How to download a file via FTP with Python ftplib

Question

I have the following code which easily connects to the FTP server and opens a zip file. I want to download that file into the local system. How to do that?

# Open the file for writing in binary mode
print 'Opening local file ' + filename
file = open(filename, 'wb')

# Download the file a chunk at a time
# Each chunk is sent to handleDownload
# We append the chunk to the file and then print a '.' for progress
# RETR is an FTP command

print 'Getting ' + filename
ftp.retrbinary('RETR ' + filename, handleDownload)

# Clean up time
print 'Closing file ' + filename
file.close()

Solution 1

handle = open(path.rstrip("/") + "/" + filename.lstrip("/"), 'wb')
ftp.retrbinary('RETR %s' % filename, handle.write)

Solution 2

A = filename

ftp = ftplib.FTP("IP")
ftp.login("USR Name", "Pass")
ftp.cwd("/Dir")


try:
    ftp.retrbinary("RETR " + filename ,open(A, 'wb').write)
except:
    print "Error"

Solution 3

FILENAME = 'StarWars.avi'    

with ftplib.FTP(FTP_IP, FTP_LOGIN, FTP_PASSWD) as ftp:
    ftp.cwd('movies')
    with open(FILENAME, 'wb') as f:
        ftp.retrbinary('RETR ' + FILENAME, f.write)

Of course it would we be wise to handle possible errors.

Solution 4

Please note if you are downloading from the FTP to your local, you will need to use the following:

with open( filename, 'wb' ) as file :
        ftp.retrbinary('RETR %s' % filename, file.write)

Otherwise, the script will at your local file storage rather than the FTP.

I spent a few hours making the mistake myself.

Script below:

import ftplib

# Open the FTP connection
ftp = ftplib.FTP()
ftp.cwd('/where/files-are/located')


filenames = ftp.nlst()

for filename in filenames:

    with open( filename, 'wb' ) as file :
        ftp.retrbinary('RETR %s' % filename, file.write)

        file.close()

ftp.quit()

Solution 5

The ftplib module in the Python standard library can be compared to assembler. Use a high level library like: https://pypi.python.org/pypi/ftputil

View more solutions

Comments

[Lekensteyn]

I suggest the use of with here which takes care of closing the file handle when done: with open(filename, "wb") as file: ftp.retrbinary("RETR " + filename, file.write)

[pnovotnak]

FD leaks are no joke! While you're at it, you might rename file to f, since file shadows the builtin file .

[Jossie Calderon]

use retrlines if the file is a text file.

[chuckjones242]

Thanks, this was a great help to me for getting started with file handling, even with comments in espanol :)

[chill_turner]

could use some context . ideally as others mention you call this command inside a with statement to manage your file descriptors and automatically close it out for you!

[LOKE2707]

what is i in open(i,'wb').write?

[LOKE2707]

how to access that file? lets say i have a csv file in my ftp that i want to open and store as a dataframe, how do I do that?

[Mathias711]

@LOKE2707 it was the filename, declared in the first line. I changed it. Thanks for noting it

[Mateus da Silva Teixeira]

Thank you, mainly for the example using 'try'. Help me a lot!

[Martin Prikryl]

As @chill_turner has commented, this does not even close the local file. For a robust example, see the answer by @RdB.

[yzorg]

Source is hosted on author's personal domain, no readme on pypi. A few releases in the last year, so looks maintained, +1. But the website (docs) are look very old and a bit janky, -1. Is the author known by you or to the community? Python is huge, so any sub-community would do.

[Debjyoti Banerjee]

This works fine for files of smaller size, but for files of larger size, the whole thing seems to stuck. Do you know how to solve that?

[variable]

Hi - I am looking at the ftplib code (github.com/python/cpython/blob/…) but can't figure out how this (line 354) connection is closed. Can you help me by pointing to the line that closes the socket?