How to pull only newer files with “adb pull”? (Android SDK utility)

With the command "adb pull /sdcard/" I can copy all the contents of the internal memory of my Android phone into my current local directory (and "adb pull /mnt/extSdCard/" does the same with the external SD card). But that command always copies everything, even files I already have stored locally.

Is there any way to copy only new and modified files? (files with a newer date)

Answer

As described by ss-3-1415926535897932384626433 there is no flag, but you have to get a list of files first and then check if your local files match. I wrote a little script for it:

#!/bin/sh

rfolder=/sdcard/DCIM/Camera
lfolder=Camera


adb shell ls "$rfolder" > android.files

ls -1 "$lfolder" > local.files

rm -f update.files
touch update.files

while IFS=  read -r q; do
  # Remove non-printable characters (are not visible on console)

  l=$(echo ${q} | sed 's/[^[:print:]]//')
  # Populate files to update
  if ! grep -q "$l" local.files; then         
    echo "$l" >> update.files
  fi  
done < android.files

script_dir=$(pwd)
cd $lfolder


while IFS=  read -r q; do
  # Remove non-printable characters (are not visible on console)
  l=$(echo ${q} | sed 's/[^[:print:]]//')
  echo "Get file: $l"
  adb pull "$rfolder/$l"
done < "${script_dir}"/update.files

Adjust the remote folder rfolder and the local folder lfolder to locations of your own choice.