{"id":460,"date":"2020-10-21T02:54:52","date_gmt":"2020-10-21T02:54:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/?p=460"},"modified":"2026-06-09T13:31:19","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T17:31:19","slug":"using-scp-and-rsync-for-copy-and-directory-sync","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/?p=460","title":{"rendered":"Using SCP and RSYNC for Copying and Syncing"},"content":{"rendered":"

Both SCP and RSYNC use SSH to transfer files and directories.<\/p>\n

While SCP simply uploads or downloads files and folders, RSYNC can synchronize the content of two folders by copying only what is new.<\/p>\n

The basic syntax of both looks like this:<\/p>\n

[scp\/rsync] [OPTION] \u2026 [SRC<\/strong>] \u2026 [USER@]HOST:DEST<\/strong>\r\n[scp\/rsync] [OPTION] \u2026 [USER@]HOST:SRC<\/strong> [DEST<\/strong>]<\/pre>\n
SCP<\/strong><\/p>\n
scp \/home\/user\/file.zip user@200.100.50.3:\/home\/user\/file.zip<\/strong>\r\nscp file.zip user@200.100.50.3:\/home\/user\r\nscp file.zip 200.100.50.3:\/home\/user\r\nscp file.zip user@200.100.50.3:\r\nscp file.zip 200.100.50.3:\r\n\r\nscp user@200.100.50.3:\/home\/user\/file.zip \/home\/user\/file.zip<\/strong>\r\nscp user@200.100.50.3:\/home\/user\/file.zip \/home\/user\r\nscp user@200.100.50.3:\/home\/user\/file.zip .\r\nscp 200.100.50.3:file.zip \/home\/user\r\nscp 200.100.50.3:file.zip .<\/pre>\n
The examples above show multiple ways to upload (1 to 5) and download (6 to 10) files.<\/p>\n
The first example in each block (in bold) shows the complete syntax, unless you need to apply additional options.<\/p>\n
By omitting the filename at the destination<\/strong>, it will be copied with the same name<\/strong>.<\/p>\n
By omitting the full path on the source<\/strong>, it refers to the current directory<\/strong>.<\/p>\n
By omitting the full path at the destination<\/strong>, it saves to the home directory<\/strong> of the user.<\/p>\n
By omitting the username<\/strong>, it will use the same username<\/strong> as the one you are logged in with locally.<\/p>\n
Use the option -r<\/strong> to copy directories recursively, -v<\/strong> (verbose) to print debugging messages, and -P<\/strong> (same as –progress<\/strong>) to see real-time progress.<\/p>\n
RSYNC<\/strong><\/p>\n
The main feature of RSYNC is the ability to compare file dates and directory contents to determine what is new or missing on either side.<\/p>\n
rsync -r<\/strong> \/directory user@200.100.50.3:\/directory\r\nrsync -r<\/strong> user@200.100.50.3:\/directory \/directory<\/pre>\n
The option -r<\/strong> (recursive) copies all content, while option -a<\/strong> (archive) compares both directories (local and remote) and only copies what is missing or has been updated.<\/p>\n
Option -b<\/strong> (backup) will not overwrite the old file with the new version but instead makes a backup copy of the old one first (file.zip~<\/strong>). The option –delete<\/strong> removes files at the destination that were deleted from the source.<\/p>\n
Using option -z<\/strong> (compress), traffic will be compressed, saving time on slow connections but increasing CPU usage on both ends. The option –dry-run<\/strong> simulates the operation and shows what would be done without actually performing any changes.<\/p>\n
The option –exclude ‘dir1’<\/strong> prevents RSYNC from comparing or copying a specific file or directory.<\/p>\n
You can also try the option –backup-dir=$(date +%F)<\/strong> to see what it does.<\/p>\n
\n
BONUS<\/strong><\/p>\n
LSYNCD is a tool that runs as a service and periodically compares and syncs files (using RSYNC) based on a provided configuration.<\/p>\n
sudo apt install lsyncd -y\r\nsudo mkdir \/etc\/lsyncd\r\nsudo nano \/etc\/lsyncd\/lsyncd.conf.lua<\/pre>\n
Add the following content, customizing the parameters in bold:<\/p>\n
settings {\r\nlogfile = \"\/var\/log\/lsyncd\/lsyncd.log\",\r\nstatusFile = \"\/var\/log\/lsyncd\/lsyncd.status\",\r\nstatusInterval = 20<\/strong>,\r\nnodaemon   = false\r\n}\r\n\r\nsync {\r\ndefault.rsync,\r\nsource = \"\/path<\/strong>\/\",\r\ntarget = \"\/path<\/strong>\"\r\n}<\/pre>\n
Note: the interval (20) is in seconds.<\/p>\n
systemctl start lsyncd\r\nsystemctl enable lsyncd\r\nsystemctl status lsyncd<\/pre>\n
For troubleshooting:<\/p>\n
tail -f \/var\/log\/lsyncd\/lsyncd.log\r\ntail -f \/var\/log\/lsyncd\/lsyncd.status<\/pre>\n
\n
Backing up additional or newer files from source to destination.<\/p>\n
rsync -rlptgo<\/strong> \/source \/destination<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Both SCP and RSYNC use SSH to transfer files and directories. While SCP simply uploads […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-linux","category-raspberry-pi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=460"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5816,"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460\/revisions\/5816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dft.wiki\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}