Question

Server 1 is connected to Server 2 via SSH.

We know this:
I can execute a command such as

” ssh server2 “cp -rv /var/www /tmp” “

which will copy the entire /var/www dir to /tmp. However inside of /var/www we have the following structure(sample LS output below)

$ ls

/web1
/web2
/web3
file1.php
file2.php
file3.php

How can I execute a cp command that will exclude /web1, /web3, file1.php and file3.php (obviously just copying web2 and file2 is not an option since there are significantly more files than just 6)

Note: I am using this to backup Server2 prior to RSYNCing from Server1.

Answer 1

The first two poster’s both have good suggestions about rsync. Here’s a more complete outline of the process.

(1) You want to backup server 2 before you sync from server 1, so let’s do that with rsync. Here’s the command as seen from server 1 (assuming it has access to server 2):

ssh user@server2 "rsync $RSYNC_OPTS /var/www/ /path/to/backup"

(2) With server 2 backed up, let’s now sync from server 1 (again, as seen from server 1)

rsync $RSYNC_OPTS /path/to/www/ user@server2:/var/www/

As long as you use sane RSYNC_OPTS, the backup and sync should both be reasonable. Richard had a reasonable suggestion for the options:

RSYNC_OPTS="--exclude-from rsync-exclude.txt --stats -avz --numeric-ids -e ssh"

If you want an accurate reproduction, I’d recommend --delete or --delete-after as well. Be sure to lookup details on any options you’re unfamiliar with.