How to tell rsync do not check permissions

file-permissionsrsync

I have two directories with same PHP application in every of them. I want to execute rsync -rvz from one, source directory to another, destination, so rsync will copy changed files only. Problem is that files in the source directory has 755 permissions, by mistake. Permissions in destination are fine.

How can I tell to rsync ignore permission checkings and check by size only?
Thanks.

Best Answer

As long as you don't supply the -p flag permissions shouldn't be changed. If you're still not getting the permissions you expect make sure perms is off and use --chmod=ugo=rwX

For reference: http://linux.die.net/man/1/rsync

 -r, --recursive             recurse into directories
 -v, --verbose               increase verbosity
 -z, --compress              compress file data during the transfer
 -n, --dry-run               perform a trial run with no changes made

 -p, --perms                 preserve permissions
 -E, --executability         preserve executability
     --chmod=CHMOD           affect file and/or directory permissions

-p, --perms This option causes the receiving rsync to set the destination permissions to be the same as the source permissions. (See also the --chmod option for a way to modify what rsync considers to be the source permissions.)

The man page goes on to say:

In summary: to give destination files (both old and new) the source permissions, use --perms. To give new files the destination-default permissions (while leaving existing files unchanged), make sure that the --perms option is off and use --chmod=ugo=rwX (which ensures that all non-masked bits get enabled).

Side-note: If possible it might make more sense for your developer to be pushing their changes back into the repo, and have all servers use a code repo, rather then use rsync to ship files form one server to the other.