rsync sub-trees that have a certain name?

Question

Hoping this is the right place to ask this...

I have a directory tree like this:

r/a/src/etc...
r/a/target/etc...
r/a/xyz/etc...
r/b/src/etc...
r/b/target/etc...
r/c/src/etc...
r/c/target/etc...

Ideally, what I need to do is to get the target directories, and their contents, to a remote server, preserving the overall tree structure. Like:

r/a/target/etc...
r/b/target/etc...
r/c/target/etc...

If it's possible to do this with rsync exclude/include/filters, I'm baffled. I'm hoping it's possible, though, since otherwise it's a bit of a pain.

Suggestions?

Thanks!

Answer 1

It should be simple using the following command:

$ rsync -aR r/*/target /destination

The /destination path can be local or on different machine. The -R option is important to preserve the tree structure. Only the target folders (with their contents) will be copied to /destination while preserving the tree structure.