How to use Rsync to copy only specific subdirectories (same names in several directories)

Question

I have such directories structure on server 1:

• data
  • company1
    • unique_folder1
    • other_folder
    • ...
  • company2

Answer 1

For example, if you only want to sync target/classes/ and target/lib/ to a remote system, do

rsync -vaH --delete --delete-excluded --include='classes/***' --include='lib/***' \
      --exclude='*' target/ user@host:/deploy/path/

The important things to watch:

• Don't forget the "/" from the end of the pathes, or you will get a copy into subdirectory.
• The order of the --include, --exclude counts.
• Contrary the other answers, starting with "/" an include/exclude parameter is unneeded, they will automatically appended to the source directory (target/ in the example).
• To test, what exactly will happen, we can use a --dry-run flags, as the other answers say.
• --delete-excluded will delete all content in the target directory, except the subdirectories we specifically included. It should be used wisely! On this reason, a --delete is not enough, it does not deletes the excluded files on the remote side by default (every other, yes), it should be given beside the ordinary --delete, again.