Using Rsync include and exclude options to include directory and file by pattern

Question

I'm having problems getting my rsync syntax right and I'm wondering if my scenario can actually be handled with rsync. First, I've confirmed that rsync is working just fine between my local host and my remote host. Doing a straight sync on a directory is successful.

Here's what my filesystem looks like:

uploads/
  1260000000/
    file_11_00.jpg
    file_11_01.jpg
    file_12_00.jpg
  1270000000/
    file_11_00.jpg
    file_11_01.jpg
    file_12_00.jpg
  1280000000/
    file_11_00.jpg
    file_11_01.jpg
    file_12_00.jpg

What I want to do is run rsync only on files that begin with "file_11_" in the subdirectories and I want to be able to run just one rsync job to sync all of these files in the subdirectories.

Here's the command that I'm trying:

rsync -nrv --include="**/file_11*.jpg" --exclude="*" /Storage/uploads/ /website/uploads/

This results in 0 files being marked for transfer in my dry run. I've tried various other combinations of --include and --exclude statements, but either continued to get no results or got everything as if no include or exclude options were set.

Anyone have any idea how to do this?

Answer 1

The problem is that --exclude="*" says to exclude (for example) the 1260000000/ directory, so rsync never examines the contents of that directory, so never notices that the directory contains files that would have been matched by your --include.

I think the closest thing to what you want is this:

rsync -nrv --include="*/" --include="file_11*.jpg" --exclude="*" /Storage/uploads/ /website/uploads/

(which will include all directories, and all files matching file_11*.jpg, but no other files), or maybe this:

rsync -nrv --include="/[0-9][0-9][0-9]0000000/" --include="file_11*.jpg" --exclude="*" /Storage/uploads/ /website/uploads/

(same concept, but much pickier about the directories it will include).

Answer 2

rsync include exclude pattern examples:

"*"         means everything
"dir1"      transfers empty directory [dir1]
"dir*"      transfers empty directories like: "dir1", "dir2", "dir3", etc...
"file*"     transfers files whose names start with [file]
"dir**"     transfers every path that starts with [dir] like "dir1/file.txt", "dir2/bar/ffaa.html", etc...
"dir***"    same as above
"dir1/*"    does nothing
"dir1/**"   does nothing
"dir1/***"  transfers [dir1] directory and all its contents like "dir1/file.txt", "dir1/fooo.sh", "dir1/fold/baar.py", etc...

And final note is that simply dont rely on asterisks that are used in the beginning for evaluating paths; like "**dir" (its ok to use them for single folders or files but not paths) and note that more than two asterisks dont work for file names.

Answer 3

Add -m to the recommended answer above to prune empty directories.