Robert Beal (Bealer)

I’ve been using rsync for a while now for doing backups.

I currently run my main pc, and a network pc (acting as a NAS), and use rsync to backup files between each pc. Here’s an example command.

rsync -rvt -pog --delete --progress --itemize-changes --stats "/media/storage/music/" "/media/backup/music/"

• -r = recursive (to include sub-folders)
• -v = verbose (so it shows the the output as it happens)
• –progress = show the progression of files being copied
• –itemize-changes = output a summary at the end of the sync
• –delete = delete files in the destination that no longer exist in the source
• –stats = gives some additional transfer stats at the end

Preserving settings:

• t = time (preserves the timestamps of the files)
• p = permissions (preserves the permissions of the files)
• o = owner (preserves the owner of the files)
• g = group (preserves the group of the files)

I put the above command, along with 4 or 5 others into one file. I can then run it on a schedule via cron (more to come on this). Here’s my rsync file.

Dry run

If you’re worried about copying or updating files etc… you can add “-n” to the command and it’ll perform a dry run.

More to come

There are plenty more settings you can implement. Just open up a Terminal and type “rsync” for a list of them. I’m currently working on getting it to work via SSH. That way I can backup files remotely (for example between my pc and my brother’s pc).