Is it possible to copy a non-empty directory from a local to remote system?
with SCP command or another thing?
Yes you can, you just need to add -r flag for directories.
You can check scp manual online scp manual or you can check this stackoverflow link
It is easy :)
The command to copy a directory is much like as when copying files. The only difference is that you need to use the -r flag for recursive.
To copy a directory from a local to remote system, use the -r option:
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The -r flag should solve your problem according to the man pages.
Related
I am trying to copy entire directories from one Linux machine to another, including permissions, and including the called directory. For example,
from the parent directory of the destination, I tried
rsync -rul root#mail3.domain.com/usr/sites/4my.com
but that does not work.
On the calling machine the destination is /home/sites
What should that command be?
Thanks!
try rsync -a username#remote_host:/home/username/dir1 place_to_sync_on_local_machine
Try
sudo cp -rp /home/source /tmp/dest
On a computer with IP address like 10.11.12.123, I have a folder document. I want to copy that folder to my local folder /home/my-pc/doc/ using the shell.
I tried like this:
scp -r smb:10.11.12.123/other-pc/document /home/my-pc/doc/
but it's not working.
So you can use below command to copy your files.
scp -r <source> <destination>
(-r: Recursively copy entire directories)
eg:
scp -r user#10.11.12.123:/other-pc/document /home/my-pc/doc
To identify the location you can use the pwd command, eg:
kasun#kasunr:~/Downloads$ pwd
/home/kasun/Downloads
If you want to copy from B to A if you are logged into B: then
scp /source username#a:/destination
If you want to copy from B to A if you are logged into A: then
scp username#b:/source /destination
In addition to the comment, when you look at your host-to-host copy options on Linux today, rsync is by far, the most robust solution around. It is brought to you by the SAMBA team[1] and continues to enjoy active development. Most distributions include the rsync package by default. (if not, you should find an easily installable package for your distro or you can download it from rsync.samba.org ).
The basic use of rsync for host-to-host directory copy is:
$ rsync -uav srchost:/path/to/dir /path/to/dest
-uav simply recursively copies -ua only new or changed files preserving file & directory times and permissions while providing -v verbose output. You will be prompted for the username/password on 10.11.12.123 unless your have setup ssh-keys to allow public/private key authentication (see: ssh-keygen for key generation)
If you notice, the syntax is basically the same as that for scp with a slight difference in the options: (e.g. scp -rv srchost:/path/to/dir /path/to/dest). rsync will use ssh for secure transport by default, so you will want to insure sshd is running on your srchost (10.11.12.123 in your case). If you have name resolution working (or a simple entry in /etc/hosts for 10.11.12.123) you can use the hostname for the remote host instead of the remote IP. Regardless, you can always transfer the files you are interested in with:
$ rsync -uav 10.11.12.123:/other-pc/document /home/my-pc/doc/
Note: do NOT include a trailing / after document if you want to copy the directory itself. If you do include a trailing / after document (i.e. 10.11.12.123:/other-pc/document/) you are telling rsync to copy the contents, (i.e. the files and directories under) document to 10.11.12.123:/other-pc/ without also copying the document directory.
The reason rsync is far superior to other copy apps is it provides options to truly synchronize filesystems and directory trees both locally and between your local machine and remote host. Meaning, in your case, if you have used rsync to transfer files to /home/my-pc/doc/ and then make changes to the files or delete files on 10.11.12.123, you can simply call rsync again and have the changes/deletions reflected in /home/my-pc/doc/. (look at the several flavors of the --delete option for details in rsync --help or in man 1 rsync)
For these, and many more reasons, it is well worth the time to familiarize yourself with rsync. It is an invaluable tool in any Linux user's hip pocket. Hopefully this will solve your problem and get you started.
Footnotes
[1] the same folks that "Opened Windows to a Wider World" allowing seemless connection between windows/Linux hosts via the native windows server message block (smb) protocol. samba.org
If the two directories (document and /home/my-pc/doc/) you mentioned are on the same 10.11.12.123 machine.
then:
cp -ai document /home/my-pc/doc/
else:
scp -r document/ root#10.11.12.123:/home/my-pc/doc/
Is there any option to tell scp command - not copy file from current machine in case file exists on remote machine
For example
On my machine I have the file -
/etc/secret-pw.txt
On Remote machine I have also the file -
/etc/secret-pw.txt
So
scp /etc/secret-pw.txt $remote_machine:/etc
Will destroy the secret-pw.txt, and scp will not ask questions about: overwrite the target file
Is there any option to avoid copy if file exist on target machine by scp?
Update: I can't install rsync or any other program.
You should be using rsync instead of scp. It will give you what you need.
If you can't install rsync (as you mentioned in the comments) you need to run a script beforehand to check if file exists and run it with ssh.
SCP does not offer any option, unfortunately.
But you can resort standard tools, like this:
ssh $remote_machine -- cp --no-clobber /dev/stdin /etc/secret-pw.txt < /etc/secret-pw.txt
Note that with this trick you gain all the functionalities of cp.
I was using scp to copy files from one host to another host. But presently it is copying all the files and overwriting the existing files.
How do I copy only those files which are modified.
Thanks in advance.
Use rsync - look at the man page for more info: http://linux.die.net/man/1/rsync
Seems like scp cannot do this but rsync can by using parameter -a. It also provides various other interesting options. I always try to prefer rsync over scp but that's just my personal opinion.
rsync -rut /your/diectory user#targetip:/target/location
It may help.
I have tried put -r directory/*, which only uploaded the files and not folders. Gave me the error, cannot Couldn't canonicalise.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
For people actually wanting a direct answer to this question (instead of being told to use something other than sftp)...
put -r local/path/to/directoryName
The uploaded directory must already exist in the working directory on the server, so you might need to create it first.
mkdir directoryName
Here you can find detailed explanation as how to copy a directory using scp. In your case, it would be something like:
$ scp -r foo your_username#remotehost.edu:/some/remote/directory/bar
This will copy the directory "foo" from the local host to a remote host's directory "bar".
Here -r is -recursively copy entire directories.
You can also use rcp with similar syntax. The only difference between them is that scp uses secure shell and rcp uses remote shell.
BTW The "Couldn't canonicalise" error you mentioned appear when sftp server is unable to access the file/directory mentioned in the command.
UPDATE: For users who want to use put specifically, please refer to Ben Thielker answer here.
sftp> mkdir source
sftp> put -r source
Uploading source/ to /home/myself/source
Entering source/
source/file1
source/file2
if you have issues using sftp, you can use ncftp
For centos
yum install ncftp
To copy a whole directory recursively
ncftpput -R -v -u username -P 21 ftp.server.dev /remote-path/ /localdirectory
Use scp instead. It uses SSH too and can easily handle recursion.