this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2025
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You might not even like rsync. Yeah it's old. Yeah it's slow. But if you're working with Linux you're going to need to know it.

In this video I walk through my favorite everyday flags for rsync.

Support the channel:
https://patreon.com/VeronicaExplains
https://ko-fi.com/VeronicaExplains
https://thestopbits.bandcamp.com/

Here's a companion blog post, where I cover a bit more detail: https://vkc.sh/everyday-rsync

Also, @BreadOnPenguins made an awesome rsync video and you should check it out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eifQI5uD6VQ

Lastly, I left out all of the ssh setup stuff because I made a video about that and the blog post goes into a smidge more detail. If you want to see a video covering the basics of using SSH, I made one a few years ago and it's still pretty good: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FKsdbjzBcc

Chapters:
1:18 Invoking rsync
4:05 The --delete flag for rsync
5:30 Compression flag: -z
6:02 Using tmux and rsync together
6:30 but Veronica... why not use (insert shiny object here)

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[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It doesn't do diffs, so it's really bad if there's a lot of duplicate data.

[–] victorz@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

If you want to use it for backups, there are other solutions, so you still don't need to use it or know it. You can use something else. That's my only point. 🤷‍♂️

And "really bad" is all relative. If you are only backing up your home drive with documents or whatever, copying a few unnecessary gigabytes over a LAN connection isn't too bad at all. But scp isn't what you should be using for backups anyway. I only used rsync for file transfer...

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I use rsync for all kinda of things:

  • deploying static files to a public webserver (blog or whatever)
  • backups - scheduled systems/cron task w/ SSH key
  • copying stuff from a USB drive

I only really use scp if the system doesn't already have rsync.

[–] victorz@lemmy.world 1 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Alright. But you don't need to know rsync. That's my only point. 👍👍

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 1 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Sure, but you should probably be aware of what it is and what it does. It's incredibly common and will be referenced in a ton of documentation for Linux server stuff.

[–] victorz@lemmy.world 1 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

You won't need to unless you run a server in that case. 👍 But the only condition here was "working with Linux".

Like I said, I've been using Linux at home and for work for over a decade, maybe 15+ years, never once did I need to use rsync or know what it is.

That being said, it was convenient when I used it, but never did I need it.

This is the self-hosted community, so that's the context I was assuming.