rsync does not exclude specified directory starting with a hash character (#)

Question

I am trying to exclude the #recycle directory with rsync:

$ rsync -Hauv -h -P --exclude '#recycle/' --exclude @eaDir/ --exclude '.DS_Store*' --exclude desktop.ini  user1@src_server:/volume2/Extension_1 /destination/dir/
receiving incremental file list
Extension_1/#recycle/subDir1/subDir2/
Extension_1/#recycle/subDir1/subDir2/BigVideo.mov
         39.23G  82%   36.40MB/s    0:03:44  ^C
$

(I also tried quoting .DS_Store* and removing the --log-file option, but they made no difference.)

I am using rsync version 3.1.2 protocol version 31 on CentOS 7.9 with bash version 4.2.46(2)-release.

To be more specific, I wrote a very small script with a variable that contains the exclusion list

$ rsyncExclusionOptions=$(printf -- "--exclude %s " "'#recycle/'" @eaDir/ "'.DS_Store*'" desktop.ini)
$ echo $rsyncExclusionOptions
--exclude '*/#recycle/' --exclude @eaDir/ --exclude '.DS_Store*' --exclude desktop.ini
$ rsync -Hauv -h -P --skip-compress=$rsyncSkipCompressList $rsyncExclusionOptions user1@src_server:/volume2/Extension_1 /destination/dir/
receiving incremental file list
Extension_1/#recycle/SERIES/mySerie/SOURCES_HD59iDF/EPISODES_666-709/
Extension_1/#recycle/SERIES/mySerie/SOURCES_HD59iDF/EPISODES_666-709/TOEI_myEpisode.mov
          3.22G   5%  104.35MB/s    0:08:23  ^CKilled by signal 2.

rsync error: unexplained error (code 255) at rsync.c(638) [generator=3.1.2]
rsync: [generator] write error: Broken pipe (32)
rsync error: received SIGUSR1 (code 19) at main.c(1430) [receiver=3.1.2]

EDIT0 : @roaima I also tried putting # between brackets (as suggested in the link you provided here) but it did not work either :

$ rsyncExclusionOptions=$(printf -- "--exclude %s " "'[#]recycle/'" @eaDir/ "'.DS_Store*'" desktop.ini)
$ echo $rsyncExclusionOptions
--exclude '[#]recycle/' --exclude @eaDir/ --exclude '.DS_Store*' --exclude desktop.ini
$ rsync -Hauv -h -P --skip-compress=$rsyncSkipCompressList $rsyncExclusionOptions user1@src_server:/volume2/Extension_1 /destination/dir/
receiving incremental file list
Extension_1/#recycle/SERIES/mySerie/SOURCES_HD59iDF/EPISODES_666-709/
Extension_1/#recycle/SERIES/mySerie/SOURCES_HD59iDF/EPISODES_666-709/TOEI_myEpisode.mov
          4.04G   7%   21.67MB/s    0:39:45  ^CKilled by signal 2.

rsync error: unexplained error (code 255) at rsync.c(638) [generator=3.1.2]
rsync: [generator] write error: Broken pipe (32)
rsync error: received SIGINT, SIGTERM, or SIGHUP (code 20) at io.c(504) [receiver=3.1.2]
rsync: [receiver] write error: Broken pipe (32)

A WORKING SOLUTION :

• The hash had be put between brackets like this : [#] AND
• The extra ' must not be used for the [#]recycle exclusion inside the rsyncExclusionOptions variable :

$ rsyncExclusionOptions=$(printf -- "--exclude %s " "[#]recycle/" @eaDir/ "'.DS_Store*'" desktop.ini)
$ echo $rsyncExclusionOptions
--exclude [#]recycle/ --exclude @eaDir/ --exclude '.DS_Store*' --exclude desktop.ini
$ rsync -Hauv -h -P --skip-compress=$rsyncSkipCompressList $rsyncExclusionOptions user1@src_server:/volume2/Extension_1 /destination/dir/
receiving incremental file list
Extension_1/SERIES/mySerie/SOURCES_VF/EPISODES_700-765/

Answer 1

I'm going to answer this to say that with rsync version 3.1.3 protocol 31 I cannot reproduce the issue as ORIGINALLY described. (Raspbian GNU/Linux 10 "buster".)

The modified question shows that the exclusion list is incorrect and will not match the directory names. You've put single quotes into the pattern names, and these do not match the directory/file names. Consequently they will not be excluded.

Original answer continues below.

---

However, I see that there is another unresolved instance reported on StackOverflow of file names containing # causing problems - see rsync fails to exclude '#filename#' file names, so you're not alone. Maybe it was fixed with the later version I'm running?

Scenario

mkdir -p /tmp/718113/Extension_1/#recycle/subDir1/subDir2
cd /tmp/718113
mkdir dst
touch Extension_1/#recycle/subDir1/subDir2/BigVideo.mov

Now the command

rsync -Hauv -h -P --exclude '#recycle/' --exclude '@eaDir/' --exclude '.DS_Store*' --exclude 'desktop.ini' localhost:/tmp/718113/Extension_1 /tmp/718113/dst

Output

receiving incremental file list
Extension_1/

sent 85 bytes  received 78 bytes  326.00 bytes/sec
total size is 0  speedup is 0.00

The only significant change is that I have quoted the exclusion patterns so that the shell has no opportunity to expand them (specifically but not exclusively '.DS_Store*'). However, if this had been an issue in this case you would have received error messages from rsync such as Unexpected remote arg: localhost:/tmp/718113/Extension_1 and rsync error: syntax or usage error (code 1) at main.c(1372) [sender=3.1.3].

I would also recommend against using --progress (implied with -P) and then redirecting stdout/stderr to a log file. Either replace -P with --partial or use the --log option to write results to the log file.