Hi all,

I would need a bash script to transfer folders recursively via FTP. Username/password/IP - static defined.

They are all Linux servers (of course), and 3 different servers
1. source
2. destination - Samba
3. Server where the script runs on

As the files that have to be transferred are big database files (.bak, etc) overwriting should be avoided. Also no prompting because the script has to be 'cronned', to run at night.
For the 'not-overwriting' issue, is there an option to select this or should the files be compared first?

(I'm not a hero in bash, but I have the impression it's the easiest for this situation)

Code solutions are my favourite...!

Thanks a bunch in advance!

this is your work, what have you tried?

If you really want a different copy every night, you can rename the target with today's date

date '+%Y%m%d'

Thanks for your replies.

To sketch the situation; Now there is a remote samba backup server containing lots of SQL database files: .bak, .mdf files etc.
Here, on location, we have a server that should be synced with this samba via FTP. File wise.
On the remote samba server the files are constantly updated and already have the filename %data%_%hour%_%databasename%.bak
Something like:

The script runs on yet another remote server.

The actions that I would need are

1. Connect via FTP to source server
2. Connect via FTP to dest. server
3. Possibly compare the files between source and dest.
4. transfer the files recursively (no overwriting)
5. close connections

What I have are the 1st, 2nd and 5th step. I would really appreciate a solution. Didn't find a lot on the web so I'm sure others will be helped by it too.

Thanks in advance!

you can retrieve a directory listing of the remote server first, do some manipulation to compare dates, then decide whether to copy over or not. or you can see if your FTP client support options of not overwriting when there are similar files..etc..

Thx. I would prefer comparing the filenames, they also contain the data as a matter a fact. Could some code hero provide me some code for this. The programming logics are not the problem, it's the (bash!) programming itself! Thanks in advance

This is a task that is crying out for the use of rsync. Unfortunately, you say it needs to be done with FTP. Is using FTP realy set in stone? If your machines were running ssh, it would be a breeze to use 'rsync -au -e ssh'.

Evo2.

to automate FTP

oh no it's not obliged to use FTP only for the solution! If you have a proposition with RSYNC, be my welcome guest.
I already had the impression it was a job for RSYNC (not that it's 'my cup of tea'...)

Thanks in advance!

Thanks