Comment by dcrazy

No, it doesn't.

I think some people may not be reading closely. On Unix, "/etc/services" is a file, not a directory:

  $ file /etc/services                                                                                                                         
  /etc/services: ASCII text

Here are two OpenBSD 7.9 endpoints running Samba rsync:

rsync -av -e ssh /etc/services example.com:/tmp/services

The above command creates a mirror of the local file /etc/services in a remote file called /tmp/services. The outcome is exactly the same as if I had run "scp /etc/services example.com:/tmp/services"

  client$ sha256 -q /etc/services                                                                                                                    
  469d28e72ed0e0994d31b555cc1bed7bc95a23fd1beeb30062affb64db0dd44a

  server$ sha256 -q /tmp/services                                                                                                          
  469d28e72ed0e0994d31b555cc1bed7bc95a23fd1beeb30062affb64db0dd44a

openrsync --rsync-path=openrsync -av -e ssh /etc/services example.com:/tmp/services

The above command creates a mirror of the local file /etc/services in a remote file called /tmp/services/services. The outcome is NOT the same as if I had run "scp /etc/services example.com:/tmp/services"

Please note that "/tmp/services" and "/tmp/services/services" are different.

  client$ sha256 -q /etc/services                                                                
  469d28e72ed0e0994d31b555cc1bed7bc95a23fd1beeb30062affb64db0dd44a

  server$ sha256 -q /tmp/services  
  sha256: /tmp/services: read error: Is a directory
  server$ sha256 -q /tmp/services/services                                                                                                 
  469d28e72ed0e0994d31b555cc1bed7bc95a23fd1beeb30062affb64db0dd44a

Here's an OpenBSD 7.9 client and Ubuntu server both running Samba rsync:

rsync -av -e ssh /etc/services example.com:/tmp/services

The above command creates a mirror of the local file /etc/services in a remote file called /tmp/services. The outcome is exactly the same as if I had run "scp /etc/services example.com:/tmp/services"

If you disagree, please state what operating systems you're using and copy/paste the output of the following commands on each side:

  uname -a
  rsync -V
  openrsync -V

I get

  $ rsync -V
  rsync  version 3.4.3  protocol version 32
  (snipped)

  $ openrsync -V
  openrsync 0.1 (protocol version 27)

Then please run the commands I ran above, in particular

openrsync --rsync-path=openrsync -av -e ssh /etc/services example.com:/tmp/services

And then type "file /tmp/services" on the remote server.