Revision as of 10:40, 1 August 2025

Efficient File Transfer with Tar and SSH

Quickly transfer directories over SSH using tar. Great for migrations or backups.

Local to remote:

tar cjf - -C /path/to/local/ <source-dir> | ssh user@remote-host 'tar xjf - -C /path/to/remote/ <target-dir>'

Remote to local:

ssh user@remote-host 'tar cjf - -C /path/to/remote/ <source-dir>' | tar xjf - -C /path/to/local/ <target-dir>

Add --exclude='pattern' to skip files or directories.
Replace j with z (i.e., czf, xzf) to use gzip for faster, but less compressed, transfers.

@@ Line 9: / Line 9: @@
 '''Local to remote:'''
 <pre>
-tar cjf - /path/to/local/dir | ssh user@remote-host 'tar xjf - -C /path/to/remote/destination'
+tar cjf - -C /path/to/local/ <source-dir> | ssh user@remote-host 'tar xjf - -C /path/to/remote/ <target-dir>'
 </pre>
 '''Remote to local:'''
 <pre>
-ssh user@remote-host "tar cjf - -C /path/to/remote/source ." | tar xjf - -C /path/to/local/destination
+ssh user@remote-host 'tar cjf - -C /path/to/remote/ <source-dir>' | tar xjf - -C /path/to/local/ <target-dir>
 </pre>