1 mailto(rsync-bugs@samba.org)
2 manpage(rsync)(1)(30 Sep 2004)()()
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 servers (ideal for
45 manpagesection(GENERAL)
47 There are eight different ways of using rsync. They are:
50 it() for copying local files. This is invoked when neither
51 source nor destination path contains a : separator
52 it() for copying from the local machine to a remote machine using
53 a remote shell program as the transport (such as ssh or
54 rsh). This is invoked when the destination path contains a
56 it() for copying from a remote machine to the local machine
57 using a remote shell program. This is invoked when the source
58 contains a : separator.
59 it() for copying from a remote rsync server to the local
60 machine. This is invoked when the source path contains a ::
61 separator or an rsync:// URL.
62 it() for copying from the local machine to a remote rsync
63 server. This is invoked when the destination path contains a ::
64 separator or an rsync:// URL.
65 it() for copying from a remote machine using a remote shell
66 program as the transport, using rsync server on the remote
67 machine. This is invoked when the source path contains a ::
68 separator and the bf(--rsh=COMMAND) (aka "bf(-e COMMAND)") option is
70 it() for copying from the local machine to a remote machine
71 using a remote shell program as the transport, using rsync
72 server on the remote machine. This is invoked when the
73 destination path contains a :: separator and the
74 bf(--rsh=COMMAND) option is also provided.
75 it() for listing files on a remote machine. This is done the
76 same way as rsync transfers except that you leave off the
80 Note that in all cases (other than listing) at least one of the source
81 and destination paths must be local.
85 See the file README for installation instructions.
87 Once installed, you can use rsync to any machine that you can access via
88 a remote shell (as well as some that you can access using the rsync
89 daemon-mode protocol). For remote transfers, a modern rsync uses ssh
90 for its communications, but it may have been configured to use a
91 different remote shell by default, such as rsh or remsh.
93 You can also specify any remote shell you like, either by using the bf(-e)
94 command line option, or by setting the RSYNC_RSH environment variable.
96 One common substitute is to use ssh, which offers a high degree of
99 Note that rsync must be installed on both the source and destination
102 manpagesection(USAGE)
104 You use rsync in the same way you use rcp. You must specify a source
105 and a destination, one of which may be remote.
107 Perhaps the best way to explain the syntax is with some examples:
109 quote(tt(rsync -t *.c foo:src/))
111 This would transfer all files matching the pattern *.c from the
112 current directory to the directory src on the machine foo. If any of
113 the files already exist on the remote system then the rsync
114 remote-update protocol is used to update the file by sending only the
115 differences. See the tech report for details.
117 quote(tt(rsync -avz foo:src/bar /data/tmp))
119 This would recursively transfer all files from the directory src/bar on the
120 machine foo into the /data/tmp/bar directory on the local machine. The
121 files are transferred in "archive" mode, which ensures that symbolic
122 links, devices, attributes, permissions, ownerships, etc. are preserved
123 in the transfer. Additionally, compression will be used to reduce the
124 size of data portions of the transfer.
126 quote(tt(rsync -avz foo:src/bar/ /data/tmp))
128 A trailing slash on the source changes this behavior to avoid creating an
129 additional directory level at the destination. You can think of a trailing
130 / on a source as meaning "copy the contents of this directory" as opposed
131 to "copy the directory by name", but in both cases the attributes of the
132 containing directory are transferred to the containing directory on the
133 destination. In other words, each of the following commands copies the
134 files in the same way, including their setting of the attributes of
138 tt(rsync -av /src/foo /dest)nl()
139 tt(rsync -av /src/foo/ /dest/foo)nl()
142 You can also use rsync in local-only mode, where both the source and
143 destination don't have a ':' in the name. In this case it behaves like
144 an improved copy command.
146 quote(tt(rsync somehost.mydomain.com::))
148 This would list all the anonymous rsync modules available on the host
149 somehost.mydomain.com. (See the following section for more details.)
151 manpagesection(ADVANCED USAGE)
153 The syntax for requesting multiple files from a remote host involves using
154 quoted spaces in the SRC. Some examples:
156 quote(tt(rsync host::'modname/dir1/file1 modname/dir2/file2' /dest))
158 This would copy file1 and file2 into /dest from an rsync daemon. Each
159 additional arg must include the same "modname/" prefix as the first one,
160 and must be preceded by a single space. All other spaces are assumed
161 to be a part of the filenames.
163 quote(tt(rsync -av host:'dir1/file1 dir2/file2' /dest))
165 This would copy file1 and file2 into /dest using a remote shell. This
166 word-splitting is done by the remote shell, so if it doesn't work it means
167 that the remote shell isn't configured to split its args based on
168 whitespace (a very rare setting, but not unknown). If you need to transfer
169 a filename that contains whitespace, you'll need to either escape the
170 whitespace in a way that the remote shell will understand, or use wildcards
171 in place of the spaces. Two examples of this are:
174 tt(rsync -av host:'file\ name\ with\ spaces' /dest)nl()
175 tt(rsync -av host:file?name?with?spaces /dest)nl()
178 This latter example assumes that your shell passes through unmatched
179 wildcards. If it complains about "no match", put the name in quotes.
181 manpagesection(CONNECTING TO AN RSYNC SERVER)
183 It is also possible to use rsync without a remote shell as the
184 transport. In this case you will connect to a remote rsync server
185 running on TCP port 873.
187 You may establish the connection via a web proxy by setting the
188 environment variable RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair pointing to
189 your web proxy. Note that your web proxy's configuration must support
190 proxy connections to port 873.
192 Using rsync in this way is the same as using it with a remote shell except
196 it() you use a double colon :: instead of a single colon to
197 separate the hostname from the path or an rsync:// URL.
198 it() the remote server may print a message of the day when you
200 it() if you specify no path name on the remote server then the
201 list of accessible paths on the server will be shown.
202 it() if you specify no local destination then a listing of the
203 specified files on the remote server is provided.
206 Some paths on the remote server may require authentication. If so then
207 you will receive a password prompt when you connect. You can avoid the
208 password prompt by setting the environment variable RSYNC_PASSWORD to
209 the password you want to use or using the bf(--password-file) option. This
210 may be useful when scripting rsync.
212 WARNING: On some systems environment variables are visible to all
213 users. On those systems using bf(--password-file) is recommended.
215 manpagesection(CONNECTING TO AN RSYNC SERVER OVER A REMOTE SHELL PROGRAM)
217 It is sometimes useful to be able to set up file transfers using rsync
218 server capabilities on the remote machine, while still using ssh or
219 rsh for transport. This is especially useful when you want to connect
220 to a remote machine via ssh (for encryption or to get through a
221 firewall), but you still want to have access to the rsync server
222 features (see RUNNING AN RSYNC SERVER OVER A REMOTE SHELL PROGRAM,
225 From the user's perspective, using rsync in this way is the same as
226 using it to connect to an rsync server, except that you must
227 explicitly set the remote shell program on the command line with
228 bf(--rsh=COMMAND). (Setting RSYNC_RSH in the environment will not turn on
231 In order to distinguish between the remote-shell user and the rsync
232 server user, you can use '-l user' on your remote-shell command:
234 verb( rsync -av --rsh="ssh -l ssh-user" \
235 rsync-user@host::module[/path] local-path)
237 The "ssh-user" will be used at the ssh level; the "rsync-user" will be
238 used to check against the rsyncd.conf on the remote host.
240 manpagesection(RUNNING AN RSYNC SERVER)
242 An rsync server is configured using a configuration file. Please see the
243 rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more information. By default the configuration
244 file is called /etc/rsyncd.conf, unless rsync is running over a remote
245 shell program and is not running as root; in that case, the default name
246 is rsyncd.conf in the current directory on the remote computer
249 manpagesection(RUNNING AN RSYNC SERVER OVER A REMOTE SHELL PROGRAM)
251 See the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for full information on the rsync
252 server configuration file.
254 Several configuration options will not be available unless the remote
255 user is root (e.g. chroot, setuid/setgid, etc.). There is no need to
256 configure inetd or the services map to include the rsync server port
257 if you run an rsync server only via a remote shell program.
259 To run an rsync server out of a single-use ssh key, see this section
260 in the rsyncd.conf(5) man page.
262 manpagesection(EXAMPLES)
264 Here are some examples of how I use rsync.
266 To backup my wife's home directory, which consists of large MS Word
267 files and mail folders, I use a cron job that runs
269 quote(tt(rsync -Cavz . arvidsjaur:backup))
271 each night over a PPP connection to a duplicate directory on my machine
274 To synchronize my samba source trees I use the following Makefile
278 rsync -avuzb --exclude '*~' samba:samba/ .
280 rsync -Cavuzb . samba:samba/
283 this allows me to sync with a CVS directory at the other end of the
284 connection. I then do CVS operations on the remote machine, which saves a
285 lot of time as the remote CVS protocol isn't very efficient.
287 I mirror a directory between my "old" and "new" ftp sites with the
290 tt(rsync -az -e ssh --delete ~ftp/pub/samba nimbus:"~ftp/pub/tridge")
292 This is launched from cron every few hours.
294 manpagesection(OPTIONS SUMMARY)
296 Here is a short summary of the options available in rsync. Please refer
297 to the detailed description below for a complete description. verb(
298 -v, --verbose increase verbosity
299 -q, --quiet suppress non-error messages
300 -c, --checksum always checksum
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 -d, --dirs transfer directories without recursing
313 -l, --links copy symlinks as symlinks
314 -L, --copy-links transform symlink into referent file/dir
315 --copy-unsafe-links only "unsafe" symlinks are transformed
316 --safe-links ignore symlinks that point outside the tree
317 -H, --hard-links preserve hard links
318 -K, --keep-dirlinks treat symlinked dir on receiver as dir
319 -p, --perms preserve permissions
320 -o, --owner preserve owner (root only)
321 -g, --group preserve group
322 -D, --devices preserve devices (root only)
323 -t, --times preserve times
324 -O, --omit-dir-times omit directories when preserving times
325 -S, --sparse handle sparse files efficiently
326 -n, --dry-run show what would have been transferred
327 -W, --whole-file copy files whole
328 --no-whole-file always use incremental rsync algorithm
329 -x, --one-file-system don't cross filesystem boundaries
330 -B, --block-size=SIZE force a fixed checksum block-size
331 -e, --rsh=COMMAND specify the remote shell to use
332 --rsync-path=PATH specify path to rsync on the remote machine
333 --existing only update files that already exist
334 --ignore-existing ignore files that already exist on receiver
335 --del an alias for --delete-during
336 --delete delete files that don't exist on sender
337 --delete-before receiver deletes before transfer (default)
338 --delete-during receiver deletes during xfer, not before
339 --delete-after receiver deletes after transfer, not before
340 --delete-excluded also delete excluded files on receiver
341 --ignore-errors delete even if there are I/O errors
342 --force force deletion of dirs even if not empty
343 --max-delete=NUM don't delete more than NUM files
344 --max-size=SIZE don't transfer any file larger than SIZE
345 --partial keep partially transferred files
346 --partial-dir=DIR put a partially transferred file into DIR
347 --delay-updates put all updated files into place at end
348 --numeric-ids don't map uid/gid values by user/group name
349 --timeout=TIME set I/O timeout in seconds
350 -I, --ignore-times don't skip files that match size and time
351 --size-only skip files that match in size
352 --modify-window=NUM compare mod-times with reduced accuracy
353 -T --temp-dir=DIR create temporary files in directory DIR
354 --compare-dest=DIR also compare received files relative to DIR
355 --copy-dest=DIR ... and include copies of unchanged files
356 --link-dest=DIR hardlink to files in DIR when unchanged
357 -z, --compress compress file data during the transfer
358 -C, --cvs-exclude auto-ignore files in the same way CVS does
359 -f, --filter=RULE add a file-filtering RULE
360 -F same as --filter=': /.rsync-filter'
361 repeated: --filter='- .rsync-filter'
362 --exclude=PATTERN exclude files matching PATTERN
363 --exclude-from=FILE read exclude patterns from FILE
364 --include=PATTERN don't exclude files matching PATTERN
365 --include-from=FILE read include patterns from FILE
366 --files-from=FILE read list of source-file names from FILE
367 -0 --from0 all *from file lists are delimited by nulls
368 --version print version number
369 --port=PORT specify double-colon alternate port number
370 --blocking-io use blocking I/O for the remote shell
371 --no-blocking-io turn off blocking I/O when it is default
372 --stats give some file-transfer stats
373 --progress show progress during transfer
374 -P same as --partial --progress
375 --log-format=FORMAT log file-transfers using specified format
376 --password-file=FILE read password from FILE
377 --list-only list the files instead of copying them
378 --bwlimit=KBPS limit I/O bandwidth; KBytes per second
379 --write-batch=FILE write a batched update to FILE
380 --read-batch=FILE read a batched update from FILE
381 --checksum-seed=NUM set block/file checksum seed (advanced)
382 -4 --ipv4 prefer IPv4
383 -6 --ipv6 prefer IPv6
384 -h, --help show this help screen)
386 Rsync can also be run as a daemon, in which case the following options are
388 --daemon run as an rsync daemon
389 --address=ADDRESS bind to the specified address
390 --bwlimit=KBPS limit I/O bandwidth; KBytes per second
391 --config=FILE specify alternate rsyncd.conf file
392 --no-detach do not detach from the parent
393 --port=PORT listen on alternate port number
394 -v, --verbose increase verbosity
395 -4 --ipv4 prefer IPv4
396 -6 --ipv6 prefer IPv6
397 -h, --help show this help screen)
401 rsync uses the GNU long options package. Many of the command line
402 options have two variants, one short and one long. These are shown
403 below, separated by commas. Some options only have a long variant.
404 The '=' for options that take a parameter is optional; whitespace
408 dit(bf(-h, --help)) Print a short help page describing the options
411 dit(bf(--version)) print the rsync version number and exit.
413 dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information you
414 are given during the transfer. By default, rsync works silently. A
415 single bf(-v) will give you information about what files are being
416 transferred and a brief summary at the end. Two bf(-v) flags will give you
417 information on what files are being skipped and slightly more
418 information at the end. More than two bf(-v) flags should only be used if
419 you are debugging rsync.
421 dit(bf(-q, --quiet)) This option decreases the amount of information you
422 are given during the transfer, notably suppressing information messages
423 from the remote server. This flag is useful when invoking rsync from
426 dit(bf(-I, --ignore-times)) Normally rsync will skip any files that are
427 already the same size and have the same modification time-stamp.
428 This option turns off this "quick check" behavior.
430 dit(bf(--size-only)) Normally rsync will not transfer any files that are
431 already the same size and have the same modification time-stamp. With the
432 bf(--size-only) option, files will not be transferred if they have the same size,
433 regardless of timestamp. This is useful when starting to use rsync
434 after using another mirroring system which may not preserve timestamps
437 dit(bf(--modify-window)) When comparing two timestamps, rsync treats the
438 timestamps as being equal if they differ by no more than the modify-window
439 value. This is normally 0 (for an exact match), but you may find it useful
440 to set this to a larger value in some situations. In particular, when
441 transferring to or from an MS Windows FAT filesystem (which represents
442 times with a 2-second resolution), bf(--modify-window=1) is useful
443 (allowing times to differ by up to 1 second).
445 dit(bf(-c, --checksum)) This forces the sender to checksum all files using
446 a 128-bit MD4 checksum before transfer. The checksum is then
447 explicitly checked on the receiver and any files of the same name
448 which already exist and have the same checksum and size on the
449 receiver are not transferred. This option can be quite slow.
451 dit(bf(-a, --archive)) This is equivalent to bf(-rlptgoD). It is a quick
452 way of saying you want recursion and want to preserve almost
453 everything. The only exception to this is if bf(--files-from) was
454 specified, in which case bf(-d) is implied instead of bf(-r).
456 Note that bf(-a) bf(does not preserve hardlinks), because
457 finding multiply-linked files is expensive. You must separately
460 dit(bf(-r, --recursive)) This tells rsync to copy directories
461 recursively. See also bf(--dirs) (bf(-d)).
463 dit(bf(-R, --relative)) Use relative paths. This means that the full path
464 names specified on the command line are sent to the server rather than
465 just the last parts of the filenames. This is particularly useful when
466 you want to send several different directories at the same time. For
467 example, if you used the command
469 quote(tt( rsync /foo/bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/))
471 then this would create a file called foo.c in /tmp/ on the remote
472 machine. If instead you used
474 quote(tt( rsync -R /foo/bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/))
476 then a file called /tmp/foo/bar/foo.c would be created on the remote
477 machine -- the full path name is preserved. To limit the amount of
478 path information that is sent, do something like this:
482 tt( rsync -R bar/foo.c remote:/tmp/)nl()
485 That would create /tmp/bar/foo.c on the remote machine.
487 dit(bf(--no-relative)) Turn off the bf(--relative) option. This is only
488 needed if you want to use bf(--files-from) without its implied bf(--relative)
491 dit(bf(--no-implied-dirs)) When combined with the bf(--relative) option, the
492 implied directories in each path are not explicitly duplicated as part
493 of the transfer. This makes the transfer more optimal and also allows
494 the two sides to have non-matching symlinks in the implied part of the
495 path. For instance, if you transfer the file "/path/foo/file" with bf(-R),
496 the default is for rsync to ensure that "/path" and "/path/foo" on the
497 destination exactly match the directories/symlinks of the source. Using
498 the bf(--no-implied-dirs) option would omit both of these implied dirs,
499 which means that if "/path" was a real directory on one machine and a
500 symlink of the other machine, rsync would not try to change this.
502 dit(bf(-b, --backup)) With this option, preexisting destination files are
503 renamed as each file is transferred or deleted. You can control where the
504 backup file goes and what (if any) suffix gets appended using the
505 bf(--backup-dir) and bf(--suffix) options.
507 dit(bf(--backup-dir=DIR)) In combination with the bf(--backup) option, this
508 tells rsync to store all backups in the specified directory. This is
509 very useful for incremental backups. You can additionally
510 specify a backup suffix using the bf(--suffix) option
511 (otherwise the files backed up in the specified directory
512 will keep their original filenames).
513 If DIR is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory
514 (which changes in a recursive transfer).
516 dit(bf(--suffix=SUFFIX)) This option allows you to override the default
517 backup suffix used with the bf(--backup) (bf(-b)) option. The default suffix is a ~
518 if no -bf(-backup-dir) was specified, otherwise it is an empty string.
520 dit(bf(-u, --update)) This forces rsync to skip any files which exist on
521 the destination and have a modified time that is newer than the source
522 file. (If an existing destination file has a modify time equal to the
523 source file's, it will be updated if the sizes are different.)
525 In the current implementation of bf(--update), a difference of file format
526 between the sender and receiver is always
527 considered to be important enough for an update, no matter what date
528 is on the objects. In other words, if the source has a directory or a
529 symlink where the destination has a file, the transfer would occur
530 regardless of the timestamps. This might change in the future (feel
531 free to comment on this on the mailing list if you have an opinion).
533 dit(bf(--inplace)) This causes rsync not to create a new copy of the file
534 and then move it into place. Instead rsync will overwrite the existing
535 file, meaning that the rsync algorithm can't accomplish the full amount of
536 network reduction it might be able to otherwise (since it does not yet try
537 to sort data matches). One exception to this is if you combine the option
538 with bf(--backup), since rsync is smart enough to use the backup file as the
539 basis file for the transfer.
541 This option is useful for transfer of large files with block-based changes
542 or appended data, and also on systems that are disk bound, not network
545 The option implies bf(--partial) (since an interrupted transfer does not delete
546 the file), but conflicts with bf(--partial-dir) and bf(--delay-updates).
547 Prior to rsync 2.6.4 bf(--inplace) was also incompatible with bf(--compare-dest),
548 bf(--copy-dest), and bf(--link-dest).
550 WARNING: The file's data will be in an inconsistent state during the
551 transfer (and possibly afterward if the transfer gets interrupted), so you
552 should not use this option to update files that are in use. Also note that
553 rsync will be unable to update a file in-place that is not writable by the
556 dit(bf(-d, --dirs)) Tell the sending side to include any directories that
557 are encountered. Unlike bf(--recursive), a directory's contents are not copied
558 unless the directory was specified on the command-line as either "." or a
559 name with a trailing slash (e.g. "foo/"). Without this option or the
560 bf(--recursive) option, rsync will skip all directories it encounters (and
561 output a message to that effect for each one).
563 dit(bf(-l, --links)) When symlinks are encountered, recreate the
564 symlink on the destination.
566 dit(bf(-L, --copy-links)) When symlinks are encountered, the file that
567 they point to (the referent) is copied, rather than the symlink. In older
568 versions of rsync, this option also had the side-effect of telling the
569 receiving side to follow symlinks, such as symlinks to directories. In a
570 modern rsync such as this one, you'll need to specify bf(--keep-dirlinks) (bf(-K))
571 to get this extra behavior. The only exception is when sending files to
572 an rsync that is too old to understand bf(-K) -- in that case, the bf(-L) option
573 will still have the side-effect of bf(-K) on that older receiving rsync.
575 dit(bf(--copy-unsafe-links)) This tells rsync to copy the referent of
576 symbolic links that point outside the copied tree. Absolute symlinks
577 are also treated like ordinary files, and so are any symlinks in the
578 source path itself when bf(--relative) is used.
580 dit(bf(--safe-links)) This tells rsync to ignore any symbolic links
581 which point outside the copied tree. All absolute symlinks are
582 also ignored. Using this option in conjunction with bf(--relative) may
583 give unexpected results.
585 dit(bf(-H, --hard-links)) This tells rsync to recreate hard links on
586 the remote system to be the same as the local system. Without this
587 option hard links are treated like regular files.
589 Note that rsync can only detect hard links if both parts of the link
590 are in the list of files being sent.
592 This option can be quite slow, so only use it if you need it.
594 dit(bf(-K, --keep-dirlinks)) On the receiving side, if a symlink is
595 pointing to a directory, it will be treated as matching a directory
598 dit(bf(-W, --whole-file)) With this option the incremental rsync algorithm
599 is not used and the whole file is sent as-is instead. The transfer may be
600 faster if this option is used when the bandwidth between the source and
601 destination machines is higher than the bandwidth to disk (especially when the
602 "disk" is actually a networked filesystem). This is the default when both
603 the source and destination are specified as local paths.
605 dit(bf(--no-whole-file)) Turn off bf(--whole-file), for use when it is the
608 dit(bf(-p, --perms)) This option causes rsync to set the destination
609 permissions to be the same as the source permissions.
611 Without this option, each new file gets its permissions set based on the
612 source file's permissions and the umask at the receiving end, while all
613 other files (including updated files) retain their existing permissions
614 (which is the same behavior as other file-copy utilities, such as cp).
616 dit(bf(-o, --owner)) This option causes rsync to set the owner of the
617 destination file to be the same as the source file. On most systems,
618 only the super-user can set file ownership. By default, the preservation
619 is done by name, but may fall back to using the ID number in some
620 circumstances. See the bf(--numeric-ids) option for a full discussion.
622 dit(bf(-g, --group)) This option causes rsync to set the group of the
623 destination file to be the same as the source file. If the receiving
624 program is not running as the super-user, only groups that the
625 receiver is a member of will be preserved. By default, the preservation
626 is done by name, but may fall back to using the ID number in some
627 circumstances. See the bf(--numeric-ids) option for a full discussion.
629 dit(bf(-D, --devices)) This option causes rsync to transfer character and
630 block device information to the remote system to recreate these
631 devices. This option is only available to the super-user.
633 dit(bf(-t, --times)) This tells rsync to transfer modification times along
634 with the files and update them on the remote system. Note that if this
635 option is not used, the optimization that excludes files that have not been
636 modified cannot be effective; in other words, a missing bf(-t) or bf(-a) will
637 cause the next transfer to behave as if it used bf(-I), causing all files to be
638 updated (though the rsync algorithm will make the update fairly efficient
639 if the files haven't actually changed, you're much better off using bf(-t)).
641 dit(bf(-O, --omit-dir-times)) This tells rsync to omit directories when
642 it is preserving modification times (see bf(--times)). If NFS is sharing
643 the directories on the receiving side, it is a good idea to use bf(-O).
645 dit(bf(-n, --dry-run)) This tells rsync to not do any file transfers,
646 instead it will just report the actions it would have taken.
648 dit(bf(-S, --sparse)) Try to handle sparse files efficiently so they take
649 up less space on the destination.
651 NOTE: Don't use this option when the destination is a Solaris "tmpfs"
652 filesystem. It doesn't seem to handle seeks over null regions
653 correctly and ends up corrupting the files.
655 dit(bf(-x, --one-file-system)) This tells rsync not to cross filesystem
656 boundaries when recursing. This is useful for transferring the
657 contents of only one filesystem.
659 dit(bf(--existing)) This tells rsync not to create any new files --
660 only update files that already exist on the destination.
662 dit(bf(--ignore-existing))
663 This tells rsync not to update files that already exist on
666 dit(bf(--max-delete=NUM)) This tells rsync not to delete more than NUM
667 files or directories. This is useful when mirroring very large trees
668 to prevent disasters.
670 dit(bf(--max-size=SIZE)) This tells rsync to avoid transferring any
671 file that is larger than the specified SIZE. The SIZE value can be
672 suffixed with a letter to indicate a size multiplier (K, M, or G) and
673 may be a fractional value (e.g. "bf(--max-size=1.5m)").
675 dit(bf(--delete)) This tells rsync to delete extraneous files from the
676 receiving side (ones that aren't on the sending side), but only for the
677 directories that are being synchronized. You must have asked rsync to
678 send the whole directory (e.g. "dir" or "dir/") without using a wildcard
679 for the directory's contents (e.g. "dir/*") since the wildcard is expanded
680 by the shell and rsync thus gets a request to transfer individual files, not
681 the files' parent directory. Files that are excluded from transfer are
682 also excluded from being deleted unless you use the bf(--delete-excluded)
683 option or mark the rules as only matching on the sending side (see the
684 include/exclude modifiers in the FILTER RULES section).
686 This option has no effect unless directory recursion is enabled.
688 This option can be dangerous if used incorrectly! It is a very good idea
689 to run first using the bf(--dry-run) option (bf(-n)) to see what files would be
690 deleted to make sure important files aren't listed.
692 If the sending side detects any I/O errors, then the deletion of any
693 files at the destination will be automatically disabled. This is to
694 prevent temporary filesystem failures (such as NFS errors) on the
695 sending side causing a massive deletion of files on the
696 destination. You can override this with the bf(--ignore-errors) option.
698 The bf(--delete) option may be combined with one of the --delete-WHEN options
699 without conflict, as well as bf(--delete-excluded). However, if none of the
700 --delete-WHEN options are specified, rsync will currently choose the
701 bf(--delete-before) algorithm. A future version may change this to choose the
702 bf(--delete-during) algorithm. See also bf(--delete-after).
704 dit(bf(--delete-before)) Request that the file-deletions on the receiving
705 side be done before the transfer starts. This is the default if bf(--delete)
706 or bf(--delete-excluded) is specified without one of the --delete-WHEN options.
707 See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
709 Deleting before the transfer is helpful if the filesystem is tight for space
710 and removing extraneous files would help to make the transfer possible.
711 However, it does introduce a delay before the start of the transfer,
712 and this delay might cause the transfer to timeout (if bf(--timeout) was
715 dit(bf(--delete-during, --del)) Request that the file-deletions on the
716 receiving side be done incrementally as the transfer happens. This is
717 a faster method than choosing the before- or after-transfer algorithm,
718 but it is only supported beginning with rsync version 2.6.4.
719 See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
721 dit(bf(--delete-after)) Request that the file-deletions on the receiving
722 side be done after the transfer has completed. This is useful if you
723 are sending new per-directory merge files as a part of the transfer and
724 you want their exclusions to take effect for the delete phase of the
726 See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
728 dit(bf(--delete-excluded)) In addition to deleting the files on the
729 receiving side that are not on the sending side, this tells rsync to also
730 delete any files on the receiving side that are excluded (see bf(--exclude)).
731 See the FILTER RULES section for a way to make individual exclusions behave
732 this way on the receiver, and for a way to protect files from
733 bf(--delete-excluded).
734 See bf(--delete) (which is implied) for more details on file-deletion.
736 dit(bf(--ignore-errors)) Tells bf(--delete) to go ahead and delete files
737 even when there are I/O errors.
739 dit(bf(--force)) This options tells rsync to delete directories even if
740 they are not empty when they are to be replaced by non-directories. This
741 is only relevant without bf(--delete) because deletions are now done depth-first.
742 Requires the bf(--recursive) option (which is implied by bf(-a)) to have any effect.
744 dit(bf(-B, --block-size=BLOCKSIZE)) This forces the block size used in
745 the rsync algorithm to a fixed value. It is normally selected based on
746 the size of each file being updated. See the technical report for details.
748 dit(bf(-e, --rsh=COMMAND)) This option allows you to choose an alternative
749 remote shell program to use for communication between the local and
750 remote copies of rsync. Typically, rsync is configured to use ssh by
751 default, but you may prefer to use rsh on a local network.
753 If this option is used with bf([user@]host::module/path), then the
754 remote shell em(COMMAND) will be used to run an rsync server on the
755 remote host, and all data will be transmitted through that remote
756 shell connection, rather than through a direct socket connection to a
757 running rsync server on the remote host. See the section "CONNECTING
758 TO AN RSYNC SERVER OVER A REMOTE SHELL PROGRAM" above.
760 Command-line arguments are permitted in COMMAND provided that COMMAND is
761 presented to rsync as a single argument. For example:
763 quote(tt( -e "ssh -p 2234"))
765 (Note that ssh users can alternately customize site-specific connect
766 options in their .ssh/config file.)
768 You can also choose the remote shell program using the RSYNC_RSH
769 environment variable, which accepts the same range of values as bf(-e).
771 See also the bf(--blocking-io) option which is affected by this option.
773 dit(bf(--rsync-path=PATH)) Use this to specify the path to the copy of
774 rsync on the remote machine. Useful when it's not in your path. Note
775 that this is the full path to the binary, not just the directory that
778 dit(bf(-C, --cvs-exclude)) This is a useful shorthand for excluding a
779 broad range of files that you often don't want to transfer between
780 systems. It uses the same algorithm that CVS uses to determine if
781 a file should be ignored.
783 The exclude list is initialized to:
785 quote(quote(tt(RCS SCCS CVS CVS.adm RCSLOG cvslog.* tags TAGS .make.state
786 .nse_depinfo *~ #* .#* ,* _$* *$ *.old *.bak *.BAK *.orig *.rej
787 .del-* *.a *.olb *.o *.obj *.so *.exe *.Z *.elc *.ln core .svn/)))
789 then files listed in a $HOME/.cvsignore are added to the list and any
790 files listed in the CVSIGNORE environment variable (all cvsignore names
791 are delimited by whitespace).
793 Finally, any file is ignored if it is in the same directory as a
794 .cvsignore file and matches one of the patterns listed therein. Unlike
795 rsync's filter/exclude files, these patterns are split on whitespace.
796 See the bf(cvs(1)) manual for more information.
798 If you're combining bf(-C) with your own bf(--filter) rules, you should
799 note that these CVS excludes are appended at the end of your own rules,
800 regardless of where the -C was placed on the command-line. This makes them
801 a lower priority than any rules you specified explicitly. If you want to
802 control where these CVS excludes get inserted into your filter rules, you
803 should omit the bf(-C) as a command-line option and use a combination of
804 bf(--filter=:C) and bf(--filter=-C) (either on your command-line or by
805 putting the ":C" and "-C" rules into a filter file with your other rules).
806 The first option turns on the per-directory scanning for the .cvsignore
807 file. The second option does a one-time import of the CVS excludes
810 dit(bf(-f, --filter=RULE)) This option allows you to add rules to selectively
811 exclude certain files from the list of files to be transferred. This is
812 most useful in combination with a recursive transfer.
814 You may use as many bf(--filter) options on the command line as you like
815 to build up the list of files to exclude.
817 See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
819 dit(bf(-F)) The bf(-F) option is a shorthand for adding two bf(--filter) rules to
820 your command. The first time it is used is a shorthand for this rule:
822 quote(tt( --filter=': /.rsync-filter'))
824 This tells rsync to look for per-directory .rsync-filter files that have
825 been sprinkled through the hierarchy and use their rules to filter the
826 files in the transfer. If bf(-F) is repeated, it is a shorthand for this
829 quote(tt( --filter='- .rsync-filter'))
831 This filters out the .rsync-filter files themselves from the transfer.
833 See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on how these options
836 dit(bf(--exclude=PATTERN)) This option is a simplified form of the
837 bf(--filter) option that defaults to an exclude rule and does not allow
838 the full rule-parsing syntax of normal filter rules.
840 See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
842 dit(bf(--exclude-from=FILE)) This option is similar to the bf(--exclude)
843 option, but instead it adds all exclude patterns listed in the file
844 FILE to the exclude list. Blank lines in FILE and lines starting with
845 ';' or '#' are ignored.
846 If em(FILE) is bf(-) the list will be read from standard input.
848 dit(bf(--include=PATTERN)) This option is a simplified form of the
849 bf(--filter) option that defaults to an include rule and does not allow
850 the full rule-parsing syntax of normal filter rules.
852 See the FILTER RULES section for detailed information on this option.
854 dit(bf(--include-from=FILE)) This specifies a list of include patterns
856 If em(FILE) is "-" the list will be read from standard input.
858 dit(bf(--files-from=FILE)) Using this option allows you to specify the
859 exact list of files to transfer (as read from the specified FILE or "-"
860 for standard input). It also tweaks the default behavior of rsync to make
861 transferring just the specified files and directories easier:
864 it() The bf(--relative) (bf(-R)) option is implied, which preserves the path
865 information that is specified for each item in the file (use
866 bf(--no-relative) if you want to turn that off).
867 it() The bf(--dirs) (bf(-d)) option is implied, which will create directories
868 specified in the list on the destination rather than noisily skipping
870 it() The bf(--archive) (bf(-a)) option's behavior does not imply bf(--recursive)
871 (bf(-r)), so specify it explicitly, if you want it.
874 The file names that are read from the FILE are all relative to the
875 source dir -- any leading slashes are removed and no ".." references are
876 allowed to go higher than the source dir. For example, take this
879 quote(tt( rsync -a --files-from=/tmp/foo /usr remote:/backup))
881 If /tmp/foo contains the string "bin" (or even "/bin"), the /usr/bin
882 directory will be created as /backup/bin on the remote host (but the
883 contents of the /usr/bin dir would not be sent unless you specified bf(-r)
884 or the names were explicitly listed in /tmp/foo). Also keep in mind
885 that the effect of the (enabled by default) bf(--relative) option is to
886 duplicate only the path info that is read from the file -- it does not
887 force the duplication of the source-spec path (/usr in this case).
889 In addition, the bf(--files-from) file can be read from the remote host
890 instead of the local host if you specify a "host:" in front of the file
891 (the host must match one end of the transfer). As a short-cut, you can
892 specify just a prefix of ":" to mean "use the remote end of the
893 transfer". For example:
895 quote(tt( rsync -a --files-from=:/path/file-list src:/ /tmp/copy))
897 This would copy all the files specified in the /path/file-list file that
898 was located on the remote "src" host.
900 dit(bf(-0, --from0)) This tells rsync that the filenames it reads from a
901 file are terminated by a null ('\0') character, not a NL, CR, or CR+LF.
902 This affects bf(--exclude-from), bf(--include-from), bf(--files-from), and any
903 merged files specified in a bf(--filter) rule.
904 It does not affect bf(--cvs-exclude) (since all names read from a .cvsignore
905 file are split on whitespace).
907 dit(bf(-T, --temp-dir=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use DIR as a
908 scratch directory when creating temporary copies of the files
909 transferred on the receiving side. The default behavior is to create
910 the temporary files in the receiving directory.
912 dit(bf(--compare-dest=DIR)) This option instructs rsync to use em(DIR) on
913 the destination machine as an additional hierarchy to compare destination
914 files against doing transfers (if the files are missing in the destination
915 directory). If a file is found in em(DIR) that is identical to the
916 sender's file, the file will NOT be transferred to the destination
917 directory. This is useful for creating a sparse backup of just files that
918 have changed from an earlier backup.
920 Beginning in version 2.6.4, multiple bf(--compare-dest) directories may be
921 provided and rsync will search the list in the order specified until it
922 finds an existing file. That first discovery is used as the basis file,
923 and also determines if the transfer needs to happen.
925 If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
926 See also bf(--copy-dest) and bf(--link-dest).
928 dit(bf(--copy-dest=DIR)) This option behaves like bf(--compare-dest), but
929 rsync will also copy unchanged files found in em(DIR) to the destination
930 directory (using the data in the em(DIR) for an efficient copy). This is
931 useful for doing transfers to a new destination while leaving existing
932 files intact, and then doing a flash-cutover when all files have been
933 successfully transferred.
935 If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
936 See also bf(--compare-dest) and bf(--link-dest).
938 dit(bf(--link-dest=DIR)) This option behaves like bf(--copy-dest), but
939 unchanged files are hard linked from em(DIR) to the destination directory.
940 The files must be identical in all preserved attributes (e.g. permissions,
941 possibly ownership) in order for the files to be linked together.
944 quote(tt( rsync -av --link-dest=$PWD/prior_dir host:src_dir/ new_dir/))
946 Beginning with version 2.6.4, if more than one bf(--link-dest) option is
947 specified, rsync will try to find an exact match to link with (searching
948 the list in the order specified), and if not found, a basis file from one
949 of the em(DIR)s will be selected to try to speed up the transfer.
951 If em(DIR) is a relative path, it is relative to the destination directory.
952 See also bf(--compare-dest) and bf(--copy-dest).
954 Note that rsync versions prior to 2.6.1 had a bug that could prevent
955 bf(--link-dest) from working properly for a non-root user when bf(-o) was specified
956 (or implied by bf(-a)). You can work-around this bug by avoiding the bf(-o) option
957 when sending to an old rsync.
959 dit(bf(-z, --compress)) With this option, rsync compresses the file data
960 as it is sent to the destination machine, which reduces the amount of data
961 being transmitted -- something that is useful over a slow connection.
963 Note this this option typically achieves better compression ratios that can
964 be achieved by using a compressing remote shell or a compressing transport
965 because it takes advantage of the implicit information in the matching data
966 blocks that are not explicitly sent over the connection.
968 dit(bf(--numeric-ids)) With this option rsync will transfer numeric group
969 and user IDs rather than using user and group names and mapping them
972 By default rsync will use the username and groupname to determine
973 what ownership to give files. The special uid 0 and the special group
974 0 are never mapped via user/group names even if the bf(--numeric-ids)
975 option is not specified.
977 If a user or group has no name on the source system or it has no match
978 on the destination system, then the numeric ID
979 from the source system is used instead. See also the comments on the
980 "use chroot" setting in the rsyncd.conf manpage for information on how
981 the chroot setting affects rsync's ability to look up the names of the
982 users and groups and what you can do about it.
984 dit(bf(--timeout=TIMEOUT)) This option allows you to set a maximum I/O
985 timeout in seconds. If no data is transferred for the specified time
986 then rsync will exit. The default is 0, which means no timeout.
988 dit(bf(--port=PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number to use
989 rather than the default of 873. This is only needed if you are using the
990 double-colon (::) syntax to connect with an rsync daemon (since the URL
991 syntax has a way to specify the port as a part of the URL). See also this
992 option in the bf(--daemon) mode section.
994 dit(bf(--blocking-io)) This tells rsync to use blocking I/O when launching
995 a remote shell transport. If the remote shell is either rsh or remsh,
996 rsync defaults to using
997 blocking I/O, otherwise it defaults to using non-blocking I/O. (Note that
998 ssh prefers non-blocking I/O.)
1000 dit(bf(--no-blocking-io)) Turn off bf(--blocking-io), for use when it is the
1003 dit(bf(--log-format=FORMAT)) This allows you to specify exactly what the
1004 rsync client logs to stdout on a per-file basis. The log format is
1005 specified using the same format conventions as the log format option in
1008 dit(bf(--stats)) This tells rsync to print a verbose set of statistics
1009 on the file transfer, allowing you to tell how effective the rsync
1010 algorithm is for your data.
1012 dit(bf(--partial)) By default, rsync will delete any partially
1013 transferred file if the transfer is interrupted. In some circumstances
1014 it is more desirable to keep partially transferred files. Using the
1015 bf(--partial) option tells rsync to keep the partial file which should
1016 make a subsequent transfer of the rest of the file much faster.
1018 dit(bf(--partial-dir=DIR)) A better way to keep partial files than the
1019 bf(--partial) option is to specify a em(DIR) that will be used to hold the
1020 partial data (instead of writing it out to the destination file).
1021 On the next transfer, rsync will use a file found in this
1022 dir as data to speed up the resumption of the transfer and then deletes it
1023 after it has served its purpose.
1024 Note that if bf(--whole-file) is specified (or implied), any partial-dir
1025 file that is found for a file that is being updated will simply be removed
1027 rsync is sending files without using the incremental rsync algorithm).
1029 Rsync will create the em(DIR) if it is missing (just the last dir -- not
1030 the whole path). This makes it easy to use a relative path (such as
1031 "bf(--partial-dir=.rsync-partial)") to have rsync create the
1032 partial-directory in the destination file's directory when needed, and then
1033 remove it again when the partial file is deleted.
1035 If the partial-dir value is not an absolute path, rsync will also add a directory
1036 bf(--exclude) of this value at the end of all your existing excludes. This
1037 will prevent partial-dir files from being transferred and also prevent the
1038 untimely deletion of partial-dir items on the receiving side. An example:
1039 the above bf(--partial-dir) option would add an "bf(--exclude=.rsync-partial/)"
1040 rule at the end of any other filter rules. Note that if you are
1041 supplying your own filter rules, you may need to manually insert a
1042 rule for this directory exclusion somewhere higher up in the list so that
1043 it has a high enough priority to be effective (e.g., if your rules specify
1044 a trailing bf(--exclude='*') rule, the auto-added rule would never be
1047 IMPORTANT: the bf(--partial-dir) should not be writable by other users or it
1048 is a security risk. E.g. AVOID "/tmp".
1050 You can also set the partial-dir value the RSYNC_PARTIAL_DIR environment
1051 variable. Setting this in the environment does not force bf(--partial) to be
1052 enabled, but rather it effects where partial files go when bf(--partial) is
1053 specified. For instance, instead of using bf(--partial-dir=.rsync-tmp)
1054 along with bf(--progress), you could set RSYNC_PARTIAL_DIR=.rsync-tmp in your
1055 environment and then just use the bf(-P) option to turn on the use of the
1056 .rsync-tmp dir for partial transfers. The only time that the bf(--partial)
1057 option does not look for this environment value is (1) when bf(--inplace) was
1058 specified (since bf(--inplace) conflicts with bf(--partial-dir)), or (2) when
1059 bf(--delay-updates) was specified (see below).
1061 For the purposes of the server-config's "refuse options" setting,
1062 bf(--partial-dir) does em(not) imply bf(--partial). This is so that a
1063 refusal of the bf(--partial) option can be used to disallow the overwriting
1064 of destination files with a partial transfer, while still allowing the
1065 safer idiom provided by bf(--partial-dir).
1067 dit(bf(--delay-updates)) This option puts the temporary file from each
1068 updated file into a holding directory until the end of the
1069 transfer, at which time all the files are renamed into place in rapid
1070 succession. This attempts to make the updating of the files a little more
1071 atomic. By default the files are placed into a directory named ".~tmp~" in
1072 each file's destination directory, but you can override this by specifying
1073 the bf(--partial-dir) option. (Note that RSYNC_PARTIAL_DIR has no effect
1074 on this value, nor is bf(--partial-dir) considered to be implied for the
1075 purposes of the server-config's "refuse options" setting.)
1076 Conflicts with bf(--inplace).
1078 This option uses more memory on the receiving side (one bit per file
1079 transferred) and also requires enough free disk space on the receiving
1080 side to hold an additional copy of all the updated files. Note also that
1081 you should not use an absolute path to bf(--partial-dir) unless there is no
1082 chance of any of the files in the transfer having the same name (since all
1083 the updated files will be put into a single directory if the path is
1086 See also the "atomic-rsync" perl script in the "support" subdir for an
1087 update algorithm that is even more atomic (it uses bf(--link-dest) and a
1088 parallel hierarchy of files).
1090 dit(bf(--progress)) This option tells rsync to print information
1091 showing the progress of the transfer. This gives a bored user
1093 Implies bf(--verbose) if it wasn't already specified.
1095 When the file is transferring, the data looks like this:
1097 verb( 782448 63% 110.64kB/s 0:00:04)
1099 This tells you the current file size, the percentage of the transfer that
1100 is complete, the current calculated file-completion rate (including both
1101 data over the wire and data being matched locally), and the estimated time
1102 remaining in this transfer.
1104 After a file is complete, the data looks like this:
1106 verb( 1238099 100% 146.38kB/s 0:00:08 (5, 57.1% of 396))
1108 This tells you the final file size, that it's 100% complete, the final
1109 transfer rate for the file, the amount of elapsed time it took to transfer
1110 the file, and the addition of a total-transfer summary in parentheses.
1111 These additional numbers tell you how many files have been updated, and
1112 what percent of the total number of files has been scanned.
1114 dit(bf(-P)) The bf(-P) option is equivalent to bf(--partial) bf(--progress). Its
1115 purpose is to make it much easier to specify these two options for a long
1116 transfer that may be interrupted.
1118 dit(bf(--password-file)) This option allows you to provide a password
1119 in a file for accessing a remote rsync server. Note that this option
1120 is only useful when accessing an rsync server using the built in
1121 transport, not when using a remote shell as the transport. The file
1122 must not be world readable. It should contain just the password as a
1125 dit(bf(--list-only)) This option will cause the source files to be listed
1126 instead of transferred. This option is inferred if there is no destination
1127 specified, so you don't usually need to use it explicitly. However, it can
1128 come in handy for a power user that wants to avoid the "bf(-r --exclude='/*/*')"
1129 options that rsync might use as a compatibility kluge when generating a
1130 non-recursive listing.
1132 dit(bf(--bwlimit=KBPS)) This option allows you to specify a maximum
1133 transfer rate in kilobytes per second. This option is most effective when
1134 using rsync with large files (several megabytes and up). Due to the nature
1135 of rsync transfers, blocks of data are sent, then if rsync determines the
1136 transfer was too fast, it will wait before sending the next data block. The
1137 result is an average transfer rate equaling the specified limit. A value
1138 of zero specifies no limit.
1140 dit(bf(--write-batch=FILE)) Record a file that can later be applied to
1141 another identical destination with bf(--read-batch). See the "BATCH MODE"
1142 section for details.
1144 dit(bf(--read-batch=FILE)) Apply all of the changes stored in FILE, a
1145 file previously generated by bf(--write-batch).
1146 If em(FILE) is "-" the batch data will be read from standard input.
1147 See the "BATCH MODE" section for details.
1149 dit(bf(-4, --ipv4) or bf(-6, --ipv6)) Tells rsync to prefer IPv4/IPv6
1150 when creating sockets. This only affects sockets that rsync has direct
1151 control over, such as the outgoing socket when directly contacting an
1152 rsync daemon. See also these options in the bf(--daemon) mode section.
1154 dit(bf(--checksum-seed=NUM)) Set the MD4 checksum seed to the integer
1155 NUM. This 4 byte checksum seed is included in each block and file
1156 MD4 checksum calculation. By default the checksum seed is generated
1157 by the server and defaults to the current time(). This option
1158 is used to set a specific checksum seed, which is useful for
1159 applications that want repeatable block and file checksums, or
1160 in the case where the user wants a more random checksum seed.
1161 Note that setting NUM to 0 causes rsync to use the default of time()
1165 manpagesection(DAEMON OPTIONS)
1167 The options allowed when starting an rsync daemon are as follows:
1170 dit(bf(--daemon)) This tells rsync that it is to run as a daemon. The
1171 daemon may be accessed using the bf(host::module) or
1172 bf(rsync://host/module/) syntax.
1174 If standard input is a socket then rsync will assume that it is being
1175 run via inetd, otherwise it will detach from the current terminal and
1176 become a background daemon. The daemon will read the config file
1177 (rsyncd.conf) on each connect made by a client and respond to
1178 requests accordingly. See the rsyncd.conf(5) man page for more
1181 dit(bf(--address)) By default rsync will bind to the wildcard address
1182 when run as a daemon with the bf(--daemon) option or when connecting to a
1183 rsync server. The bf(--address) option allows you to specify a specific IP
1184 address (or hostname) to bind to. This makes virtual hosting possible
1185 in conjunction with the bf(--config) option. See also the "address" global
1186 option in the rsyncd.conf manpage.
1188 dit(bf(--bwlimit=KBPS)) This option allows you to specify a maximum
1189 transfer rate in kilobytes per second for the data the daemon sends.
1190 The client can still specify a smaller bf(--bwlimit) value, but their
1191 requested value will be rounded down if they try to exceed it. See the
1192 client version of this option (above) for some extra details.
1194 dit(bf(--config=FILE)) This specifies an alternate config file than
1195 the default. This is only relevant when bf(--daemon) is specified.
1196 The default is /etc/rsyncd.conf unless the daemon is running over
1197 a remote shell program and the remote user is not root; in that case
1198 the default is rsyncd.conf in the current directory (typically $HOME).
1200 dit(bf(--no-detach)) When running as a daemon, this option instructs
1201 rsync to not detach itself and become a background process. This
1202 option is required when running as a service on Cygwin, and may also
1203 be useful when rsync is supervised by a program such as
1204 bf(daemontools) or AIX's bf(System Resource Controller).
1205 bf(--no-detach) is also recommended when rsync is run under a
1206 debugger. This option has no effect if rsync is run from inetd or
1209 dit(bf(--port=PORT)) This specifies an alternate TCP port number for the
1210 daemon to listen on rather than the default of 873. See also the "port"
1211 global option in the rsyncd.conf manpage.
1213 dit(bf(-v, --verbose)) This option increases the amount of information the
1214 daemon logs during its startup phase. After the client connects, the
1215 daemon's verbosity level will be controlled by the options that the client
1216 used and the "max verbosity" setting in the module's config section.
1218 dit(bf(-4, --ipv4) or bf(-6, --ipv6)) Tells rsync to prefer IPv4/IPv6
1219 when creating the incoming sockets that the rsync daemon will use to
1220 listen for connections. One of these options may be required in older
1221 versions of Linux to work around an IPv6 bug in the kernel (if you see
1222 an "address already in use" error when nothing else is using the port,
1223 try specifying bf(--ipv6) or bf(--ipv4) when starting the daemon).
1225 dit(bf(-h, --help)) When specified after bf(--daemon), print a short help
1226 page describing the options available for starting an rsync daemon.
1229 manpagesection(FILTER RULES)
1231 The filter rules allow for flexible selection of which files to transfer
1232 (include) and which files to skip (exclude). The rules either directly
1233 specify include/exclude patterns or they specify a way to acquire more
1234 include/exclude patterns (e.g. to read them from a file).
1236 As the list of files/directories to transfer is built, rsync checks each
1237 name to be transferred against the list of include/exclude patterns in
1238 turn, and the first matching pattern is acted on: if it is an exclude
1239 pattern, then that file is skipped; if it is an include pattern then that
1240 filename is not skipped; if no matching pattern is found, then the
1241 filename is not skipped.
1243 Rsync builds an ordered list of filter rules as specified on the
1244 command-line. Filter rules have the following syntax:
1247 tt(RULE [PATTERN_OR_FILENAME])nl()
1248 tt(RULE,MODIFIERS [PATTERN_OR_FILENAME])nl()
1251 You have your choice of using either short or long RULE names, as described
1252 below. If you use a short-named rule, the ',' separating the RULE from the
1253 MODIFIERS is optional. The PATTERN or FILENAME that follows (when present)
1254 must come after either a single space or an underscore (_).
1255 Here are the available rule prefixes:
1258 bf(exclude, -) specifies an exclude pattern. nl()
1259 bf(include, +) specifies an include pattern. nl()
1260 bf(merge, .) specifies a merge-file to read for more rules. nl()
1261 bf(dir-merge, :) specifies a per-directory merge-file. nl()
1262 bf(hide, H) specifies a pattern for hiding files from the transfer. nl()
1263 bf(show, S) files that match the pattern are not hidden. nl()
1264 bf(protect, P) specifies a pattern for protecting files from deletion. nl()
1265 bf(risk, R) files that match the pattern are not protected. nl()
1266 bf(clear, !) clears the current include/exclude list (takes no arg) nl()
1269 When rules are being read from a file, empty lines are ignored, as are
1270 comment lines that start with a "#".
1272 Note that the bf(--include)/bf(--exclude) command-line options do not allow the
1273 full range of rule parsing as described above -- they only allow the
1274 specification of include/exclude patterns plus a "!" token to clear the
1275 list (and the normal comment parsing when rules are read from a file).
1277 does not begin with "- " (dash, space) or "+ " (plus, space), then the
1278 rule will be interpreted as if "+ " (for an include option) or "- " (for
1279 an exclude option) were prefixed to the string. A bf(--filter) option, on
1280 the other hand, must always contain either a short or long rule name at the
1283 Note also that the bf(--filter), bf(--include), and bf(--exclude) options take one
1284 rule/pattern each. To add multiple ones, you can repeat the options on
1285 the command-line, use the merge-file syntax of the bf(--filter) option, or
1286 the bf(--include-from)/bf(--exclude-from) options.
1288 manpagesection(INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERN RULES)
1290 You can include and exclude files by specifying patterns using the "+",
1291 "-", etc. filter rules (as introduced in the FILTER RULES section above).
1292 The include/exclude rules each specify a pattern that is matched against
1293 the names of the files that are going to be transferred. These patterns
1294 can take several forms:
1297 it() if the pattern starts with a / then it is anchored to a
1298 particular spot in the hierarchy of files, otherwise it is matched
1299 against the end of the pathname. This is similar to a leading ^ in
1300 regular expressions.
1301 Thus "/foo" would match a file called "foo" at either the "root of the
1302 transfer" (for a global rule) or in the merge-file's directory (for a
1303 per-directory rule).
1304 An unqualified "foo" would match any file or directory named "foo"
1305 anywhere in the tree because the algorithm is applied recursively from
1307 top down; it behaves as if each path component gets a turn at being the
1308 end of the file name. Even the unanchored "sub/foo" would match at
1309 any point in the hierarchy where a "foo" was found within a directory
1310 named "sub". See the section on ANCHORING INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERNS for
1311 a full discussion of how to specify a pattern that matches at the root
1313 it() if the pattern ends with a / then it will only match a
1314 directory, not a file, link, or device.
1315 it() if the pattern contains a wildcard character from the set
1316 *?[ then expression matching is applied using the shell filename
1317 matching rules. Otherwise a simple string match is used.
1318 it() the double asterisk pattern "**" will match slashes while a
1319 single asterisk pattern "*" will stop at slashes.
1320 it() if the pattern contains a / (not counting a trailing /) or a "**"
1321 then it is matched against the full pathname, including any leading
1322 directories. If the pattern doesn't contain a / or a "**", then it is
1323 matched only against the final component of the filename.
1324 (Remember that the algorithm is applied recursively so "full filename"
1325 can actually be any portion of a path from the starting directory on
1329 Note that, when using the bf(--recursive) (bf(-r)) option (which is implied by
1330 bf(-a)), every subcomponent of every path is visited from the top down, so
1331 include/exclude patterns get applied recursively to each subcomponent's
1332 full name (e.g. to include "/foo/bar/baz" the subcomponents "/foo" and
1333 "/foo/bar" must not be excluded).
1334 The exclude patterns actually short-circuit the directory traversal stage
1335 when rsync finds the files to send. If a pattern excludes a particular
1336 parent directory, it can render a deeper include pattern ineffectual
1337 because rsync did not descend through that excluded section of the
1338 hierarchy. This is particularly important when using a trailing '*' rule.
1339 For instance, this won't work:
1342 tt(+ /some/path/this-file-will-not-be-found)nl()
1343 tt(+ /file-is-included)nl()
1347 This fails because the parent directory "some" is excluded by the '*'
1348 rule, so rsync never visits any of the files in the "some" or "some/path"
1349 directories. One solution is to ask for all directories in the hierarchy
1350 to be included by using a single rule: "+ */" (put it somewhere before the
1351 "- *" rule). Another solution is to add specific include rules for all
1352 the parent dirs that need to be visited. For instance, this set of rules
1357 tt(+ /some/path/)nl()
1358 tt(+ /some/path/this-file-is-found)nl()
1359 tt(+ /file-also-included)nl()
1363 Here are some examples of exclude/include matching:
1366 it() "- *.o" would exclude all filenames matching *.o
1367 it() "- /foo" would exclude a file called foo in the transfer-root directory
1368 it() "- foo/" would exclude any directory called foo
1369 it() "- /foo/*/bar" would exclude any file called bar two
1370 levels below a directory called foo in the transfer-root directory
1371 it() "- /foo/**/bar" would exclude any file called bar two
1372 or more levels below a directory called foo in the transfer-root directory
1373 it() The combination of "+ */", "+ *.c", and "- *" would include all
1374 directories and C source files but nothing else.
1375 it() The combination of "+ foo/", "+ foo/bar.c", and "- *" would include
1376 only the foo directory and foo/bar.c (the foo directory must be
1377 explicitly included or it would be excluded by the "*")
1380 manpagesection(MERGE-FILE FILTER RULES)
1382 You can merge whole files into your filter rules by specifying either a
1383 merge (.) or a dir-merge (:) filter rule (as introduced in the FILTER RULES
1386 There are two kinds of merged files -- single-instance ('.') and
1387 per-directory (':'). A single-instance merge file is read one time, and
1388 its rules are incorporated into the filter list in the place of the "."
1389 rule. For per-directory merge files, rsync will scan every directory that
1390 it traverses for the named file, merging its contents when the file exists
1391 into the current list of inherited rules. These per-directory rule files
1392 must be created on the sending side because it is the sending side that is
1393 being scanned for the available files to transfer. These rule files may
1394 also need to be transferred to the receiving side if you want them to
1395 affect what files don't get deleted (see PER-DIRECTORY RULES AND DELETE
1401 tt(merge /etc/rsync/default.rules)nl()
1402 tt(. /etc/rsync/default.rules)nl()
1403 tt(dir-merge .per-dir-filter)nl()
1404 tt(dir-merge,n- .non-inherited-per-dir-excludes)nl()
1405 tt(:n- .non-inherited-per-dir-excludes)nl()
1408 The following modifiers are accepted after a merge or dir-merge rule:
1411 it() A bf(-) specifies that the file should consist of only exclude
1412 patterns, with no other rule-parsing except for in-file comments.
1413 it() A bf(+) specifies that the file should consist of only include
1414 patterns, with no other rule-parsing except for in-file comments.
1415 it() A bf(C) is a way to specify that the file should be read in a
1416 CVS-compatible manner. This turns on 'n', 'w', and '-', but also
1417 allows the list-clearing token (!) to be specified. If no filename is
1418 provided, ".cvsignore" is assumed.
1419 it() A bf(e) will exclude the merge-file name from the transfer; e.g.
1420 "dir-merge,e .rules" is like "dir-merge .rules" and "- .rules".
1421 it() An bf(n) specifies that the rules are not inherited by subdirectories.
1422 it() A bf(w) specifies that the rules are word-split on whitespace instead
1423 of the normal line-splitting. This also turns off comments. Note: the
1424 space that separates the prefix from the rule is treated specially, so
1425 "- foo + bar" is parsed as two rules (assuming that prefix-parsing wasn't
1427 it() You may also specify any of the modifiers for the "+" or "-" rules
1428 (below) in order to have the rules that are read-in from the file
1429 default to having that modifier set. For instance, "merge,-/ .excl" would
1430 treat the contents of .excl as absolute-path excludes,
1431 while "dir-merge,s .filt" and ":sC" would each make all their
1432 per-directory rules apply only on the server side.
1435 The following modifiers are accepted after a "+" or "-":
1438 it() A "/" specifies that the include/exclude should be treated as an
1439 absolute path, relative to the root of the filesystem. For example,
1440 "-/ /etc/passwd" would exclude the passwd file any time the transfer
1441 was sending files from the "/etc" directory.
1442 it() A "!" specifies that the include/exclude should take effect if
1443 the pattern fails to match. For instance, "-! */" would exclude all
1445 it() A bf(C) is used to indicate that all the global CVS-exclude rules
1446 should be inserted as excludes in place of the "-C". No arg should
1448 it() An bf(s) is used to indicate that the rule applies to the sending
1449 side. When a rule affects the sending side, it prevents files from
1450 being transferred. The default is for a rule to affect both sides
1451 unless bf(--delete-excluded) was specified, in which case default rules
1452 become sender-side only. See also the hide (H) and show (S) rules,
1453 which are an alternate way to specify server-side includes/excludes.
1454 it() An bf(r) is used to indicate that the rule applies to the receiving
1455 side. When a rule affects the receiving side, it prevents files from
1456 being deleted. See the bf(s) modifier for more info. See also the
1457 protect (P) and risk (R) rules, which are an alternate way to
1458 specify receiver-side includes/excludes.
1461 Per-directory rules are inherited in all subdirectories of the directory
1462 where the merge-file was found unless the 'n' modifier was used. Each
1463 subdirectory's rules are prefixed to the inherited per-directory rules
1464 from its parents, which gives the newest rules a higher priority than the
1465 inherited rules. The entire set of dir-merge rules are grouped together in
1466 the spot where the merge-file was specified, so it is possible to override
1467 dir-merge rules via a rule that got specified earlier in the list of global
1468 rules. When the list-clearing rule ("!") is read from a per-directory
1469 file, it only clears the inherited rules for the current merge file.
1471 Another way to prevent a single rule from a dir-merge file from being inherited is to
1472 anchor it with a leading slash. Anchored rules in a per-directory
1473 merge-file are relative to the merge-file's directory, so a pattern "/foo"
1474 would only match the file "foo" in the directory where the dir-merge filter
1477 Here's an example filter file which you'd specify via bf(--filter=". file":)
1480 tt(merge /home/user/.global-filter)nl()
1482 tt(dir-merge .rules)nl()
1487 This will merge the contents of the /home/user/.global-filter file at the
1488 start of the list and also turns the ".rules" filename into a per-directory
1489 filter file. All rules read-in prior to the start of the directory scan
1490 follow the global anchoring rules (i.e. a leading slash matches at the root
1493 If a per-directory merge-file is specified with a path that is a parent
1494 directory of the first transfer directory, rsync will scan all the parent
1495 dirs from that starting point to the transfer directory for the indicated
1496 per-directory file. For instance, here is a common filter (see bf(-F)):
1498 quote(tt(--filter=': /.rsync-filter'))
1500 That rule tells rsync to scan for the file .rsync-filter in all
1501 directories from the root down through the parent directory of the
1502 transfer prior to the start of the normal directory scan of the file in
1503 the directories that are sent as a part of the transfer. (Note: for an
1504 rsync daemon, the root is always the same as the module's "path".)
1506 Some examples of this pre-scanning for per-directory files:
1509 tt(rsync -avF /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
1510 tt(rsync -av --filter=': ../../.rsync-filter' /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
1511 tt(rsync -av --filter=': .rsync-filter' /src/path/ /dest/dir)nl()
1514 The first two commands above will look for ".rsync-filter" in "/" and
1515 "/src" before the normal scan begins looking for the file in "/src/path"
1516 and its subdirectories. The last command avoids the parent-dir scan
1517 and only looks for the ".rsync-filter" files in each directory that is
1518 a part of the transfer.
1520 If you want to include the contents of a ".cvsignore" in your patterns,
1521 you should use the rule ":C", which creates a dir-merge of the .cvsignore
1522 file, but parsed in a CVS-compatible manner. You can
1523 use this to affect where the bf(--cvs-exclude) (bf(-C)) option's inclusion of the
1524 per-directory .cvsignore file gets placed into your rules by putting the
1525 ":C" wherever you like in your filter rules. Without this, rsync would
1526 add the dir-merge rule for the .cvsignore file at the end of all your other
1527 rules (giving it a lower priority than your command-line rules). For
1531 tt(cat <<EOT | rsync -avC --filter='. -' a/ b)nl()
1536 tt(rsync -avC --include=foo.o -f :C --exclude='*.old' a/ b)nl()
1539 Both of the above rsync commands are identical. Each one will merge all
1540 the per-directory .cvsignore rules in the middle of the list rather than
1541 at the end. This allows their dir-specific rules to supersede the rules
1542 that follow the :C instead of being subservient to all your rules. To
1543 affect the other CVS exclude rules (i.e. the default list of exclusions,
1544 the contents of $HOME/.cvsignore, and the value of $CVSIGNORE) you should
1545 omit the bf(-C) command-line option and instead insert a "-C" rule into
1546 your filter rules; e.g. "--filter=-C".
1548 manpagesection(LIST-CLEARING FILTER RULE)
1550 You can clear the current include/exclude list by using the "!" filter
1551 rule (as introduced in the FILTER RULES section above). The "current"
1552 list is either the global list of rules (if the rule is encountered while
1553 parsing the filter options) or a set of per-directory rules (which are
1554 inherited in their own sub-list, so a subdirectory can use this to clear
1555 out the parent's rules).
1557 manpagesection(ANCHORING INCLUDE/EXCLUDE PATTERNS)
1559 As mentioned earlier, global include/exclude patterns are anchored at the
1560 "root of the transfer" (as opposed to per-directory patterns, which are
1561 anchored at the merge-file's directory). If you think of the transfer as
1562 a subtree of names that are being sent from sender to receiver, the
1563 transfer-root is where the tree starts to be duplicated in the destination
1564 directory. This root governs where patterns that start with a / match.
1566 Because the matching is relative to the transfer-root, changing the
1567 trailing slash on a source path or changing your use of the bf(--relative)
1568 option affects the path you need to use in your matching (in addition to
1569 changing how much of the file tree is duplicated on the destination
1570 host). The following examples demonstrate this.
1572 Let's say that we want to match two source files, one with an absolute
1573 path of "/home/me/foo/bar", and one with a path of "/home/you/bar/baz".
1574 Here is how the various command choices differ for a 2-source transfer:
1577 Example cmd: rsync -a /home/me /home/you /dest nl()
1578 +/- pattern: /me/foo/bar nl()
1579 +/- pattern: /you/bar/baz nl()
1580 Target file: /dest/me/foo/bar nl()
1581 Target file: /dest/you/bar/baz nl()
1585 Example cmd: rsync -a /home/me/ /home/you/ /dest nl()
1586 +/- pattern: /foo/bar (note missing "me") nl()
1587 +/- pattern: /bar/baz (note missing "you") nl()
1588 Target file: /dest/foo/bar nl()
1589 Target file: /dest/bar/baz nl()
1593 Example cmd: rsync -a --relative /home/me/ /home/you /dest nl()
1594 +/- pattern: /home/me/foo/bar (note full path) nl()
1595 +/- pattern: /home/you/bar/baz (ditto) nl()
1596 Target file: /dest/home/me/foo/bar nl()
1597 Target file: /dest/home/you/bar/baz nl()
1601 Example cmd: cd /home; rsync -a --relative me/foo you/ /dest nl()
1602 +/- pattern: /me/foo/bar (starts at specified path) nl()
1603 +/- pattern: /you/bar/baz (ditto) nl()
1604 Target file: /dest/me/foo/bar nl()
1605 Target file: /dest/you/bar/baz nl()
1608 The easiest way to see what name you should filter is to just
1609 look at the output when using bf(--verbose) and put a / in front of the name
1610 (use the bf(--dry-run) option if you're not yet ready to copy any files).
1612 manpagesection(PER-DIRECTORY RULES AND DELETE)
1614 Without a delete option, per-directory rules are only relevant on the
1615 sending side, so you can feel free to exclude the merge files themselves
1616 without affecting the transfer. To make this easy, the 'e' modifier adds
1617 this exclude for you, as seen in these two equivalent commands:
1620 tt(rsync -av --filter=': .excl' --exclude=.excl host:src/dir /dest)nl()
1621 tt(rsync -av --filter=':e .excl' host:src/dir /dest)nl()
1624 However, if you want to do a delete on the receiving side AND you want some
1625 files to be excluded from being deleted, you'll need to be sure that the
1626 receiving side knows what files to exclude. The easiest way is to include
1627 the per-directory merge files in the transfer and use bf(--delete-after),
1628 because this ensures that the receiving side gets all the same exclude
1629 rules as the sending side before it tries to delete anything:
1631 quote(tt(rsync -avF --delete-after host:src/dir /dest))
1633 However, if the merge files are not a part of the transfer, you'll need to
1634 either specify some global exclude rules (i.e. specified on the command
1635 line), or you'll need to maintain your own per-directory merge files on
1636 the receiving side. An example of the first is this (assume that the
1637 remote .rules files exclude themselves):
1639 verb(rsync -av --filter=': .rules' --filter='. /my/extra.rules'
1640 --delete host:src/dir /dest)
1642 In the above example the extra.rules file can affect both sides of the
1643 transfer, but (on the sending side) the rules are subservient to the rules
1644 merged from the .rules files because they were specified after the
1645 per-directory merge rule.
1647 In one final example, the remote side is excluding the .rsync-filter
1648 files from the transfer, but we want to use our own .rsync-filter files
1649 to control what gets deleted on the receiving side. To do this we must
1650 specifically exclude the per-directory merge files (so that they don't get
1651 deleted) and then put rules into the local files to control what else
1652 should not get deleted. Like one of these commands:
1654 verb( rsync -av --filter=':e /.rsync-filter' --delete \
1656 rsync -avFF --delete host:src/dir /dest)
1658 manpagesection(BATCH MODE)
1660 Batch mode can be used to apply the same set of updates to many
1661 identical systems. Suppose one has a tree which is replicated on a
1662 number of hosts. Now suppose some changes have been made to this
1663 source tree and those changes need to be propagated to the other
1664 hosts. In order to do this using batch mode, rsync is run with the
1665 write-batch option to apply the changes made to the source tree to one
1666 of the destination trees. The write-batch option causes the rsync
1667 client to store in a "batch file" all the information needed to repeat
1668 this operation against other, identical destination trees.
1670 To apply the recorded changes to another destination tree, run rsync
1671 with the read-batch option, specifying the name of the same batch
1672 file, and the destination tree. Rsync updates the destination tree
1673 using the information stored in the batch file.
1675 For convenience, one additional file is creating when the write-batch
1676 option is used. This file's name is created by appending
1677 ".sh" to the batch filename. The .sh file contains
1678 a command-line suitable for updating a destination tree using that
1679 batch file. It can be executed using a Bourne(-like) shell, optionally
1680 passing in an alternate destination tree pathname which is then used
1681 instead of the original path. This is useful when the destination tree
1682 path differs from the original destination tree path.
1684 Generating the batch file once saves having to perform the file
1685 status, checksum, and data block generation more than once when
1686 updating multiple destination trees. Multicast transport protocols can
1687 be used to transfer the batch update files in parallel to many hosts
1688 at once, instead of sending the same data to every host individually.
1693 tt($ rsync --write-batch=foo -a host:/source/dir/ /adest/dir/)nl()
1694 tt($ scp foo* remote:)nl()
1695 tt($ ssh remote ./foo.sh /bdest/dir/)nl()
1699 tt($ rsync --write-batch=foo -a /source/dir/ /adest/dir/)nl()
1700 tt($ ssh remote rsync --read-batch=- -a /bdest/dir/ <foo)nl()
1703 In these examples, rsync is used to update /adest/dir/ from /source/dir/
1704 and the information to repeat this operation is stored in "foo" and
1705 "foo.sh". The host "remote" is then updated with the batched data going
1706 into the directory /bdest/dir. The differences between the two examples
1707 reveals some of the flexibility you have in how you deal with batches:
1710 it() The first example shows that the initial copy doesn't have to be
1711 local -- you can push or pull data to/from a remote host using either the
1712 remote-shell syntax or rsync daemon syntax, as desired.
1713 it() The first example uses the created "foo.sh" file to get the right
1714 rsync options when running the read-batch command on the remote host.
1715 it() The second example reads the batch data via standard input so that
1716 the batch file doesn't need to be copied to the remote machine first.
1717 This example avoids the foo.sh script because it needed to use a modified
1718 bf(--read-batch) option, but you could edit the script file if you wished to
1719 make use of it (just be sure that no other option is trying to use
1720 standard input, such as the "bf(--exclude-from=-)" option).
1725 The read-batch option expects the destination tree that it is updating
1726 to be identical to the destination tree that was used to create the
1727 batch update fileset. When a difference between the destination trees
1728 is encountered the update might be discarded with no error (if the file
1729 appears to be up-to-date already) or the file-update may be attempted
1730 and then, if the file fails to verify, the update discarded with an
1731 error. This means that it should be safe to re-run a read-batch operation
1732 if the command got interrupted. If you wish to force the batched-update to
1733 always be attempted regardless of the file's size and date, use the bf(-I)
1734 option (when reading the batch).
1735 If an error occurs, the destination tree will probably be in a
1736 partially updated state. In that case, rsync can
1737 be used in its regular (non-batch) mode of operation to fix up the
1740 The rsync version used on all destinations must be at least as new as the
1741 one used to generate the batch file. Rsync will die with an error if the
1742 protocol version in the batch file is too new for the batch-reading rsync
1745 The bf(--dry-run) (bf(-n)) option does not work in batch mode and yields a runtime
1748 When reading a batch file, rsync will force the value of certain options
1749 to match the data in the batch file if you didn't set them to the same
1750 as the batch-writing command. Other options can (and should) be changed.
1751 For instance bf(--write-batch) changes to bf(--read-batch),
1752 bf(--files-from) is dropped, and the
1753 bf(--filter)/bf(--include)/bf(--exclude) options are not needed unless
1754 one of the bf(--delete) options is specified.
1756 The code that creates the BATCH.sh file transforms any filter/include/exclude
1757 options into a single list that is appended as a "here" document to the
1758 shell script file. An advanced user can use this to modify the exclude
1759 list if a change in what gets deleted by bf(--delete) is desired. A normal
1760 user can ignore this detail and just use the shell script as an easy way
1761 to run the appropriate bf(--read-batch) command for the batched data.
1763 The original batch mode in rsync was based on "rsync+", but the latest
1764 version uses a new implementation.
1766 manpagesection(SYMBOLIC LINKS)
1768 Three basic behaviors are possible when rsync encounters a symbolic
1769 link in the source directory.
1771 By default, symbolic links are not transferred at all. A message
1772 "skipping non-regular" file is emitted for any symlinks that exist.
1774 If bf(--links) is specified, then symlinks are recreated with the same
1775 target on the destination. Note that bf(--archive) implies
1778 If bf(--copy-links) is specified, then symlinks are "collapsed" by
1779 copying their referent, rather than the symlink.
1781 rsync also distinguishes "safe" and "unsafe" symbolic links. An
1782 example where this might be used is a web site mirror that wishes
1783 ensure the rsync module they copy does not include symbolic links to
1784 bf(/etc/passwd) in the public section of the site. Using
1785 bf(--copy-unsafe-links) will cause any links to be copied as the file
1786 they point to on the destination. Using bf(--safe-links) will cause
1787 unsafe links to be omitted altogether.
1789 Symbolic links are considered unsafe if they are absolute symlinks
1790 (start with bf(/)), empty, or if they contain enough bf("..")
1791 components to ascend from the directory being copied.
1793 manpagediagnostics()
1795 rsync occasionally produces error messages that may seem a little
1796 cryptic. The one that seems to cause the most confusion is "protocol
1797 version mismatch -- is your shell clean?".
1799 This message is usually caused by your startup scripts or remote shell
1800 facility producing unwanted garbage on the stream that rsync is using
1801 for its transport. The way to diagnose this problem is to run your
1802 remote shell like this:
1804 quote(tt(ssh remotehost /bin/true > out.dat))
1806 then look at out.dat. If everything is working correctly then out.dat
1807 should be a zero length file. If you are getting the above error from
1808 rsync then you will probably find that out.dat contains some text or
1809 data. Look at the contents and try to work out what is producing
1810 it. The most common cause is incorrectly configured shell startup
1811 scripts (such as .cshrc or .profile) that contain output statements
1812 for non-interactive logins.
1814 If you are having trouble debugging filter patterns, then
1815 try specifying the bf(-vv) option. At this level of verbosity rsync will
1816 show why each individual file is included or excluded.
1818 manpagesection(EXIT VALUES)
1822 dit(bf(1)) Syntax or usage error
1823 dit(bf(2)) Protocol incompatibility
1824 dit(bf(3)) Errors selecting input/output files, dirs
1825 dit(bf(4)) Requested action not supported: an attempt
1826 was made to manipulate 64-bit files on a platform that cannot support
1827 them; or an option was specified that is supported by the client and
1829 dit(bf(5)) Error starting client-server protocol
1830 dit(bf(10)) Error in socket I/O
1831 dit(bf(11)) Error in file I/O
1832 dit(bf(12)) Error in rsync protocol data stream
1833 dit(bf(13)) Errors with program diagnostics
1834 dit(bf(14)) Error in IPC code
1835 dit(bf(20)) Received SIGUSR1 or SIGINT
1836 dit(bf(21)) Some error returned by waitpid()
1837 dit(bf(22)) Error allocating core memory buffers
1838 dit(bf(23)) Partial transfer due to error
1839 dit(bf(24)) Partial transfer due to vanished source files
1840 dit(bf(30)) Timeout in data send/receive
1843 manpagesection(ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES)
1846 dit(bf(CVSIGNORE)) The CVSIGNORE environment variable supplements any
1847 ignore patterns in .cvsignore files. See the bf(--cvs-exclude) option for
1849 dit(bf(RSYNC_RSH)) The RSYNC_RSH environment variable allows you to
1850 override the default shell used as the transport for rsync. Command line
1851 options are permitted after the command name, just as in the bf(-e) option.
1852 dit(bf(RSYNC_PROXY)) The RSYNC_PROXY environment variable allows you to
1853 redirect your rsync client to use a web proxy when connecting to a
1854 rsync daemon. You should set RSYNC_PROXY to a hostname:port pair.
1855 dit(bf(RSYNC_PASSWORD)) Setting RSYNC_PASSWORD to the required
1856 password allows you to run authenticated rsync connections to an rsync
1857 daemon without user intervention. Note that this does not supply a
1858 password to a shell transport such as ssh.
1859 dit(bf(USER) or bf(LOGNAME)) The USER or LOGNAME environment variables
1860 are used to determine the default username sent to an rsync server.
1861 If neither is set, the username defaults to "nobody".
1862 dit(bf(HOME)) The HOME environment variable is used to find the user's
1863 default .cvsignore file.
1868 /etc/rsyncd.conf or rsyncd.conf
1876 times are transferred as unix time_t values
1878 When transferring to FAT filesystems rsync may re-sync
1880 See the comments on the bf(--modify-window) option.
1882 file permissions, devices, etc. are transferred as native numerical
1885 see also the comments on the bf(--delete) option
1887 Please report bugs! See the website at
1888 url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/)
1890 manpagesection(CREDITS)
1892 rsync is distributed under the GNU public license. See the file
1893 COPYING for details.
1895 A WEB site is available at
1896 url(http://rsync.samba.org/)(http://rsync.samba.org/). The site
1897 includes an FAQ-O-Matic which may cover questions unanswered by this
1900 The primary ftp site for rsync is
1901 url(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync)(ftp://rsync.samba.org/pub/rsync).
1903 We would be delighted to hear from you if you like this program.
1905 This program uses the excellent zlib compression library written by
1906 Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler.
1908 manpagesection(THANKS)
1910 Thanks to Richard Brent, Brendan Mackay, Bill Waite, Stephen Rothwell
1911 and David Bell for helpful suggestions, patches and testing of rsync.
1912 I've probably missed some people, my apologies if I have.
1914 Especial thanks also to: David Dykstra, Jos Backus, Sebastian Krahmer,
1915 Martin Pool, Wayne Davison, J.W. Schultz.
1919 rsync was originally written by Andrew Tridgell and Paul Mackerras.
1920 Many people have later contributed to it.
1922 Mailing lists for support and development are available at
1923 url(http://lists.samba.org)(lists.samba.org)