1FTP(1)                    BSD General Commands Manual                   FTP(1)
2

NAME

4     ftp — Internet file transfer program
5

SYNOPSIS

7     ftp [-46AadefginpRtVv] [-N netrc] [-o output] [-P port] [-q quittime]
8         [-r retry] [-s srcaddr] [-T dir,max[,inc]] [-x xferbufsize]
9         [[user@]host [port]] [[user@]host:[path][/]] [file:///path]
10         [ftp://[user[:password]@]host[:port]/path[/][;type=X]]
11         [http://[user[:password]@]host[:port]/path] [...]
12     ftp -u URL file [...]
13

DESCRIPTION

15     ftp is the user interface to the Internet standard File Transfer Proto‐
16     col.  The program allows a user to transfer files to and from a remote
17     network site.
18
19     The last five arguments will fetch a file using the FTP or HTTP proto‐
20     cols, or by direct copying, into the current directory.  This is ideal
21     for scripts.  Refer to AUTO-FETCHING FILES below for more information.
22
23     Options may be specified at the command line, or to the command inter‐
24     preter.
25
26     -4          Forces ftp to only use IPv4 addresses.
27
28     -6          Forces ftp to only use IPv6 addresses.
29
30     -A          Force active mode ftp.  By default, ftp will try to use pas‐
31                 sive mode ftp and fall back to active mode if passive is not
32                 supported by the server.  This option causes ftp to always
33                 use an active connection.  It is only useful for connecting
34                 to very old servers that do not implement passive mode prop‐
35                 erly.
36
37     -a          Causes ftp to bypass normal login procedure, and use an
38                 anonymous login instead.
39
40     -d          Enables debugging.
41
42     -e          Disables command line editing.  This is useful for Emacs
43                 ange-ftp mode.
44
45     -f          Forces a cache reload for transfers that go through the FTP
46                 or HTTP proxies.
47
48     -g          Disables file name globbing.
49
50     -i          Turns off interactive prompting during multiple file trans‐
51                 fers.
52
53     -N netrc    Use netrc instead of ~/.netrc.  Refer to THE .netrc FILE for
54                 more information.
55
56     -n          Restrains ftp from attempting “auto-login” upon initial con‐
57                 nection for non auto-fetch transfers.  If auto-login is
58                 enabled, ftp will check the .netrc (see below) file in the
59                 user's home directory for an entry describing an account on
60                 the remote machine.  If no entry exists, ftp will prompt for
61                 the remote machine login name (default is the user identity
62                 on the local machine), and, if necessary, prompt for a pass‐
63                 word and an account with which to login.  To override the
64                 auto-login for auto-fetch transfers, specify the username
65                 (and optionally, password) as appropriate.
66
67     -o output   When auto-fetching files, save the contents in output.
68                 output is parsed according to the FILE NAMING CONVENTIONS
69                 below.  If output is not ‘-’ or doesn't start with ‘|’, then
70                 only the first file specified will be retrieved into output;
71                 all other files will be retrieved into the basename of their
72                 remote name.
73
74     -P port     Sets the port number to port.
75
76     -p          Enable passive mode operation for use behind connection fil‐
77                 tering firewalls.  This option has been deprecated as ftp now
78                 tries to use passive mode by default, falling back to active
79                 mode if the server does not support passive connections.
80
81     -q quittime
82                 Quit if the connection has stalled for quittime seconds.
83
84     -R          Restart all non-proxied auto-fetches.
85
86     -r wait     Retry the connection attempt if it failed, pausing for wait
87                 seconds.
88
89     -s srcaddr  Uses srcaddr as the local IP address for all connections.
90
91     -t          Enables packet tracing.
92
93     -T direction,maximum[,increment]
94                 Set the maximum transfer rate for direction to maximum
95                 bytes/second, and if specified, the increment to increment
96                 bytes/second.  Refer to rate for more information.
97
98     -u URL file [...]
99                 Upload files on the command line to URL where URL is one of
100                 the ftp URL types as supported by auto-fetch (with an
101                 optional target filename for single file uploads), and file
102                 is one or more local files to be uploaded.
103
104     -V          Disable verbose and progress, overriding the default of
105                 enabled when output is to a terminal.
106
107     -v          Enable verbose and progress.  This is the default if output
108                 is to a terminal (and in the case of progress, ftp is the
109                 foreground process).  Forces ftp to show all responses from
110                 the remote server, as well as report on data transfer statis‐
111                 tics.
112
113     -x xferbufsize
114                 Set the size of the socket send and receive buffers to
115                 xferbufsize.  Refer to xferbuf for more information.
116
117     The client host with which ftp is to communicate may be specified on the
118     command line.  If this is done, ftp will immediately attempt to establish
119     a connection to an FTP server on that host; otherwise, ftp will enter its
120     command interpreter and await instructions from the user.  When ftp is
121     awaiting commands from the user the prompt ‘ftp>’ is provided to the
122     user.  The following commands are recognized by ftp:
123
124     ! [command [args]]
125                 Invoke an interactive shell on the local machine.  If there
126                 are arguments, the first is taken to be a command to execute
127                 directly, with the rest of the arguments as its arguments.
128
129     $ macro-name [args]
130                 Execute the macro macro-name that was defined with the macdef
131                 command.  Arguments are passed to the macro unglobbed.
132
133     account [passwd]
134                 Supply a supplemental password required by a remote system
135                 for access to resources once a login has been successfully
136                 completed.  If no argument is included, the user will be
137                 prompted for an account password in a non-echoing input mode.
138
139     append local-file [remote-file]
140                 Append a local file to a file on the remote machine.  If
141                 remote-file is left unspecified, the local file name is used
142                 in naming the remote file after being altered by any ntrans
143                 or nmap setting.  File transfer uses the current settings for
144                 type, format, mode, and structure.
145
146     ascii       Set the file transfer type to network ASCII.  This is the
147                 default type.
148
149     bell        Arrange that a bell be sounded after each file transfer com‐
150                 mand is completed.
151
152     binary      Set the file transfer type to support binary image transfer.
153
154     bye         Terminate the FTP session with the remote server and exit
155                 ftp.  An end of file will also terminate the session and
156                 exit.
157
158     case        Toggle remote computer file name case mapping during get,
159                 mget and mput commands.  When case is on (default is off),
160                 remote computer file names with all letters in upper case are
161                 written in the local directory with the letters mapped to
162                 lower case.
163
164     cd remote-directory
165                 Change the working directory on the remote machine to
166                 remote-directory.
167
168     cdup        Change the remote machine working directory to the parent of
169                 the current remote machine working directory.
170
171     chmod mode remote-file
172                 Change the permission modes of the file remote-file on the
173                 remote system to mode.
174
175     close       Terminate the FTP session with the remote server, and return
176                 to the command interpreter.  Any defined macros are erased.
177
178     cr          Toggle carriage return stripping during ascii type file
179                 retrieval.  Records are denoted by a carriage return/linefeed
180                 sequence during ascii type file transfer.  When cr is on (the
181                 default), carriage returns are stripped from this sequence to
182                 conform with the UNIX single linefeed record delimiter.
183                 Records on non-UNIX remote systems may contain single line‐
184                 feeds; when an ascii type transfer is made, these linefeeds
185                 may be distinguished from a record delimiter only when cr is
186                 off.
187
188     delete remote-file
189                 Delete the file remote-file on the remote machine.
190
191     dir [remote-path [local-file]]
192                 Print a listing of the contents of a directory on the remote
193                 machine.  The listing includes any system-dependent informa‐
194                 tion that the server chooses to include; for example, most
195                 UNIX systems will produce output from the command ‘ls -l’.
196                 If remote-path is left unspecified, the current working
197                 directory is used.  If interactive prompting is on, ftp will
198                 prompt the user to verify that the last argument is indeed
199                 the target local file for receiving dir output.  If no local
200                 file is specified, or if local-file is ‘-’, the output is
201                 sent to the terminal.
202
203     disconnect  A synonym for close.
204
205     edit        Toggle command line editing, and context sensitive command
206                 and file completion.  This is automatically enabled if input
207                 is from a terminal, and disabled otherwise.
208
209     epsv epsv4 epsv6
210                 Toggle the use of the extended EPSV and EPRT commands on all
211                 IP, IPv4, and IPv6 connections respectively.  First try EPSV
212                 / EPRT, and then PASV / PORT.  This is enabled by default.
213                 If an extended command fails then this option will be tempo‐
214                 rarily disabled for the duration of the current connection,
215                 or until epsv, epsv4, or epsv6 is executed again.
216
217     exit        A synonym for bye.
218
219     features    Display what features the remote server supports (using the
220                 FEAT command).
221
222     fget localfile
223                 Retrieve the files listed in localfile, which has one line
224                 per filename.
225
226     form format
227                 Set the file transfer form to format.  The default (and only
228                 supported) format is “non-print”.
229
230     ftp host [port]
231                 A synonym for open.
232
233     ftp_debug [ftp_debug-value]
234                 Toggle debugging mode.  If an optional ftp_debug-value is
235                 specified it is used to set the debugging level.  When debug‐
236                 ging is on, ftp prints each command sent to the remote
237                 machine, preceded by the string ‘-->’.
238
239     gate [host [port]]
240                 Toggle gate-ftp mode, which used to connect through the TIS
241                 FWTK and Gauntlet ftp proxies.  This will not be permitted if
242                 the gate-ftp server hasn't been set (either explicitly by the
243                 user, or from the FTPSERVER environment variable).  If host
244                 is given, then gate-ftp mode will be enabled, and the gate-
245                 ftp server will be set to host.  If port is also given, that
246                 will be used as the port to connect to on the gate-ftp
247                 server.
248
249     get remote-file [local-file]
250                 Retrieve the remote-file and store it on the local machine.
251                 If the local file name is not specified, it is given the same
252                 name it has on the remote machine, subject to alteration by
253                 the current case, ntrans, and nmap settings.  The current
254                 settings for type, form, mode, and structure are used while
255                 transferring the file.
256
257     glob        Toggle filename expansion for mdelete, mget, mput, and
258                 mreget.  If globbing is turned off with glob, the file name
259                 arguments are taken literally and not expanded.  Globbing for
260                 mput is done as in csh(1).  For mdelete, mget, and mreget,
261                 each remote file name is expanded separately on the remote
262                 machine and the lists are not merged.  Expansion of a direc‐
263                 tory name is likely to be different from expansion of the
264                 name of an ordinary file: the exact result depends on the
265                 foreign operating system and ftp server, and can be previewed
266                 by doing ‘mls remote-files -’ Note: mget, mput and mreget are
267                 not meant to transfer entire directory subtrees of files.
268                 That can be done by transferring a tar(1) archive of the sub‐
269                 tree (in binary mode).
270
271     hash [size]
272                 Toggle hash-sign (‘#’) printing for each data block trans‐
273                 ferred.  The size of a data block defaults to 1024 bytes.
274                 This can be changed by specifying size in bytes.  Enabling
275                 hash disables progress.
276
277     help [command]
278                 Print an informative message about the meaning of command.
279                 If no argument is given, ftp prints a list of the known com‐
280                 mands.
281
282     idle [seconds]
283                 Set the inactivity timer on the remote server to seconds sec‐
284                 onds.  If seconds is omitted, the current inactivity timer is
285                 printed.
286
287     image       A synonym for binary.
288
289     lcd [directory]
290                 Change the working directory on the local machine.  If no
291                 directory is specified, the user's home directory is used.
292
293     less file   A synonym for page.
294
295     lpage local-file
296                 Display local-file with the program specified by the set
297                 pager option.
298
299     lpwd        Print the working directory on the local machine.
300
301     ls [remote-path [local-file]]
302                 A synonym for dir.
303
304     macdef macro-name
305                 Define a macro.  Subsequent lines are stored as the macro
306                 macro-name; a null line (consecutive newline characters in a
307                 file or carriage returns from the terminal) terminates macro
308                 input mode.  There is a limit of 16 macros and 4096 total
309                 characters in all defined macros.  Macro names can be a maxi‐
310                 mum of 8 characters.  Macros are only applicable to the cur‐
311                 rent session they are defined within (or if defined outside a
312                 session, to the session invoked with the next open command),
313                 and remain defined until a close command is executed.  To
314                 invoke a macro, use the $ command (see above).
315
316                 The macro processor interprets ‘$’ and ‘\’ as special charac‐
317                 ters.  A ‘$’ followed by a number (or numbers) is replaced by
318                 the corresponding argument on the macro invocation command
319                 line.  A ‘$’ followed by an ‘i’ signals the macro processor
320                 that the executing macro is to be looped.  On the first pass
321                 “$i” is replaced by the first argument on the macro invoca‐
322                 tion command line, on the second pass it is replaced by the
323                 second argument, and so on.  A ‘\’ followed by any character
324                 is replaced by that character.  Use the ‘\’ to prevent spe‐
325                 cial treatment of the ‘$’.
326
327     mdelete [remote-files]
328                 Delete the remote-files on the remote machine.
329
330     mdir remote-files local-file
331                 Like dir, except multiple remote files may be specified.  If
332                 interactive prompting is on, ftp will prompt the user to ver‐
333                 ify that the last argument is indeed the target local file
334                 for receiving mdir output.
335
336     mget remote-files
337                 Expand the remote-files on the remote machine and do a get
338                 for each file name thus produced.  See glob for details on
339                 the filename expansion.  Resulting file names will then be
340                 processed according to case, ntrans, and nmap settings.
341                 Files are transferred into the local working directory, which
342                 can be changed with ‘lcd directory’; new local directories
343                 can be created with ‘! mkdir directory’.
344
345     mkdir directory-name
346                 Make a directory on the remote machine.
347
348     mls remote-files local-file
349                 Like ls, except multiple remote files may be specified, and
350                 the local-file must be specified.  If interactive prompting
351                 is on, ftp will prompt the user to verify that the last argu‐
352                 ment is indeed the target local file for receiving mls out‐
353                 put.
354
355     mlsd [remote-path]
356                 Display the contents of remote-path (which should default to
357                 the current directory if not given) in a machine-parsable
358                 form, using MLSD.  The format of display can be changed with
359                 ‘remopts mlst ...’.
360
361     mlst [remote-path]
362                 Display the details about remote-path (which should default
363                 to the current directory if not given) in a machine-parsable
364                 form, using MLST.  The format of display can be changed with
365                 ‘remopts mlst ...’.
366
367     mode mode-name
368                 Set the file transfer mode to mode-name.  The default (and
369                 only supported) mode is “stream”.
370
371     modtime remote-file
372                 Show the last modification time of the file on the remote
373                 machine, in RFC 2822 format.
374
375     more file   A synonym for page.
376
377     mput local-files
378                 Expand wild cards in the list of local files given as argu‐
379                 ments and do a put for each file in the resulting list.  See
380                 glob for details of filename expansion.  Resulting file names
381                 will then be processed according to ntrans and nmap settings.
382
383     mreget remote-files
384                 As per mget, but performs a reget instead of get.
385
386     msend local-files
387                 A synonym for mput.
388
389     newer remote-file [local-file]
390                 Get the file only if the modification time of the remote file
391                 is more recent that the file on the current system.  If the
392                 file does not exist on the current system, the remote file is
393                 considered newer.  Otherwise, this command is identical to
394                 get.
395
396     nlist [remote-path [local-file]]
397                 A synonym for ls.
398
399     nmap [inpattern outpattern]
400                 Set or unset the filename mapping mechanism.  If no arguments
401                 are specified, the filename mapping mechanism is unset.  If
402                 arguments are specified, remote filenames are mapped during
403                 mput commands and put commands issued without a specified
404                 remote target filename.  If arguments are specified, local
405                 filenames are mapped during mget commands and get commands
406                 issued without a specified local target filename.  This com‐
407                 mand is useful when connecting to a non-UNIX remote computer
408                 with different file naming conventions or practices.  The
409                 mapping follows the pattern set by inpattern and outpattern.
410                 [Inpattern] is a template for incoming filenames (which may
411                 have already been processed according to the ntrans and case
412                 settings).  Variable templating is accomplished by including
413                 the sequences “$1”, “$2”, ...  “$9” in inpattern.  Use ‘\’ to
414                 prevent this special treatment of the ‘$’ character.  All
415                 other characters are treated literally, and are used to
416                 determine the nmap [inpattern] variable values.  For example,
417                 given inpattern $1.$2 and the remote file name "mydata.data",
418                 $1 would have the value "mydata", and $2 would have the value
419                 "data".  The outpattern determines the resulting mapped file‐
420                 name.  The sequences “$1”, “$2”, ...  “$9” are replaced by
421                 any value resulting from the inpattern template.  The
422                 sequence “$0” is replaced by the original filename.  Addi‐
423                 tionally, the sequence “[seq1, seq2]” is replaced by [seq1]
424                 if seq1 is not a null string; otherwise it is replaced by
425                 seq2.  For example, the command
426
427                       nmap $1.$2.$3 [$1,$2].[$2,file]
428
429                 would yield the output filename "myfile.data" for input file‐
430                 names "myfile.data" and "myfile.data.old", "myfile.file" for
431                 the input filename "myfile", and "myfile.myfile" for the
432                 input filename ".myfile".  Spaces may be included in
433                 outpattern, as in the example:
434                       nmap $1 sed s/  *$// > $1
435                 Use the ‘\’ character to prevent special treatment of the
436                 ‘$’, ‘[’, ‘]’, and ‘,’ characters.
437
438     ntrans [inchars [outchars]]
439                 Set or unset the filename character translation mechanism.
440                 If no arguments are specified, the filename character trans‐
441                 lation mechanism is unset.  If arguments are specified, char‐
442                 acters in remote filenames are translated during mput com‐
443                 mands and put commands issued without a specified remote tar‐
444                 get filename.  If arguments are specified, characters in
445                 local filenames are translated during mget commands and get
446                 commands issued without a specified local target filename.
447                 This command is useful when connecting to a non-UNIX remote
448                 computer with different file naming conventions or practices.
449                 Characters in a filename matching a character in inchars are
450                 replaced with the corresponding character in outchars.  If
451                 the character's position in inchars is longer than the length
452                 of outchars, the character is deleted from the file name.
453
454     open host [port]
455                 Establish a connection to the specified host FTP server.  An
456                 optional port number may be supplied, in which case, ftp will
457                 attempt to contact an FTP server at that port.  If the set
458                 auto-login option is on (default), ftp will also attempt to
459                 automatically log the user in to the FTP server (see below).
460
461     page file   Retrieve file and display with the program specified by the
462                 set pager option.
463
464     passive [auto]
465                 Toggle passive mode (if no arguments are given).  If auto is
466                 given, act as if FTPMODE is set to ‘auto’.  If passive mode
467                 is turned on (default), ftp will send a PASV command for all
468                 data connections instead of a PORT command.  The PASV command
469                 requests that the remote server open a port for the data con‐
470                 nection and return the address of that port.  The remote
471                 server listens on that port and the client connects to it.
472                 When using the more traditional PORT command, the client lis‐
473                 tens on a port and sends that address to the remote server,
474                 who connects back to it.  Passive mode is useful when using
475                 ftp through a gateway router or host that controls the direc‐
476                 tionality of traffic.  (Note that though FTP servers are
477                 required to support the PASV command by RFC 1123, some do
478                 not.)
479
480     pdir [remote-path]
481                 Perform dir [remote-path], and display the result with the
482                 program specified by the set pager option.
483
484     pls [remote-path]
485                 Perform ls [remote-path], and display the result with the
486                 program specified by the set pager option.
487
488     pmlsd [remote-path]
489                 Perform mlsd [remote-path], and display the result with the
490                 program specified by the set pager option.
491
492     preserve    Toggle preservation of modification times on retrieved files.
493
494     progress    Toggle display of transfer progress bar.  The progress bar
495                 will be disabled for a transfer that has local-file as ‘-’ or
496                 a command that starts with ‘|’.  Refer to FILE NAMING
497                 CONVENTIONS for more information.  Enabling progress disables
498                 hash.
499
500     prompt      Toggle interactive prompting.  Interactive prompting occurs
501                 during multiple file transfers to allow the user to selec‐
502                 tively retrieve or store files.  If prompting is turned off
503                 (default is on), any mget or mput will transfer all files,
504                 and any mdelete will delete all files.
505
506                 When prompting is on, the following commands are available at
507                 a prompt:
508
509                       a   Answer ‘yes’ to the current file, and automatically
510                           answer ‘yes’ to any remaining files for the current
511                           command.
512
513                       n   Answer ‘no’, and do not transfer the file.
514
515                       p   Answer ‘yes’ to the current file, and turn off
516                           prompt mode (as is “prompt off” had been given).
517
518                       q   Terminate the current operation.
519
520                       y   Answer ‘yes’, and transfer the file.
521
522                       ?   Display a help message.
523
524                 Any other response will answer ‘yes’ to the current file.
525
526     proxy ftp-command
527                 Execute an ftp command on a secondary control connection.
528                 This command allows simultaneous connection to two remote FTP
529                 servers for transferring files between the two servers.  The
530                 first proxy command should be an open, to establish the sec‐
531                 ondary control connection.  Enter the command "proxy ?" to
532                 see other FTP commands executable on the secondary connec‐
533                 tion.  The following commands behave differently when pref‐
534                 aced by proxy: open will not define new macros during the
535                 auto-login process, close will not erase existing macro defi‐
536                 nitions, get and mget transfer files from the host on the
537                 primary control connection to the host on the secondary con‐
538                 trol connection, and put, mput, and append transfer files
539                 from the host on the secondary control connection to the host
540                 on the primary control connection.  Third party file trans‐
541                 fers depend upon support of the FTP protocol PASV command by
542                 the server on the secondary control connection.
543
544     put local-file [remote-file]
545                 Store a local file on the remote machine.  If remote-file is
546                 left unspecified, the local file name is used after process‐
547                 ing according to any ntrans or nmap settings in naming the
548                 remote file.  File transfer uses the current settings for
549                 type, format, mode, and structure.
550
551     pwd         Print the name of the current working directory on the remote
552                 machine.
553
554     quit        A synonym for bye.
555
556     quote arg1 arg2 ...
557                 The arguments specified are sent, verbatim, to the remote FTP
558                 server.
559
560     rate direction [maximum [increment]]
561                 Throttle the maximum transfer rate to maximum bytes/second.
562                 If maximum is 0, disable the throttle.
563
564                 direction may be one of:
565                       all  Both directions.
566                       get  Incoming transfers.
567                       put  Outgoing transfers.
568
569                 maximum can be modified on the fly by increment bytes
570                 (default: 1024) each time a given signal is received:
571
572                       SIGUSR1  Increment maximum by increment bytes.
573
574                       SIGUSR2  Decrement maximum by increment bytes.  The
575                                result must be a positive number.
576
577                 If maximum is not supplied, the current throttle rates are
578                 displayed.
579
580                 Note: rate is not yet implemented for ascii mode transfers.
581
582     rcvbuf size
583                 Set the size of the socket receive buffer to size.
584
585     recv remote-file [local-file]
586                 A synonym for get.
587
588     reget remote-file [local-file]
589                 reget acts like get, except that if local-file exists and is
590                 smaller than remote-file, local-file is presumed to be a par‐
591                 tially transferred copy of remote-file and the transfer is
592                 continued from the apparent point of failure.  This command
593                 is useful when transferring very large files over networks
594                 that are prone to dropping connections.
595
596     remopts command [command-options]
597                 Set options on the remote FTP server for command to
598                 command-options (whose absence is handled on a command-spe‐
599                 cific basis).  Remote FTP commands known to support options
600                 include: ‘MLST’ (used for MLSD and MLST).
601
602     rename [from [to]]
603                 Rename the file from on the remote machine, to the file to.
604
605     reset       Clear reply queue.  This command re-synchronizes com‐
606                 mand/reply sequencing with the remote FTP server.  Resynchro‐
607                 nization may be necessary following a violation of the FTP
608                 protocol by the remote server.
609
610     restart marker
611                 Restart the immediately following get or put at the indicated
612                 marker.  On UNIX systems, marker is usually a byte offset
613                 into the file.
614
615     rhelp [command-name]
616                 Request help from the remote FTP server.  If a command-name
617                 is specified it is supplied to the server as well.
618
619     rmdir directory-name
620                 Delete a directory on the remote machine.
621
622     rstatus [remote-file]
623                 With no arguments, show status of remote machine.  If
624                 remote-file is specified, show status of remote-file on
625                 remote machine.
626
627     runique     Toggle storing of files on the local system with unique file‐
628                 names.  If a file already exists with a name equal to the
629                 target local filename for a get or mget command, a ".1" is
630                 appended to the name.  If the resulting name matches another
631                 existing file, a ".2" is appended to the original name.  If
632                 this process continues up to ".99", an error message is
633                 printed, and the transfer does not take place.  The generated
634                 unique filename will be reported.  Note that runique will not
635                 affect local files generated from a shell command (see
636                 below).  The default value is off.
637
638     send local-file [remote-file]
639                 A synonym for put.
640
641     sendport    Toggle the use of PORT commands.  By default, ftp will
642                 attempt to use a PORT command when establishing a connection
643                 for each data transfer.  The use of PORT commands can prevent
644                 delays when performing multiple file transfers.  If the PORT
645                 command fails, ftp will use the default data port.  When the
646                 use of PORT commands is disabled, no attempt will be made to
647                 use PORT commands for each data transfer.  This is useful for
648                 certain FTP implementations which do ignore PORT commands
649                 but, incorrectly, indicate they've been accepted.
650
651     set [option value]
652                 Set option to value.  If option and value are not given, dis‐
653                 play all of the options and their values.  The currently sup‐
654                 ported options are:
655
656                       anonpass     Defaults to $FTPANONPASS
657
658                       ftp_proxy    Defaults to $ftp_proxy.
659
660                       http_proxy   Defaults to $http_proxy.
661
662                       https_proxy  Defaults to $https_proxy.
663
664                       no_proxy     Defaults to $no_proxy.
665
666                       pager        Defaults to $PAGER.
667
668                       prompt       Defaults to $FTPPROMPT.
669
670                       rprompt      Defaults to $FTPRPROMPT.
671
672     site arg1 arg2 ...
673                 The arguments specified are sent, verbatim, to the remote FTP
674                 server as a SITE command.
675
676     size remote-file
677                 Return size of remote-file on remote machine.
678
679     sndbuf size
680                 Set the size of the socket send buffer to size.
681
682     status      Show the current status of ftp.
683
684     struct struct-name
685                 Set the file transfer structure to struct-name.  The default
686                 (and only supported) structure is “file”.
687
688     sunique     Toggle storing of files on remote machine under unique file
689                 names.  The remote FTP server must support FTP protocol STOU
690                 command for successful completion.  The remote server will
691                 report unique name.  Default value is off.
692
693     system      Show the type of operating system running on the remote
694                 machine.
695
696     tenex       Set the file transfer type to that needed to talk to TENEX
697                 machines.
698
699     throttle    A synonym for rate.
700
701     trace       Toggle packet tracing.
702
703     type [type-name]
704                 Set the file transfer type to type-name.  If no type is spec‐
705                 ified, the current type is printed.  The default type is net‐
706                 work ASCII.
707
708     umask [newmask]
709                 Set the default umask on the remote server to newmask.  If
710                 newmask is omitted, the current umask is printed.
711
712     unset option
713                 Unset option.  Refer to set for more information.
714
715     usage command
716                 Print the usage message for command.
717
718     user user-name [password [account]]
719                 Identify yourself to the remote FTP server.  If the password
720                 is not specified and the server requires it, ftp will prompt
721                 the user for it (after disabling local echo).  If an account
722                 field is not specified, and the FTP server requires it, the
723                 user will be prompted for it.  If an account field is speci‐
724                 fied, an account command will be relayed to the remote server
725                 after the login sequence is completed if the remote server
726                 did not require it for logging in.  Unless ftp is invoked
727                 with “auto-login” disabled, this process is done automati‐
728                 cally on initial connection to the FTP server.
729
730     verbose     Toggle verbose mode.  In verbose mode, all responses from the
731                 FTP server are displayed to the user.  In addition, if ver‐
732                 bose is on, when a file transfer completes, statistics
733                 regarding the efficiency of the transfer are reported.  By
734                 default, verbose is on.
735
736     xferbuf size
737                 Set the size of the socket send and receive buffers to size.
738
739     ? [command]
740                 A synonym for help.
741
742     Command arguments which have embedded spaces may be quoted with quote ‘"’
743     marks.
744
745     Commands which toggle settings can take an explicit on or off argument to
746     force the setting appropriately.
747
748     Commands which take a byte count as an argument (e.g., hash, rate, and
749     xferbuf) support an optional suffix on the argument which changes the
750     interpretation of the argument.  Supported suffixes are:
751           b    Causes no modification.  (Optional)
752           k    Kilo; multiply the argument by 1024
753           m    Mega; multiply the argument by 1048576
754           g    Giga; multiply the argument by 1073741824
755
756     If ftp receives a SIGINFO (see the “status” argument of stty(1)) or
757     SIGQUIT signal whilst a transfer is in progress, the current transfer
758     rate statistics will be written to the standard error output, in the same
759     format as the standard completion message.
760

AUTO-FETCHING FILES

762     In addition to standard commands, this version of ftp supports an auto-
763     fetch feature.  To enable auto-fetch, simply pass the list of host‐
764     names/files on the command line.
765
766     The following formats are valid syntax for an auto-fetch element:
767
768     [user@]host:[path][/]
769           “Classic” FTP format.
770
771           If path contains a glob character and globbing is enabled, (see
772           glob), then the equivalent of ‘mget path’ is performed.
773
774           If the directory component of path contains no globbing characters,
775           it is stored locally with the name basename (see basename(1)) of
776           path, in the current directory.  Otherwise, the full remote name is
777           used as the local name, relative to the local root directory.
778
779     ftp://[user[:password]@]host[:port]/path[/][;type=X]
780           An FTP URL, retrieved using the FTP protocol if set ftp_proxy isn't
781           defined.  Otherwise, transfer the URL using HTTP via the proxy
782           defined in set ftp_proxy.  If set ftp_proxy isn't defined and user
783           is given, login as user.  In this case, use password if supplied,
784           otherwise prompt the user for one.
785
786           If a suffix of ‘;type=A’ or ‘;type=I’ is supplied, then the trans‐
787           fer type will take place as ascii or binary (respectively).  The
788           default transfer type is binary.
789
790           In order to be compliant with RFC 3986, ftp interprets the path
791           part of an “ftp://” auto-fetch URL as follows:
792
793           ·   The ‘/’ immediately after the host[:port] is interpreted as a
794               separator before the path, and not as part of the path itself.
795
796           ·   The path is interpreted as a ‘/’-separated list of name compo‐
797               nents.  For all but the last such component, ftp performs the
798               equivalent of a cd command.  For the last path component, ftp
799               performs the equivalent of a get command.
800
801           ·   Empty name components, which result from ‘//’ within the path,
802               or from an extra ‘/’ at the beginning of the path, will cause
803               the equivalent of a cd command without a directory name.  This
804               is unlikely to be useful.
805
806           ·   Any ‘%XX’ codes (per RFC 3986) within the path components are
807               decoded, with XX representing a character code in hexadecimal.
808               This decoding takes place after the path has been split into
809               components, but before each component is used in the equivalent
810               of a cd or get command.  Some often-used codes are ‘%2F’ (which
811               represents ‘/’) and ‘%7E’ (which represents ‘~’).
812
813           The above interpretation has the following consequences:
814
815           ·   The path is interpreted relative to the default login directory
816               of the specified user or of the ‘anonymous’ user.  If the /
817               directory is required, use a leading path of “%2F”.  If a
818               user's home directory is required (and the remote server sup‐
819               ports the syntax), use a leading path of “%7Euser/”.  For exam‐
820               ple, to retrieve /etc/motd from ‘localhost’ as the user
821               ‘myname’ with the password ‘mypass’, use
822               “ftp://myname:mypass@localhost/%2fetc/motd”
823
824           ·   The exact cd and get commands can be controlled by careful
825               choice of where to use ‘/’ and where to use ‘%2F’ (or ‘%2f’).
826               For example, the following URLs correspond to the equivalents
827               of the indicated commands:
828
829               ftp://host/dir1/dir2/file         “cd dir1”, “cd dir2”, “get
830                                                 file”.
831
832               ftp://host/%2Fdir1/dir2/file      “cd /dir1”, “cd dir2”, “get
833                                                 file”.
834
835               ftp://host/dir1%2Fdir2/file       “cd dir1/dir2”, “get file”.
836
837               ftp://host/%2Fdir1%2Fdir2/file    “cd /dir1/dir2”, “get file”.
838
839               ftp://host/dir1%2Fdir2%2Ffile     “get dir1/dir2/file”.
840
841               ftp://host/%2Fdir1%2Fdir2%2Ffile  “get /dir1/dir2/file”.
842
843           ·   You must have appropriate access permission for each of the
844               intermediate directories that is used in the equivalent of a cd
845               command.
846
847     http://[user[:password]@]host[:port]/path
848           An HTTP URL, retrieved using the HTTP protocol.  If set http_proxy
849           is defined, it is used as a URL to an HTTP proxy server.  If HTTP
850           authorization is required to retrieve path, and ‘user’ (and option‐
851           ally ‘password’) is in the URL, use them for the first attempt to
852           authenticate.
853
854     https://[user[:password]@]host[:port]/path
855           An HTTPS URL, retrieved using the HTTPS protocol.  If set
856           https_proxy is defined, it is used as a URL to an HTTPS proxy
857           server.  If HTTPS authorization is required to retrieve path, and
858           ‘user’ (and optionally ‘password’) is in the URL, use them for the
859           first attempt to authenticate.  There is currently no certificate
860           validation and verification.
861
862     file:///path
863           A local URL, copied from /path on the local host.
864
865     about:topic
866           Display information regarding topic; no file is retrieved for this
867           auto-fetched element.  Supported values include:
868
869           about:ftp      Information about ftp.
870
871           about:version  The version of ftp.  Useful to provide when report‐
872                          ing problems.
873
874     Unless noted otherwise above, and -o output is not given, the file is
875     stored in the current directory as the basename(1) of path.  Note that if
876     a HTTP redirect is received, the fetch is retried using the new target
877     URL supplied by the server, with a corresponding new path.  Using an
878     explicit -o output is recommended, to avoid writing to unexpected file
879     names.
880
881     If a classic format or an FTP URL format has a trailing ‘/’ or an empty
882     path component, then ftp will connect to the site and cd to the directory
883     given as the path, and leave the user in interactive mode ready for fur‐
884     ther input.  This will not work if set ftp_proxy is being used.
885
886     Direct HTTP transfers use HTTP 1.1.  Proxied FTP and HTTP transfers use
887     HTTP 1.0.
888
889     If -R is given, all auto-fetches that don't go via the FTP or HTTP prox‐
890     ies will be restarted.  For FTP, this is implemented by using reget
891     instead of get.  For HTTP, this is implemented by using the ‘Range:
892     bytes=’ HTTP/1.1 directive.
893
894     If WWW or proxy WWW authentication is required, you will be prompted to
895     enter a username and password to authenticate with.
896
897     When specifying IPv6 numeric addresses in a URL, you need to surround the
898     address in square brackets.  E.g.: “ftp://[::1]:21/”.  This is because
899     colons are used in IPv6 numeric address as well as being the separator
900     for the port number.
901

ABORTING A FILE TRANSFER

903     To abort a file transfer, use the terminal interrupt key (usually Ctrl-
904     C).  Sending transfers will be immediately halted.  Receiving transfers
905     will be halted by sending an FTP protocol ABOR command to the remote
906     server, and discarding any further data received.  The speed at which
907     this is accomplished depends upon the remote server's support for ABOR
908     processing.  If the remote server does not support the ABOR command, the
909     prompt will not appear until the remote server has completed sending the
910     requested file.
911
912     If the terminal interrupt key sequence is used whilst ftp is awaiting a
913     reply from the remote server for the ABOR processing, then the connection
914     will be closed.  This is different from the traditional behaviour (which
915     ignores the terminal interrupt during this phase), but is considered more
916     useful.
917

FILE NAMING CONVENTIONS

919     Files specified as arguments to ftp commands are processed according to
920     the following rules.
921
922     1.   If the file name ‘-’ is specified, the stdin (for reading) or stdout
923          (for writing) is used.
924
925     2.   If the first character of the file name is ‘|’, the remainder of the
926          argument is interpreted as a shell command.  ftp then forks a shell,
927          using popen(3) with the argument supplied, and reads (writes) from
928          the stdout (stdin).  If the shell command includes spaces, the argu‐
929          ment must be quoted; e.g.  “"| ls -lt"”.  A particularly useful
930          example of this mechanism is: “dir "" |more”.
931
932     3.   Failing the above checks, if “globbing” is enabled, local file names
933          are expanded according to the rules used in the csh(1); see the glob
934          command.  If the ftp command expects a single local file (e.g.
935          put), only the first filename generated by the "globbing" operation
936          is used.
937
938     4.   For mget commands and get commands with unspecified local file
939          names, the local filename is the remote filename, which may be
940          altered by a case, ntrans, or nmap setting.  The resulting filename
941          may then be altered if runique is on.
942
943     5.   For mput commands and put commands with unspecified remote file
944          names, the remote filename is the local filename, which may be
945          altered by a ntrans or nmap setting.  The resulting filename may
946          then be altered by the remote server if sunique is on.
947

FILE TRANSFER PARAMETERS

949     The FTP specification specifies many parameters which may affect a file
950     transfer.  The type may be one of “ascii”, “image” (binary), “ebcdic”,
951     and “local byte size” (for PDP-10's and PDP-20's mostly).  ftp supports
952     the ascii and image types of file transfer, plus local byte size 8 for
953     tenex mode transfers.
954
955     ftp supports only the default values for the remaining file transfer
956     parameters: mode, form, and struct.
957

THE .netrc FILE

959     The .netrc file contains login and initialization information used by the
960     auto-login process.  It resides in the user's home directory, unless
961     overridden with the -N netrc option, or specified in the NETRC environ‐
962     ment variable.  The following tokens are recognized; they may be sepa‐
963     rated by spaces, tabs, or new-lines:
964
965     machine name
966               Identify a remote machine name.  The auto-login process
967               searches the .netrc file for a machine token that matches the
968               remote machine specified on the ftp command line or as an open
969               command argument.  Once a match is made, the subsequent .netrc
970               tokens are processed, stopping when the end of file is reached
971               or another machine or a default token is encountered.
972
973     default   This is the same as machine name except that default matches
974               any name.  There can be only one default token, and it must be
975               after all machine tokens.  This is normally used as:
976
977                     default login anonymous password user@site
978
979               thereby giving the user an automatic anonymous FTP login to
980               machines not specified in .netrc.  This can be overridden by
981               using the -n flag to disable auto-login.
982
983     login name
984               Identify a user on the remote machine.  If this token is
985               present, the auto-login process will initiate a login using the
986               specified name.
987
988     password string
989               Supply a password.  If this token is present, the auto-login
990               process will supply the specified string if the remote server
991               requires a password as part of the login process.  Note that if
992               this token is present in the .netrc file for any user other
993               than anonymous, ftp will abort the auto-login process if the
994               .netrc is readable by anyone besides the user.
995
996     account string
997               Supply an additional account password.  If this token is
998               present, the auto-login process will supply the specified
999               string if the remote server requires an additional account
1000               password, or the auto-login process will initiate an ACCT com‐
1001               mand if it does not.
1002
1003     macdef name
1004               Define a macro.  This token functions like the ftp macdef com‐
1005               mand functions.  A macro is defined with the specified name;
1006               its contents begin with the next .netrc line and continue until
1007               a blank line (consecutive new-line characters) is encountered.
1008               Like the other tokens in the .netrc file, a macdef is applica‐
1009               ble only to the machine definition preceding it.  A macdef
1010               entry cannot be used by multiple machine definitions; rather,
1011               it must be defined following each machine it is intended to be
1012               used with.  If a macro named init is defined, it is automati‐
1013               cally executed as the last step in the auto-login process.  For
1014               example,
1015
1016                     default
1017                     macdef init
1018                     epsv4 off
1019
1020               followed by a blank line.
1021

COMMAND LINE EDITING

1023     ftp supports interactive command line editing, via the editline(3)
1024     library.  It is enabled with the edit command, and is enabled by default
1025     if input is from a tty.  Previous lines can be recalled and edited with
1026     the arrow keys, and other GNU Emacs-style editing keys may be used as
1027     well.
1028
1029     The editline(3) library is configured with a .editrc file - refer to
1030     editrc(5) for more information.
1031
1032     An extra key binding is available to ftp to provide context sensitive
1033     command and filename completion (including remote file completion).  To
1034     use this, bind a key to the editline(3) command ftp-complete.  By
1035     default, this is bound to the TAB key.
1036

COMMAND LINE PROMPT

1038     By default, ftp displays a command line prompt of “ftp> ” to the user.
1039     This can be changed with the set prompt command.
1040
1041     A prompt can be displayed on the right side of the screen (after the com‐
1042     mand input) with the set rprompt command.
1043
1044     The following formatting sequences are replaced by the given information:
1045
1046           %/   The current remote working directory.
1047
1048           %c[[0]n],%.[[0]n]
1049                The trailing component of the current remote working direc‐
1050                tory, or n trailing components if a digit n is given.  If n
1051                begins with ‘0’, the number of skipped components precede the
1052                trailing component(s) in the format “/<number>trailing” (for
1053                ‘%c’) or “...trailing” (for ‘%.’).
1054
1055           %M   The remote host name.
1056
1057           %m   The remote host name, up to the first ‘.’.
1058
1059           %n   The remote user name.
1060
1061           %%   A single ‘%’.
1062

ENVIRONMENT

1064     ftp uses the following environment variables.
1065
1066     FTPANONPASS    Password to send in an anonymous FTP transfer.  Defaults
1067                    to “`whoami`@”.
1068
1069     FTPMODE        Overrides the default operation mode.  Support values are:
1070
1071                    active   active mode FTP only
1072
1073                    auto     automatic determination of passive or active
1074                             (this is the default)
1075
1076                    gate     gate-ftp mode
1077
1078                    passive  passive mode FTP only
1079
1080     FTPPROMPT      Command-line prompt to use.  Defaults to “ftp> ”.  Refer
1081                    to COMMAND LINE PROMPT for more information.
1082
1083     FTPRPROMPT     Command-line right side prompt to use.  Defaults to “”.
1084                    Refer to COMMAND LINE PROMPT for more information.
1085
1086     FTPSERVER      Host to use as gate-ftp server when gate is enabled.
1087
1088     FTPSERVERPORT  Port to use when connecting to gate-ftp server when gate
1089                    is enabled.  Default is port returned by a getservbyname()
1090                    lookup of “ftpgate/tcp”.
1091
1092     FTPUSERAGENT   The value to send for the HTTP User-Agent header.
1093
1094     HOME           For default location of a .netrc file, if one exists.
1095
1096     NETRC          An alternate location of the .netrc file.
1097
1098     PAGER          Used by various commands to display files.  Defaults to
1099                    more(1) if empty or not set.
1100
1101     SHELL          For default shell.
1102
1103     ftp_proxy      URL of FTP proxy to use when making FTP URL requests (if
1104                    not defined, use the standard FTP protocol).
1105
1106                    See http_proxy for further notes about proxy use.
1107
1108     http_proxy     URL of HTTP proxy to use when making HTTP URL requests.
1109                    If proxy authentication is required and there is a user‐
1110                    name and password in this URL, they will automatically be
1111                    used in the first attempt to authenticate to the proxy.
1112
1113                    If “unsafe” URL characters are required in the username or
1114                    password (for example ‘@’ or ‘/’), encode them with RFC
1115                    3986 ‘%XX’ encoding.
1116
1117                    Note that the use of a username and password in ftp_proxy
1118                    and http_proxy may be incompatible with other programs
1119                    that use it (such as lynx(1)).
1120
1121                    NOTE: this is not used for interactive sessions, only for
1122                    command-line fetches.
1123
1124     no_proxy       A space or comma separated list of hosts (or domains) for
1125                    which proxying is not to be used.  Each entry may have an
1126                    optional trailing ":port", which restricts the matching to
1127                    connections to that port.
1128

EXTENDED PASSIVE MODE AND FIREWALLS

1130     Some firewall configurations do not allow ftp to use extended passive
1131     mode.  If you find that even a simple ls appears to hang after printing a
1132     message such as this:
1133
1134           229 Entering Extended Passive Mode (|||58551|)
1135
1136     then you will need to disable extended passive mode with epsv4 off.  See
1137     the above section The .netrc File for an example of how to make this
1138     automatic.
1139

SEE ALSO

1141     getservbyname(3), editrc(5), services(5), ftpd(8)
1142

STANDARDS

1144     ftp attempts to be compliant with:
1145
1146           RFC 959   File Transfer Protocol
1147
1148           RFC 1123  Requirements for Internet Hosts - Application and Support
1149
1150           RFC 1635  How to Use Anonymous FTP
1151
1152           RFC 2389  Feature negotiation mechanism for the File Transfer
1153                     Protocol
1154
1155           RFC 2428  FTP Extensions for IPv6 and NATs
1156
1157           RFC 2616  Hypertext Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1
1158
1159           RFC 2822  Internet Message Format
1160
1161           RFC 3659  Extensions to FTP
1162
1163           RFC 3986  Uniform Resource Identifier (URI)
1164

HISTORY

1166     The ftp command appeared in 4.2BSD.
1167
1168     Various features such as command line editing, context sensitive command
1169     and file completion, dynamic progress bar, automatic fetching of files
1170     and URLs, modification time preservation, transfer rate throttling, con‐
1171     figurable command line prompt, and other enhancements over the standard
1172     BSD ftp were implemented in NetBSD 1.3 and later releases by Luke Mewburn
1173     ⟨lukem@NetBSD.org⟩.
1174
1175     IPv6 support was added by the WIDE/KAME project (but may not be present
1176     in all non-NetBSD versions of this program, depending if the operating
1177     system supports IPv6 in a similar manner to KAME).
1178

BUGS

1180     Correct execution of many commands depends upon proper behavior by the
1181     remote server.
1182
1183     An error in the treatment of carriage returns in the 4.2BSD ascii-mode
1184     transfer code has been corrected.  This correction may result in incor‐
1185     rect transfers of binary files to and from 4.2BSD servers using the ascii
1186     type.  Avoid this problem by using the binary image type.
1187
1188     ftp assumes that all IPv4 mapped addresses (IPv6 addresses with a form
1189     like ::ffff:10.1.1.1) indicate IPv4 destinations which can be handled by
1190     AF_INET sockets.  However, in certain IPv6 network configurations, this
1191     assumption is not true.  In such an environment, IPv4 mapped addresses
1192     must be passed to AF_INET6 sockets directly.  For example, if your site
1193     uses a SIIT translator for IPv6-to-IPv4 translation, ftp is unable to
1194     support your configuration.
1195
1196BSD                             April 24, 2015                             BSD
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