Output of --list-only not as I expected for symlinks

[Michael Hipp]

Thank you. But I'm afraid I don't understand. The man entry reads:

"--list-only
     This option will cause the source files to be listed instead of 
transferred. This option is inferred if there is a single source arg and 
no destination specified..."

It doesn't say anything about "list remote files". In fact I am not sure 
why it would even contact the remote end. And the behavior does not 
change even if no destination is specified.

As far as it ignoring the rest of the command line, note that it does 
obey exclusion rules. Symlinks seem to be the only anomaly in its output.

I use --dry-run and --itemize-changes frequently. But I was trying to 
find something that would give me a correct list of the candidate source 
files but without having to make an expensive connect to the remote 
server. Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Michael Hipp



On 2018-09-12 11:17, Kevin Korb via rsync wrote:
> --list-only is simply a way to list remote files when you only have
> access via rsync.  It ignores the rest of the command line.  You want
> --dry-run (--itemize-changes would be a good idea too).
> 
> On 09/12/2018 11:06 AM, Michael Hipp via rsync wrote:
>> The output of --list-only isn't as I expected as regards symlinks. Here
>> are my test files:
>>
>> $ ls ./src
>> -rw-------  1 michael michael    0 2018-09-05 09:18:15 file
>> lrwxrwxrwx  1 michael michael    4 2018-09-05 09:18:28 near_symlink -> file
>> lrwxrwxrwx  1 michael michael   23 2018-09-05 09:19:05 far_symlink ->
>> /home/michael/Documents
>>
>> The "destination" dir is empty:
>>
>> $ ls ./dest
>> drwxr-xr-x 31 michael michael 4.0K 2018-09-12 09:46:06 ..
>> drwx------  2 michael michael 4.0K 2018-09-12 09:50:20 .
>>
>> I want to know which files are candidates to transfer. I don't want
>> symlinks to transfer. So I run it with --list-only :
>>
>> $ rsync -r --no-links --list-only ./src/ ./dest
>> drwx------          4,096 2018/09/06 09:39:16 .
>> lrwxrwxrwx             23 2018/09/05 09:19:05 far_symlink
>> -rw-------              0 2018/09/05 09:18:15 file
>> lrwxrwxrwx              4 2018/09/05 09:18:28 near_symlink
>>
>> This seems to indicate the symlinks are expected to transfer. But if I
>> actually run the transfer by removing --list-only ...
>>
>> $ rsync -r --no-links ./src/ ./dest
>> skipping non-regular file "far_symlink"
>> skipping non-regular file "near_symlink"
>>
>> It does not transfer the symlinks and this is confirmed by the contents
>> of dest:
>>
>> $ ls ./dest
>> drwxr-xr-x 31 michael michael 4.0K 2018-09-12 09:46:06 ..
>> -rw-------  1 michael michael    0 2018-09-12 09:57:50 file
>> drwx------  2 michael michael 4.0K 2018-09-12 09:57:50 .
>>
>> So it seems like --list-only isn't being truthful as it surely knows
>> beforehand the symlinks will not be transferred regardless of the
>> condition of dest.
>>
>> What am I missing?
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Michael Hipp
>>
>>
> 
>