How to exclude subdirectories in the destination while using mir xd switch in robocopy

Question

There is a script running which mirrors a bunch of folders from one volume to another  The problem is that now there are going to be subdirectories within those folders at the destination which are not part of the original mirroring script  They are standalone subdirectories and I don t want them purged once the mirroring kicks in  Is there a way for me to use the  xd switch in robocopy wherein I d be able to exclude the destination subdirectories    Example   robocopy    hq04t2fis202 archive dr     hq04t3fis202 archive dr   mir  xd    hq04t3fis202 archive dr   hq04s2dba301    In the above example  there are several directories under   hq04t2fis202 archive dr that are being mirrored  And at the destination  once these directories are mirrored from the source  there is another script which dumps separate subdirectories within each of those directories  So what I want to do is somehow use the  xd switch to avoid purging those subdirectories at the destination   Also  in the above example  in the  xd switch  I m using the     wildcard to mean that I want to include all the directories that fall under the    hq04t3fis202 archive dr  root folder at the destination   Need help and suggestions as to whether this is possible  and if it is then how can I do it  So far I ve tried and tested many other switches like  xo   xx  but none of them solve my purpose  Also   xx would work except that now it won t delete any folders at the destination at all and it wouldn t be mirroring   Hopefully I m not overly confusing everyone here  Let me know if you have any questions

User · Answer

Try my way        robocopy exe  Desktop Test folder 1   Desktop Test folder 2   XD  C  Users Steve Desktop Test folder 2 XXX dont touch   MIR   Had to put  XD before  MIR while including the full Destination Source directly after  XD

User · Answer

When i tried the solution with  XD i found  that the path to exclude should be the source path - not the destination   e g  this Works  robocopy c  test a c  test b  MIR  XD c  test a leavethisdiralone

User · Answer

The issue is that even though we add a folder to skip list it will be deleted if it does not exist   The solution is to add both the destination and the source folder with full path   I will try to explain the different scenarios and what happens below  based on my experience   Starting folder structure   d  Temp source 1 txt d  Temp source 2 2 txt   Command   robocopy D  Temp source D  Temp dest  MIR   This will copy over all the files and folders that are missing and deletes all the files and folders that cannot be found in the source  Let s add a new folder and then add it to the command to skip it   New structure   d  Temp source 1 txt d  Temp source 2 2 txt d  Temp source 3 3 txt   Command   robocopy D  Temp source D  Temp dest  MIR  XD  D  Temp source 3            If I add  XD with the source folder and run the command it all seems good the command it wont copy it over   Now add a folder to the destination to get this setup   d  Temp source 1 txt d  Temp source 2 2 txt d  Temp source 3 3 txt  d  Temp dest 1 txt d  Temp dest 2 2 txt d  Temp dest 3 4 txt   If I run the command it is still fine  4 txt stays there 3 txt is not copied over  All is fine   But  if I delete the source folder  d  Temp source 3  then the destination folder and the file are deleted even though it is on the skip list                         1    D  Temp source       EXTRA Dir        -1    D  Temp dest 3         EXTRA File                  4        4 txt                        1    D  Temp source 2    If I change the command to skip the destination folder instead then the folder is not deleted  when the folder is missing from the source   robocopy D  Temp source D  Temp dest  MIR  XD  D  Temp dest 3    On the other hand if the folder exists and there are files it will copy them over and delete them                          1    D  Temp source 3             EXTRA File                  4        4 txt 100         New File                   4        3 txt   To make sure the folder is always skipped and no files are copied over even if the source or destination folder is missing we have to add both to the skip list   robocopy D  Temp source D  Temp dest  MIR  XD  d  Temp source 3   D  Temp dest 3    After this no matters if the source folder is missing or the destination folder is missing  robocopy will leave it as it is

User · Answer

Rather than creating empty directories in source to exclude  you can supply the full destination path to the  XD switch to have the destination directories untouched  robocopy   SOURCE PATH     DEST PATH    MIR  XD   DEST PATH   hq04s2dba301

User · Answer

The way you can exclude a destination directory while using the  mir is by making sure the destination directory also exists on the source  I went into my source drive and created blank directories with the same name as on the destination  and then added that directory name to the  xd  It successfully mirrored everything while excluding the directory on the source  thereby leaving the directory on the destination intact

User · Answer

The argument order seems to matter    to exclude subdirectories  I used  robocopy   source folder C  destinationfolder  XD    MIR      and that works for me  Windows 10 copy from Windows Server 2016

[robocopy] How to exclude subdirectories in the destination while using /mir /xd switch in robocopy

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