Three basic behaviors are possible when rsync encounters a
symbolic link in the source directory.
By default, symbolic links are not transferred at all. A message
"skipping non-regular" file is emitted for any symlinks that
exist.
If --links is specified, then symlinks are recreated with the
same target on the destination. Note that --archive implies
--links.
If --copy-links is specified, then symlinks are "collapsed" by
copying their referent, rather than the symlink.
Rsync can also distinguish "safe" and "unsafe" symbolic links.
An example where this might be used is a web site mirror that
wishes to ensure that the rsync module that is copied does not
include symbolic links to /etc/passwd in the public section of
the site. Using --copy-unsafe-links will cause any links to be
copied as the file they point to on the destination. Using
--safe-links will cause unsafe links to be omitted altogether.
(Note that you must specify --links for --safe-links to have any
effect.)
Symbolic links are considered unsafe if they are absolute
symlinks (start with /), empty, or if they contain enough ".."
components to ascend from the directory being copied.
Here's a summary of how the symlink options are interpreted. The
list is in order of precedence, so if your combination of options
isn't mentioned, use the first line that is a complete subset of
your options:
--copy-links
Turn all symlinks into normal files (leaving no symlinks
for any other options to affect).
--links --copy-unsafe-links
Turn all unsafe symlinks into files and duplicate all safe
symlinks.
--copy-unsafe-links
Turn all unsafe symlinks into files, noisily skip all safe
symlinks.
--links --safe-links
Duplicate safe symlinks and skip unsafe ones.
--links
Duplicate all symlinks.
