How to property setup rsync?

Question

I want to sync all files and folders in my home directory expect for the ones that start with .

This is what I have done so far:

rsync -azPnv --delete /home/USER/ DESTINATION

In order to ignore hidden files, I guess that I have to utilize --exclude and --include as well but I am not sure how. Any ideas?

Answer 1

You can use this --exclude parameter to ignore files and folders. For hidden files and folders (filename or folder name starts with a .) use the parameter below:

--exclude "**/.*"

This means, match all files and folders which starts with a . in all folders recursively.

• The glob ** will recursively match all files and directories
• * will match any number of characters

_{More infos about pathname expansion (globbing)}

From man rsync

--exclude=PATTERN
      exclude files matching PATTERN