Is there an scp variant of mv command?

linux scp mv
Chris Maes picture Chris Maes · Mar 20, 2014 · Viewed 9.7k times · Source

I am writing a script that will move files from a local system to a remote system. It must do so through an encrypted channel like ssh. What is the best way to do this? I can perform this in two steps like:

scp *.jpg user@ip:
rm *.jpg

But, that is not an atomic process (like mv is for a local filesystem). If the copy fails I will no longer have the local copies either. How can I script this to make sure the local files only get removed if the copy succeeds?

Answer

Josh Jolly picture Josh Jolly · Mar 20, 2014

You could use rsync with --remove-source-files: 

rsync -avz --remove-source-files /local/dir/*.jpg user@ip:/remote/dir

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