rsync copy over only certain types of files using include option

Question

I use the following bash script to copy only files of certain extension(in this case *.sh), however it still copies over all the files. what's wrong? ``` from=$1 to=$2 rsync -zarv --include="*.sh" $from $to ```

Accepted Answer

I think `--include` is used to include a subset of files that are otherwise excluded by `--exclude`, rather than including only those files. In other words: you have to think about include meaning don't exclude.

Try instead:

```
rsync -zarv  --include "*/" --exclude="*" --include="*.sh" "$from" "$to"
```

For rsync version 3.0.6 or higher, the order needs to be modified as follows (see comments):

```
rsync -zarv --include="*/" --include="*.sh" --exclude="*" "$from" "$to"
```

Adding the `-m` flag will avoid creating empty directory structures in the destination. Tested in version 3.1.2.

So if we only want *.sh files we have to exclude all files `--exclude="*"`, include all directories `--include="*/"` and include all *.sh files `--include="*.sh"`.

You can find some good examples in the section Include/Exclude Pattern Rules of the man page

rsync copy over only certain types of files using include option

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