Dave <foo@coo.com> writes:

>Goran Ivanic wrote:
>> Assuem I want to transfer large amounts of stuff from one server to another (through Internet).
>>
>> Which method should I prefer:
>>
>> ftp or rsync ?
>>
>> What are the Pros and Cons?
>>
>> Which is faster?
>>
>> Which is more stable?
>>
>> Goran

>It depends.

>If you need to send a lot, and none of it exists at the far end, then
>ftp will be faster. ftp just needs to transfer the files, with no
>overhead checking what versions exists at each end.

>My guess is ftp will be faster. It just moves the files, and does not
>care whether they exist on the other end or not.

On large files that is a trivial overhead. rsync can also checks if the
files transfered are the same or not. ftp does not
From man rsync
Note that rsync always verifies that each transferred file was
correctly reconstructed on the receiving side by checking its
whole-file checksum,...

>However, if a large number of files to be transfered already exist at
>the far end, then rsync will be faster as it needs to transfer less data.