How to copy every file with extension X while keeping the original folder structure? (Unix-like systems)

Question

I am trying to copy every HTML file from an src folder to a dist folder. However, I should like to preserve the original folder structure and if the dist folder does not exist I

Answer 1

find _src -type f -name "*.html" -exec cp -t _dist --parents {}  ";"

• cp -t : target directory
• --parents : append parents dir to target

This will omit empty (no html-files) dirs. But if you need them, repeat without -name "*.html" but with -type d.