rsync: can't get rid of password prompt

I'm trying to run rsync to copy files (Centos 5.2 -> Centos 5.2) and I need run using nohup it so it can run after I disconnect my ssh session. The problem is I cannot get rsync to not prompt for a passowrd, and I cannot get nohup to play nice with the password prompt.

rsync -v -r -x --password-file=/root/password.txt /sourcedir/ [email protected]:/destdir

I've tried both setting the RSYNC_PASSWORD variable to the password and creating a file with the password and using --password-file, but in both those case I still get the prompt asking for the password.

How do I give rsync the password it needs to it will run happily?

You can use public/pricate key authentication.

Generate a pair public/private key with

ssh-keygen -t rsa

then copy dsa.pub into .ssh/authorized_keys file in your home directory in the destiny host.

The problem is that RSYNC_PASSWORD as well as --password-file only is applicable when connecting directly to a rsyncd server, not when spawning rsync using a remote shell such as ssh. Your choices are, depending on the data you are transferring, to either to setup password-less ssh keys or to start using a rsyncd daemon instead.

(Note that if you connect directly to a rsyncd then your data will be transfered unencrypted.)

Alternatively you could use screen instead of nohup. It works like this :

• type screen
• you will be presented with a new terminal
• start you're command that will take forever, the rsync command in your case.
• disconnect from your screen terminal with ctrl-a, followed by d
• you can exit now or do other stuff, your screen terminal will go on doing your stuff
• you can reconnect to screen, by typing screen -r, this alose works from another tty or ssh connection or whatever.