Building scripts for automated FTP

AUTOMATIC DELIVERY

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If you find your self executing the same few steps in FTP, you’ll save time and effort with a little automation.

File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is the defacto standard for transferring files over TCP/ IP networks. The basic FTP protocol has been around for years, and though FTP is not especially secure, it will be around for many years to come due to its many features and well established user base. This article examines some techniques for automating FTP through scripting. I will not be focusing on the different types of FTP servers like wu-ftp or vs-ftp but will concentrate instead on the client side. I’ll show you how you can use a script to connect to an FTP server and retrieve files.