How to exclude numeric directories with rsync?

Question

I know rsync has an --exclude option which I use quite frequently. But how can I specify that it should exclude all "numeric" directories?

In the directory listing below I would like to only have it copy css,html,and include

.
..
123414
42344523
345343
2323
css
html
include

Normally my syntax is something like

rsync -avz /local/path/ user@server:/remote/path/ --exclude="cache"

I think it should look something like --exclude="[0-9]*" but I don't think that will work.

Solution 1

rsync's exclude option doesn't really support regex, it's more of a shell globbing pattern matching.

If those directories are fairly static, you should just list them in a file and use --exclude-from=/full/path/to/file/exclude_directories.txt.

Updated to provide example

First, you just put the directories into a file:

find . -type d -regex '.*/[0-9]*$' -print > /tmp/rsync-dir-exlcusions.txt

or

( cat <<EOT
123414
42344523
345343
2323
EOT ) > /tmp/rsync-directory-exclusions.txt

then you can do your rsync work:

rsync -avHp --exclude-from=/tmp/rsync-directory-exclusions.txt /path/to/source/ /path/to/dest/

You just need an extra step to set up the text file that contains the directories to exclude, 1 per line.

Keep in mind that the path of the directories in the job, is their relative path to how rsync sees the directory.

Solution 2

You can't say “a name that contains only digits” in rsync's pattern syntax. So include all names that contain a non-digit and exclude the rest.

rsync --include='*[!0-9]*' --exclude='*/' …

See also my rsync pattern guide.

Solution 3

You can do it in one line:

rsync -avHp --exclude-from=<(cd /path/to/source; find . -type d -regex './[0-9]*' | sed -e 's|./||') /path/to/source/ /path/to/dest/

Solution 4

Use find to make a list of the directories to be excluded, then use rsync's --exclude-from option as Tim Kennedy described it.

View more solutions

Comments

[Rory Alsop]

You could use a script which uses a regex to create this file before running the rsync

[cwd]

Could you give an example as an answer?

[Tim Kennedy]

just updated to include an example, including what @RoryAlsop suggested combined with what thiton suggested below.

[Ludovic Kuty]

Haa the power of the shell :)

[Tal Ben Shalom]

@TimKennedy In the file containing excludes, does rsync understand line-changes or space is enough?

[Tim Kennedy]

@Abhinav rsync understands one entry per line. spaces will not work.

[Anthony Geoghegan]

That excludes InnoDB files -- not numeric directories.