Grant permissions using rysnc

Question

I want to use rsync (as a user) from "me" on a local computer to "another" user on a distant computer. However, I also want "another" user (on the distant computer) to own the files and to be able to use them exactly as "me" (on the local computer).

I believe I shall play with the options: -p (preserve permissions), -g (preserve groups) and -o (preserve ownership), but I'm not sure of the exact effect of those. Which one(s) shall I impose ?

Answer 1

Your answer can be found in the rsync manpage, under the -p, --perms option:

Thus, when --perms and --executability are both disabled, rsync’s behavior is the same as that of other file-copy utilities, such as cp(1) and tar(1).

Which looks like what you want, you're on the right track. I suggest you read the entire section in the manpage to get the full view of what these options offer.

You can disable an option using the --no-OPTION syntax, so disabling permissions would be:

rsync -a --no-perms --no-group /source /target

You can set it up as an alias in ~/.bashrc (for Ubuntu IIRC) to make typing easier:

alias rsync-cp='rsync -a --no-perms --no-group --progress'

and just call rsync-cp instead of rsync to use those options. I included --progress too to show rsync progress bars.