Copy Folders from one Unix server to another?

Question

I would like to copy a folder from one Unix server to another Unix server. Can anyone tell me if there is a method or command to to achieve this?

Answer 1

Yes, there is scp or the former rcp or rsync

scp -r source_folder user@host.com:destination_folder

The command above will copy source_folder to destination_folder in the user's home directory on host.com

Answer 2

You can use SCP:

scp -rp foldertocopy/ user@server:destination/

or

rsync

Answer 3

If your folder contains subfolders and more importantly symlinks you want to use rsync:

rsync -aruv localfolder/ user@server:destination/

Or in reverse:

rsync -aruv user@server:destination/ localfolder/

This will do a recursive backup / copy from localfolder to your server while keeping ownership and permissions intact. The solutions suggested so far are valid however scp doesn't handle symlinks by default and will instead create a new copy of the linked file.

For detailed usage see man(1) rsync or here