file. Rsync will die with an error if the
1935 protocol version in the batch file is too new for the batch-reading rsync
1936 to handle. See also the bf(--protocol) option for a way to have the
1937 creating rsync generate a batch file that an older rsync can understand.
1938 (Note that batch files changed format in version 2.6.3, so mixing versions
1939 older than that with newer versions will not work.)
1941 When reading a batch file, rsync will force the value of certain options
1942 to match the data in the batch file if you didn't set them to the same
1943 as the batch-writing command. Other options can (and should) be changed.
1944 For instance bf(--write-batch) changes to bf(--read-batch),
1945 bf(--files-from) is dropped, and the
1946 bf(--filter)/bf(--include)/bf(--exclude) options are not needed unless
1947 one of the bf(--delete) options is specified.
1949 The code that creates the BATCH.sh file transforms any filter/include/exclude
1950 options into a single list that is appended as a "here" document to the
1951 shell script file. An advanced user can use this to modify the exclude
1952 list if a change in what gets deleted by bf(--delete) is desired. A normal
1953 user can ignore this detail and just use the shell script as an easy way
1954 to run the appropriate bf(--read-batch) command for the batched data.
1956 The original batch mode in rsync was based on "rsync+", but the latest
1957 version uses a new implementation.
1959 manpagesection(SYMBOLIC LINKS)
1961 Three basic behaviors are possible when rsync encounters a symbolic
1962 link in the source directory.
1964 By default, symbolic links are not transferred at all. A message
1965 "skipping non-regular" file is emitted for any symlinks that exist.
1967 If bf(--links) is specified, then symlinks are recreated with the same
1968 target on the destination. Note that bf(--archive) implies
1971 If bf(--copy-links) is specified, then symlinks are "collapsed" by
1972 copying their referent, rather than the symlink.
1974 rsync also distinguishes "safe" and "unsafe" symbolic links. An
1975 example where this might be used is a web site mirror that wishes
1976 ensure the rsync module they copy does not include symbolic links to
1977 bf(/etc/passwd) in the public section of the site. Using
1978 bf(--copy-unsafe-links) will cause any links to be copied as the file
1979 they point to on the destination. Using bf(--safe-links) will cause
1980 unsafe links to be omitted altogether. (Note that you must specify
1981 bf(--links) for bf(--safe-links) to have any effect.)
1983 Symbolic links are considered unsafe if they are absolute symlinks
1984 (start with bf(/)), empty, or if they contain enough bf("..")
1985 components to ascend from the directory being copied.
1987 Here's a summary of how the symlink options are interpreted. The list is
1988 in order of precedence, so if your combination of options isn't mentioned,
1989 use the first line that is a complete subset of your options:
1991 dit(bf(--copy-links)) Turn all symlinks into normal files (leaving no
1992 symlinks for any other options to affect).
1994 dit(bf(--links --copy-unsafe-links)) Turn all unsafe symlinks into files
1995 and duplicate all safe symlinks.
1997 dit(bf(--copy-unsafe-links)) Turn all unsafe symlinks into files, noisily
1998 skip all safe symlinks.
2000 dit(bf(--links --safe-links)) Duplicate safe symlinks and skip unsafe
2003 dit(bf(--links)) Duplicate all symlinks.
2005 manpagediagnostics()
2007 rsync occasionally produces error messages that may seem a little
2008 cryptic. The one that seems to cause the most confusion is "protocol
2009 version mismatch -- is your shell clean?".
2011 This message is usually caused by your startup scripts or remote shell
2012 facility producing unwanted garbage on the stream that rsync is using
2013 for its transport. The way to diagnose this problem is to run your
2014 remote shell like this:
2016 quote(tt(ssh remotehost /bin/true > out.dat))
2018 then look at out.dat. If everything is working correctly then out.dat
2019 should be a zero length file. If you are getting the above error from
2020 rsync then you will probably find that out.dat contains some text or
2021 data. Look at the contents and try to work out what is producing
2022 it. The most common cause is incorrectly configured shell startup
2023 scripts (such as .cshrc or .profile) that contain output statements
2024 for non-interactive logins.
2026 If you are having trouble debugging filter patterns, then
2027 try specifying the bf(-vv) option. At this level of verbosity rsync will
2028 show why each individual file is included or excluded.
2030 manpagesection(EXIT VALUES)
2034 dit(bf(1)) Syntax or usage error
2035 dit(bf(2)) Protocol incompatibility
2036 dit(bf(3)) Errors selecting input/output files, dirs
2037 dit(bf(4)) Requested action not supported: an attempt
2038 was made to manipulate 64-bit files on a platform that cannot support
2039 them; or an option was specified that is supported by the client and
2041 dit(bf(5)) Error starting client-server protocol
2042 dit(bf(6)) Daemon unable to append to log-file
2043 dit(bf(10)) Error in socket I/O
2044 dit(bf(11)) Error in file I/O
2045 dit(bf(12)) Error in rsync protocol data stream
2046 dit(bf(13)) Errors with program diagnostics
2047 dit(bf(14)) Error in IPC code
2048 dit(bf(20)) Received SIGUSR1 or SIGINT
2049 dit(bf(21)) Some error returned by waitpid()
2050 dit(bf(22)) Error allocating core memory buffers
2051 dit(bf(23)) Partial transfer due to error
2052 dit(bf(24)) Partial transfer due to vanished source files
2053 dit(bf(25)) The --max-delete limit stopped deletions
2054 dit(bf(30)) Timeout in data send/receive
2057 manpagesection(ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES)
2060 dit(bf(CVSIGNORE)) The CVSIGNORE environment variable supplements any
2061 ignore patterns in .cvsignore files. See the bf(--cvs-exclude) option for
2063 dit(bf(RSYNC_RSH)) The RSYNC_RSH environment variable allows you to
2064 override the default shell used as the transport for rsync. Command line
2065 options are permitted after the command name, just as in the bf(-e) option.
2066 dit(bf(RSYNC_PROXY)) The RSYNC_PROXY environment variable allows you to
2067 redirect your rsync client to use a web proxy when connecting to a
2068 rsync daemon. You should set RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair.
2069 dit(bf(RSYNC_PASSWORD)) Setting RSYNC_PASSWORD to the required
2070 password allows you to run authenticated rsync connections to an rsync
2071 daemon without user intervention. Note that this does not supply a
2072 password to a shell transport such as ssh.
2073 dit(bf(USER) or bf(LOGNAME)) The USER or LOGNAME environment variables
2074 are used to determine the default username sent to an rsync daemon.
2075 If neither is set, the username defaults to "nobody".
2076 dit(bf(HOME)) The HOME environment variable is used to find the user's
2077 default .cvsignore file.
2082 /etc/rsyncd.conf or rsyncd.conf
2090 times are transferred as unix time_t values
2092 When transferring to FAT filesystems rsync may re-sync
2094 See the comments on the bf(--modify-window) option.
2096 file permissions, devices, etc. are transferred as native numerical
2099 see also the comments on the bf(--delete) option
2101 Please report bugs! See the website at
2102 url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/)
2104 manpagesection(VERSION)
2106 This man page is current for version 2.6.6 of rsync.
2108 manpagesection(CREDITS)
2110 rsync is distributed under the GNU public license. See the file
2111 COPYING for details.
2113 A WEB site is available at
2114 url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/). The site
2115 includes an FAQ-O-Matic which may cover questions unanswered by this
2118 The primary ftp site for rsync is
2119 url(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync)(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync).
2121 We would be delighted to hear from you if you like this program.
2123 This program uses the excellent zlib compression library written by
2124 Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler.
2126 manpagesection(THANKS)
2128 Thanks to Richard Brent, Brendan Mackay, Bill Waite, Stephen Rothwell
2129 and David Bell for helpful suggestions, patches and testing of rsync.
2130 I've probably missed some people, my apologies if I have.
2132 Especial thanks also to: David Dykstra, Jos Backus, Sebastian Krahmer,
2133 Martin Pool, Wayne Davison, J.W. Schultz.
2137 rsync was originally written by Andrew Tridgell and Paul Mackerras.
2138 Many people have later contributed to it.
2140 Mailing lists for support and development are available at
2141 url(http://lists.samba.org)(lists.samba.org)