Sync one directory to another
Destructive
What do risk levels mean?
- Read-only
- Inspects state without changing anything.
- Low risk
- Reversible with a routine follow-up command.
- Medium risk
- Changes state; undo path documented.
- Destructive
- Deletes or overwrites; confirmation required.
Mirrors a source directory to a destination with rsync (or robocopy on Windows), copying only what changed — the standard local backup move.
filessyncrsyncbackup
Confirmation required
This recipe is destructive and requires confirmation — confirm you understand the impact before running any command below.
Parameters
Source directory (contents are synced; trailing slash is added by the recipe).
Destination directory to mirror into.
Commands
Dry-run showing exactly what would be copied and deleted
rsync -avn --delete "<source>/" "<destination>/"Copy changed files and remove destination files absent from the source
rsync -av --delete "<source>/" "<destination>/"Verification
diff -rq "<source>" "<destination>"No output — the two directories are identical.
Undo
Not undoable
Files deleted from the destination by --delete/MIR cannot be recovered by this recipe. Run the dry-run step first, every time.
Pitfalls
- The trailing slash on the rsync source means "sync contents"; omitting it creates a nested copy of the directory inside the destination.
- The --delete and /MIR flags remove destination files not present in the source — pointing the sync the wrong way destroys the backup.
- robocopy exit codes 0–7 mean success; only 8+ are errors, which surprises scripts checking for 0.