Why is rsync skipping the main directory?

by 

rsync -v -e ssh [email protected]:/Library/WebServer/sites/staging/app1/ ./export

You didn’t give it any options to put it into recursive mode like -r or -a.

remote app1 directory is empty while local export directory has 4 sub
directories and then a bunch of files in each of those

Do you have the options backwards here? The command should be rsync [source] [DESTINATION]. If the app1 directory is empty and you are trying to copy an empty directory then you aren’t going to do anything useful.

Perhaps you need something like this instead?

rsync -avz ./export/  [email protected]:/Library/WebServer/sites/staging/app1/

Also:

  • You should almost always include a trailing slash on directories with rsync.
  • Almost every version of rsync released in the last 5-10 years defaults to using ssh has the remote transport. You probably don’t have to specify the -e ssh.

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