Is there a way to only update existing files?

[Animosity022]

@sinister3vil

Not sure what is unclear.

Unclear is from my perception as of course it's clear to you

@sinister3vil

A, B and Remote are synced.

So you have 3 remotes? A B C ? What is the significance of "Remote?

@sinister3vil

A, B and Remote are synced.

@sinister3vil

A creates a new file.
A copies all changes to Remote.

So this means A copies to C.

@sinister3vil

Remote holds up to date versions of all files, including the new file.

Ok

@sinister3vil

B wants to update all files, it already has, but doesn't care about the new file.

Meaning you want to copy from C->B and ensure B is now in sync?

@sinister3vil

rclone copy remote B, would copy both updated files and any new files. --update is also implied in copy, no?

No update is not implied as normal flow, folks copy from A->B and A updates everything in B and you don't want to skip newer files as that would be a copy.

rclone isn't rsync so it's a bad compare on how things operate as they operate very differently.

Rclone copy/sync is really one way. You have to pick a source of truth and decide what you want to do with changes. If you have a method to exclude them, you can use exclude.

You can skip newer files on the destination or you can overwrite them.

@sinister3vil

If I was rsync-ing A to B directly, --existing would update all changed files that are older at the destination but not copy the new file.

I'd avoid comparing as they operate very different from each other as noted above.

Good post on some applications:

Two-way sync with 'sync'

Bi directional sync is fundamentally harder than one-way. Mostly because it cannot be stateless otherwise you could never know the difference between deletions or new files! Until rclone nativly supports something, there are many tools to do this...including one I wrote. They are all on this wiki page. I actually wrote two: syncrclone: Written from the ground up to support any two rclone remotes. Lots of options and ability to back up first. Extensivly tested on macOS and linux. Probably w…

Which. may fit your use case.

There is a feature request out there for 2 way sync as well which might be it but I can't seem to locate the issue offhand.