I use rsync to keep a directory in synchronization betwen a Linux box with the hostname brutal and a Mac running OS X 10.5 (Leopard) with the hostname cooper. When I run the following command on my Linux machine:
rsync -avz --delete myuserid@cooper:/Library/WebServer/Documents /Library/WebServer/Documents

It works perfectsly, it mirrors exactly what I have on the Mac into the same directory structure. However, when I run the following command on my Mac:

rsync -avz --delete myuserid@brutal:/Library/WebServer/Documents /Library/WebServer/Documents

It does begin to synchronize, but it always creates a new Documents directory under the structure I provided and ignores what is already there. So I get something that like this.

/Library/WebServer/Documents/Documents/allmyfiles

Why is this working differently and are there any suggestions. I believe even if I tried synchronizing using the following command I still encountered the exact same behavior.

rsync -avz --delete myuserid@brutal:/Library/WebServer/Documents /Library/WebServer

Meaning I still got the following - /Library/WebServer/Documents/Documents/allmyfiles

Maybe you have to use a patched rsync version on both sides?

See:

Mini-HOWTO: Fixing rsync on Tiger (Mac OS X 10.4.x)

sudo port list | grep -i rsync

sudo port install rsync-lart

HOWTO Backup Your Mac With rsync

syncing large (10--50GB) disk images over ssh efficiently? - Topic Powered by eve community

Try this (note the extra /) :