How to exclude a folder by name recursively when making a tar archive?

I know it is possible to exclude a particular folder by a command like this:

tar --exclude='/srv/www/project/node_modules' -zcvf /backup/project.tgz .

My question how to exclude any folder named node_modules anywhere within the entire /srv/www directory, to exclude it and exclude all folders under it?

2

1 Answer

To exclude the directory named node_modules wherever it is located under /srv/www/ even if there are multiple copies of it under different sub-directories, just do not specify a path in the --exclude part and use it like this:

tar -zcvf /backup/project.tar.gz --exclude "node_modules" /srv/www/

This will exclude all directories and files named exactly node_modules and all sub-directories and files under them anywhere in /srv/www/.

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