--include-from with no source directory

[August Zajonc]

Dear Friends,

I've seen this come up on the list in the past, most particularly here.

http://groups.google.com/groups?q=rsync+include-from+cat&hl=en&lr=&ie=UT
F-8&oe=UTF-8&selm=b2h7t8%2422nt%241%40FreeBSD.csie.NCTU.edu.tw&rnum=2

I find myself in a very similar position. 

Ideally I'd have a single file, as follows:

+ /www
- /www/bigstuff
+ /home
- /home/tempuser
+ /var/log/httpd

These are directories I'd like to backup recursively. 

This currently seems akward to do with the current version of rsync. 

If I do a 

- /* 

In the file I then have to make sure to include parent directories for
all the patterns I want to match. 

On the rsync commandline I'd do something like

rsync -r --include-from=abovefile /destination_dir

I'd still like to recurse through the directories listed, so it's more
then just a list of files to use. 

If the -from-files patch is what I need, count this as a vote for it's
inclusion in the mainline release. If anyone has some pointers who has
found themselves in a similar situation (and doesn't want to `cat
filelist` the files) please do let me know. 

- August