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cychoi
Asked: 2013-08-21 23:03:15 +0800 CST

How to move a set of files on the same FTP server?

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On the remote FTP server, I have a set of files in the directory remote.dir1. I would like to move all the files in that directory to remote.dir2.

I am using lftp and was trying something like this:

lftp> mv remote.dir1/* remote.dir2/

It does not work and displays: Access failed: 550 remote.dir1/*: The filename, directory name, or volume label syntax is incorrect.

I also tried:

lftp> glob -a mv remote.dir1/* remote.dir2/

which displays the usage message: Usage: mv <file1> <file2>

However, moving single file works: lftp> mv remote.dir1/file1 remote.dir2/

As a last resort, we can construct a file containing a set of lftp mv commands and source it.
Are there any solutions I am not aware of?
Or, are there any capable command line tools for the task?

Edit: I am restricted to FTP environment, so only solutions using FTP are acceptable due to the environmental constraint.

command-line-interface

5 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    For documentation purpose, I will post the steps I used to complete the task. Any better solutions are much appreciated. ;-)

    Note: this solution uses the lftp FTP client. You may have to install it on your machine before you can proceed.

    Solution:

    lftp> renlist remote.dir1/ | "sed 's/\(.*\)/mv \"\1\" \"remote.dir2\/\"/'" > list  
lftp> source list  
lftp> !rm list

    Or, the one-linerTM:

    lftp> renlist remote.dir1/ | "sed 's/\(.*\)/mv \"\1\" \"remote.dir2\/\"/'" > list && source list && !rm list
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  2. It appears that lftp only supports the glob syntax with commands accepting a single argument, so mv, which requires two, is out.

    With FTP, your server might allow for extended commands, especially the execution of a limited command set via SITE EXEC or similar means - check the FTP server's documentation, its help (SITE HELP) or the login banner. These however are not standardized, so if the solution needs to be FTP-server-agnostic, scripting based on the output of the file list seems like the best idea.

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  3. rsync is great for moving files from one machine to another (or even between the same machine).

    rsync -avz -e "ssh -i /key/path/key.rsa" [email protected]:/path/on/remote/server/ /path/on/local/server

    This command supplies a private key, and connects to a machine. It grabs files from the remote directory, and copies them to the local directory. You can also do the reverse of this by switching the source and destination.

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  4. A bit late to the party, but in July 2017 the "mmv" command was added to lftp.

    Usage: mmv [OPTS] <files> <target-dir>
Move <files> to <target-directory> with wildcard expansion
 -O <dir>  specifies the target directory (alternative way)

    So, in your case:

    mmv remote.dir1/* remote.dir2/
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  5. I thought FTP was more or less dead. It's been close to 5 years since I've used it, and it was on the way out 10 years ago.

    That said, I always found the ncftp family of command line tools very friendly, and I expect this would "just work".

    I'm not going to set up an FTP server for the purposes of verifying this, but give it a try. There's a lot else to like about ncftp (At least from version 2 on).

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