1 \input texinfo @c -*-texinfo-*-
6 @settitle GNU Wget @value{VERSION} Manual
7 @c Disable the monstrous rectangles beside overfull hbox-es.
9 @c Use `odd' to print double-sided.
14 @c Remove this if you don't use A4 paper.
18 @c Title for man page. The weird way texi2pod.pl is written requires
19 @c the preceding @set.
21 @c man title Wget The non-interactive network downloader.
23 @dircategory Network Applications
25 * Wget: (wget). The non-interactive network downloader.
29 This file documents the GNU Wget utility for downloading network
32 @c man begin COPYRIGHT
33 Copyright @copyright{} 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003,
34 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
37 Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of
38 this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice
39 are preserved on all copies.
43 Permission is granted to process this file through TeX and print the
44 results, provided the printed document carries a copying permission
45 notice identical to this one except for the removal of this paragraph
46 (this paragraph not being relevant to the printed manual).
48 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
49 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or
50 any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no
51 Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A
52 copy of the license is included in the section entitled ``GNU Free
53 Documentation License''.
58 @title GNU Wget @value{VERSION}
59 @subtitle The non-interactive download utility
60 @subtitle Updated for Wget @value{VERSION}, @value{UPDATED}
61 @author by Hrvoje Nik@v{s}i@'{c} and others
65 Originally written by Hrvoje Niksic <hniksic@xemacs.org>.
66 Currently maintained by Micah Cowan <micah@cowan.name>.
69 This is @strong{not} the complete manual for GNU Wget.
70 For more complete information, including more detailed explanations of
71 some of the options, and a number of commands available
72 for use with @file{.wgetrc} files and the @samp{-e} option, see the GNU
73 Info entry for @file{wget}.
78 @vskip 0pt plus 1filll
85 @node Top, Overview, (dir), (dir)
86 @top Wget @value{VERSION}
92 * Overview:: Features of Wget.
93 * Invoking:: Wget command-line arguments.
94 * Recursive Download:: Downloading interlinked pages.
95 * Following Links:: The available methods of chasing links.
96 * Time-Stamping:: Mirroring according to time-stamps.
97 * Startup File:: Wget's initialization file.
98 * Examples:: Examples of usage.
99 * Various:: The stuff that doesn't fit anywhere else.
100 * Appendices:: Some useful references.
101 * Copying this manual:: You may give out copies of this manual.
102 * Concept Index:: Topics covered by this manual.
105 @node Overview, Invoking, Top, Top
110 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
111 GNU Wget is a free utility for non-interactive download of files from
112 the Web. It supports @sc{http}, @sc{https}, and @sc{ftp} protocols, as
113 well as retrieval through @sc{http} proxies.
116 This chapter is a partial overview of Wget's features.
120 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
121 Wget is non-interactive, meaning that it can work in the background,
122 while the user is not logged on. This allows you to start a retrieval
123 and disconnect from the system, letting Wget finish the work. By
124 contrast, most of the Web browsers require constant user's presence,
125 which can be a great hindrance when transferring a lot of data.
130 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
134 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
135 Wget can follow links in @sc{html}, @sc{xhtml}, and @sc{css} pages, to
136 create local versions of remote web sites, fully recreating the
137 directory structure of the original site. This is sometimes referred to
138 as ``recursive downloading.'' While doing that, Wget respects the Robot
139 Exclusion Standard (@file{/robots.txt}). Wget can be instructed to
140 convert the links in downloaded files to point at the local files, for
145 File name wildcard matching and recursive mirroring of directories are
146 available when retrieving via @sc{ftp}. Wget can read the time-stamp
147 information given by both @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} servers, and store it
148 locally. Thus Wget can see if the remote file has changed since last
149 retrieval, and automatically retrieve the new version if it has. This
150 makes Wget suitable for mirroring of @sc{ftp} sites, as well as home
155 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
159 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
160 Wget has been designed for robustness over slow or unstable network
161 connections; if a download fails due to a network problem, it will
162 keep retrying until the whole file has been retrieved. If the server
163 supports regetting, it will instruct the server to continue the
164 download from where it left off.
168 Wget supports proxy servers, which can lighten the network load, speed
169 up retrieval and provide access behind firewalls. Wget uses the passive
170 @sc{ftp} downloading by default, active @sc{ftp} being an option.
173 Wget supports IP version 6, the next generation of IP. IPv6 is
174 autodetected at compile-time, and can be disabled at either build or
175 run time. Binaries built with IPv6 support work well in both
176 IPv4-only and dual family environments.
179 Built-in features offer mechanisms to tune which links you wish to follow
180 (@pxref{Following Links}).
183 The progress of individual downloads is traced using a progress gauge.
184 Interactive downloads are tracked using a ``thermometer''-style gauge,
185 whereas non-interactive ones are traced with dots, each dot
186 representing a fixed amount of data received (1KB by default). Either
187 gauge can be customized to your preferences.
190 Most of the features are fully configurable, either through command line
191 options, or via the initialization file @file{.wgetrc} (@pxref{Startup
192 File}). Wget allows you to define @dfn{global} startup files
193 (@file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default) for site settings.
198 @item /usr/local/etc/wgetrc
199 Default location of the @dfn{global} startup file.
208 Finally, GNU Wget is free software. This means that everyone may use
209 it, redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General
210 Public License, as published by the Free Software Foundation (see the
211 file @file{COPYING} that came with GNU Wget, for details).
214 @node Invoking, Recursive Download, Overview, Top
221 By default, Wget is very simple to invoke. The basic syntax is:
224 @c man begin SYNOPSIS
225 wget [@var{option}]@dots{} [@var{URL}]@dots{}
229 Wget will simply download all the @sc{url}s specified on the command
230 line. @var{URL} is a @dfn{Uniform Resource Locator}, as defined below.
232 However, you may wish to change some of the default parameters of
233 Wget. You can do it two ways: permanently, adding the appropriate
234 command to @file{.wgetrc} (@pxref{Startup File}), or specifying it on
240 * Basic Startup Options::
241 * Logging and Input File Options::
243 * Directory Options::
245 * HTTPS (SSL/TLS) Options::
247 * Recursive Retrieval Options::
248 * Recursive Accept/Reject Options::
252 @node URL Format, Option Syntax, Invoking, Invoking
257 @dfn{URL} is an acronym for Uniform Resource Locator. A uniform
258 resource locator is a compact string representation for a resource
259 available via the Internet. Wget recognizes the @sc{url} syntax as per
260 @sc{rfc1738}. This is the most widely used form (square brackets denote
264 http://host[:port]/directory/file
265 ftp://host[:port]/directory/file
268 You can also encode your username and password within a @sc{url}:
271 ftp://user:password@@host/path
272 http://user:password@@host/path
275 Either @var{user} or @var{password}, or both, may be left out. If you
276 leave out either the @sc{http} username or password, no authentication
277 will be sent. If you leave out the @sc{ftp} username, @samp{anonymous}
278 will be used. If you leave out the @sc{ftp} password, your email
279 address will be supplied as a default password.@footnote{If you have a
280 @file{.netrc} file in your home directory, password will also be
283 @strong{Important Note}: if you specify a password-containing @sc{url}
284 on the command line, the username and password will be plainly visible
285 to all users on the system, by way of @code{ps}. On multi-user systems,
286 this is a big security risk. To work around it, use @code{wget -i -}
287 and feed the @sc{url}s to Wget's standard input, each on a separate
288 line, terminated by @kbd{C-d}.
290 You can encode unsafe characters in a @sc{url} as @samp{%xy}, @code{xy}
291 being the hexadecimal representation of the character's @sc{ascii}
292 value. Some common unsafe characters include @samp{%} (quoted as
293 @samp{%25}), @samp{:} (quoted as @samp{%3A}), and @samp{@@} (quoted as
294 @samp{%40}). Refer to @sc{rfc1738} for a comprehensive list of unsafe
297 Wget also supports the @code{type} feature for @sc{ftp} @sc{url}s. By
298 default, @sc{ftp} documents are retrieved in the binary mode (type
299 @samp{i}), which means that they are downloaded unchanged. Another
300 useful mode is the @samp{a} (@dfn{ASCII}) mode, which converts the line
301 delimiters between the different operating systems, and is thus useful
302 for text files. Here is an example:
305 ftp://host/directory/file;type=a
308 Two alternative variants of @sc{url} specification are also supported,
309 because of historical (hysterical?) reasons and their widespreaded use.
311 @sc{ftp}-only syntax (supported by @code{NcFTP}):
316 @sc{http}-only syntax (introduced by @code{Netscape}):
321 These two alternative forms are deprecated, and may cease being
322 supported in the future.
324 If you do not understand the difference between these notations, or do
325 not know which one to use, just use the plain ordinary format you use
326 with your favorite browser, like @code{Lynx} or @code{Netscape}.
330 @node Option Syntax, Basic Startup Options, URL Format, Invoking
331 @section Option Syntax
332 @cindex option syntax
333 @cindex syntax of options
335 Since Wget uses GNU getopt to process command-line arguments, every
336 option has a long form along with the short one. Long options are
337 more convenient to remember, but take time to type. You may freely
338 mix different option styles, or specify options after the command-line
339 arguments. Thus you may write:
342 wget -r --tries=10 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/ -o log
345 The space between the option accepting an argument and the argument may
346 be omitted. Instead of @samp{-o log} you can write @samp{-olog}.
348 You may put several options that do not require arguments together,
355 This is completely equivalent to:
358 wget -d -r -c @var{URL}
361 Since the options can be specified after the arguments, you may
362 terminate them with @samp{--}. So the following will try to download
363 @sc{url} @samp{-x}, reporting failure to @file{log}:
369 The options that accept comma-separated lists all respect the convention
370 that specifying an empty list clears its value. This can be useful to
371 clear the @file{.wgetrc} settings. For instance, if your @file{.wgetrc}
372 sets @code{exclude_directories} to @file{/cgi-bin}, the following
373 example will first reset it, and then set it to exclude @file{/~nobody}
374 and @file{/~somebody}. You can also clear the lists in @file{.wgetrc}
375 (@pxref{Wgetrc Syntax}).
378 wget -X '' -X /~nobody,/~somebody
381 Most options that do not accept arguments are @dfn{boolean} options,
382 so named because their state can be captured with a yes-or-no
383 (``boolean'') variable. For example, @samp{--follow-ftp} tells Wget
384 to follow FTP links from HTML files and, on the other hand,
385 @samp{--no-glob} tells it not to perform file globbing on FTP URLs. A
386 boolean option is either @dfn{affirmative} or @dfn{negative}
387 (beginning with @samp{--no}). All such options share several
390 Unless stated otherwise, it is assumed that the default behavior is
391 the opposite of what the option accomplishes. For example, the
392 documented existence of @samp{--follow-ftp} assumes that the default
393 is to @emph{not} follow FTP links from HTML pages.
395 Affirmative options can be negated by prepending the @samp{--no-} to
396 the option name; negative options can be negated by omitting the
397 @samp{--no-} prefix. This might seem superfluous---if the default for
398 an affirmative option is to not do something, then why provide a way
399 to explicitly turn it off? But the startup file may in fact change
400 the default. For instance, using @code{follow_ftp = on} in
401 @file{.wgetrc} makes Wget @emph{follow} FTP links by default, and
402 using @samp{--no-follow-ftp} is the only way to restore the factory
403 default from the command line.
405 @node Basic Startup Options, Logging and Input File Options, Option Syntax, Invoking
406 @section Basic Startup Options
411 Display the version of Wget.
415 Print a help message describing all of Wget's command-line options.
419 Go to background immediately after startup. If no output file is
420 specified via the @samp{-o}, output is redirected to @file{wget-log}.
422 @cindex execute wgetrc command
423 @item -e @var{command}
424 @itemx --execute @var{command}
425 Execute @var{command} as if it were a part of @file{.wgetrc}
426 (@pxref{Startup File}). A command thus invoked will be executed
427 @emph{after} the commands in @file{.wgetrc}, thus taking precedence over
428 them. If you need to specify more than one wgetrc command, use multiple
429 instances of @samp{-e}.
433 @node Logging and Input File Options, Download Options, Basic Startup Options, Invoking
434 @section Logging and Input File Options
439 @item -o @var{logfile}
440 @itemx --output-file=@var{logfile}
441 Log all messages to @var{logfile}. The messages are normally reported
444 @cindex append to log
445 @item -a @var{logfile}
446 @itemx --append-output=@var{logfile}
447 Append to @var{logfile}. This is the same as @samp{-o}, only it appends
448 to @var{logfile} instead of overwriting the old log file. If
449 @var{logfile} does not exist, a new file is created.
454 Turn on debug output, meaning various information important to the
455 developers of Wget if it does not work properly. Your system
456 administrator may have chosen to compile Wget without debug support, in
457 which case @samp{-d} will not work. Please note that compiling with
458 debug support is always safe---Wget compiled with the debug support will
459 @emph{not} print any debug info unless requested with @samp{-d}.
460 @xref{Reporting Bugs}, for more information on how to use @samp{-d} for
466 Turn off Wget's output.
471 Turn on verbose output, with all the available data. The default output
476 Turn off verbose without being completely quiet (use @samp{-q} for
477 that), which means that error messages and basic information still get
482 @itemx --input-file=@var{file}
483 Read @sc{url}s from a local or external @var{file}. If @samp{-} is
484 specified as @var{file}, @sc{url}s are read from the standard input.
485 (Use @samp{./-} to read from a file literally named @samp{-}.)
487 If this function is used, no @sc{url}s need be present on the command
488 line. If there are @sc{url}s both on the command line and in an input
489 file, those on the command lines will be the first ones to be
490 retrieved. If @samp{--force-html} is not specified, then @var{file}
491 should consist of a series of URLs, one per line.
493 However, if you specify @samp{--force-html}, the document will be
494 regarded as @samp{html}. In that case you may have problems with
495 relative links, which you can solve either by adding @code{<base
496 href="@var{url}">} to the documents or by specifying
497 @samp{--base=@var{url}} on the command line.
499 If the @var{file} is an external one, the document will be automatically
500 treated as @samp{html} if the Content-Type matches @samp{text/html}.
501 Furthermore, the @var{file}'s location will be implicitly used as base
502 href if none was specified.
507 When input is read from a file, force it to be treated as an @sc{html}
508 file. This enables you to retrieve relative links from existing
509 @sc{html} files on your local disk, by adding @code{<base
510 href="@var{url}">} to @sc{html}, or using the @samp{--base} command-line
513 @cindex base for relative links in input file
515 @itemx --base=@var{URL}
516 Resolves relative links using @var{URL} as the point of reference,
517 when reading links from an HTML file specified via the
518 @samp{-i}/@samp{--input-file} option (together with
519 @samp{--force-html}, or when the input file was fetched remotely from
520 a server describing it as @sc{html}). This is equivalent to the
521 presence of a @code{BASE} tag in the @sc{html} input file, with
522 @var{URL} as the value for the @code{href} attribute.
524 For instance, if you specify @samp{http://foo/bar/a.html} for
525 @var{URL}, and Wget reads @samp{../baz/b.html} from the input file, it
526 would be resolved to @samp{http://foo/baz/b.html}.
529 @node Download Options, Directory Options, Logging and Input File Options, Invoking
530 @section Download Options
534 @cindex client IP address
535 @cindex IP address, client
536 @item --bind-address=@var{ADDRESS}
537 When making client TCP/IP connections, bind to @var{ADDRESS} on
538 the local machine. @var{ADDRESS} may be specified as a hostname or IP
539 address. This option can be useful if your machine is bound to multiple
544 @cindex number of retries
545 @item -t @var{number}
546 @itemx --tries=@var{number}
547 Set number of retries to @var{number}. Specify 0 or @samp{inf} for
548 infinite retrying. The default is to retry 20 times, with the exception
549 of fatal errors like ``connection refused'' or ``not found'' (404),
550 which are not retried.
553 @itemx --output-document=@var{file}
554 The documents will not be written to the appropriate files, but all
555 will be concatenated together and written to @var{file}. If @samp{-}
556 is used as @var{file}, documents will be printed to standard output,
557 disabling link conversion. (Use @samp{./-} to print to a file
558 literally named @samp{-}.)
560 Use of @samp{-O} is @emph{not} intended to mean simply ``use the name
561 @var{file} instead of the one in the URL;'' rather, it is
562 analogous to shell redirection:
563 @samp{wget -O file http://foo} is intended to work like
564 @samp{wget -O - http://foo > file}; @file{file} will be truncated
565 immediately, and @emph{all} downloaded content will be written there.
567 For this reason, @samp{-N} (for timestamp-checking) is not supported
568 in combination with @samp{-O}: since @var{file} is always newly
569 created, it will always have a very new timestamp. A warning will be
570 issued if this combination is used.
572 Similarly, using @samp{-r} or @samp{-p} with @samp{-O} may not work as
573 you expect: Wget won't just download the first file to @var{file} and
574 then download the rest to their normal names: @emph{all} downloaded
575 content will be placed in @var{file}. This was disabled in version
576 1.11, but has been reinstated (with a warning) in 1.11.2, as there are
577 some cases where this behavior can actually have some use.
579 Note that a combination with @samp{-k} is only permitted when
580 downloading a single document, as in that case it will just convert
581 all relative URIs to external ones; @samp{-k} makes no sense for
582 multiple URIs when they're all being downloaded to a single file;
583 @samp{-k} can be used only when the output is a regular file.
585 @cindex clobbering, file
586 @cindex downloading multiple times
590 If a file is downloaded more than once in the same directory, Wget's
591 behavior depends on a few options, including @samp{-nc}. In certain
592 cases, the local file will be @dfn{clobbered}, or overwritten, upon
593 repeated download. In other cases it will be preserved.
595 When running Wget without @samp{-N}, @samp{-nc}, @samp{-r}, or
596 @samp{-p}, downloading the same file in the same directory will result
597 in the original copy of @var{file} being preserved and the second copy
598 being named @samp{@var{file}.1}. If that file is downloaded yet
599 again, the third copy will be named @samp{@var{file}.2}, and so on.
600 (This is also the behavior with @samp{-nd}, even if @samp{-r} or
601 @samp{-p} are in effect.) When @samp{-nc} is specified, this behavior
602 is suppressed, and Wget will refuse to download newer copies of
603 @samp{@var{file}}. Therefore, ``@code{no-clobber}'' is actually a
604 misnomer in this mode---it's not clobbering that's prevented (as the
605 numeric suffixes were already preventing clobbering), but rather the
606 multiple version saving that's prevented.
608 When running Wget with @samp{-r} or @samp{-p}, but without @samp{-N},
609 @samp{-nd}, or @samp{-nc}, re-downloading a file will result in the
610 new copy simply overwriting the old. Adding @samp{-nc} will prevent
611 this behavior, instead causing the original version to be preserved
612 and any newer copies on the server to be ignored.
614 When running Wget with @samp{-N}, with or without @samp{-r} or
615 @samp{-p}, the decision as to whether or not to download a newer copy
616 of a file depends on the local and remote timestamp and size of the
617 file (@pxref{Time-Stamping}). @samp{-nc} may not be specified at the
618 same time as @samp{-N}.
620 Note that when @samp{-nc} is specified, files with the suffixes
621 @samp{.html} or @samp{.htm} will be loaded from the local disk and
622 parsed as if they had been retrieved from the Web.
624 @cindex continue retrieval
625 @cindex incomplete downloads
626 @cindex resume download
629 Continue getting a partially-downloaded file. This is useful when you
630 want to finish up a download started by a previous instance of Wget, or
631 by another program. For instance:
634 wget -c ftp://sunsite.doc.ic.ac.uk/ls-lR.Z
637 If there is a file named @file{ls-lR.Z} in the current directory, Wget
638 will assume that it is the first portion of the remote file, and will
639 ask the server to continue the retrieval from an offset equal to the
640 length of the local file.
642 Note that you don't need to specify this option if you just want the
643 current invocation of Wget to retry downloading a file should the
644 connection be lost midway through. This is the default behavior.
645 @samp{-c} only affects resumption of downloads started @emph{prior} to
646 this invocation of Wget, and whose local files are still sitting around.
648 Without @samp{-c}, the previous example would just download the remote
649 file to @file{ls-lR.Z.1}, leaving the truncated @file{ls-lR.Z} file
652 Beginning with Wget 1.7, if you use @samp{-c} on a non-empty file, and
653 it turns out that the server does not support continued downloading,
654 Wget will refuse to start the download from scratch, which would
655 effectively ruin existing contents. If you really want the download to
656 start from scratch, remove the file.
658 Also beginning with Wget 1.7, if you use @samp{-c} on a file which is of
659 equal size as the one on the server, Wget will refuse to download the
660 file and print an explanatory message. The same happens when the file
661 is smaller on the server than locally (presumably because it was changed
662 on the server since your last download attempt)---because ``continuing''
663 is not meaningful, no download occurs.
665 On the other side of the coin, while using @samp{-c}, any file that's
666 bigger on the server than locally will be considered an incomplete
667 download and only @code{(length(remote) - length(local))} bytes will be
668 downloaded and tacked onto the end of the local file. This behavior can
669 be desirable in certain cases---for instance, you can use @samp{wget -c}
670 to download just the new portion that's been appended to a data
671 collection or log file.
673 However, if the file is bigger on the server because it's been
674 @emph{changed}, as opposed to just @emph{appended} to, you'll end up
675 with a garbled file. Wget has no way of verifying that the local file
676 is really a valid prefix of the remote file. You need to be especially
677 careful of this when using @samp{-c} in conjunction with @samp{-r},
678 since every file will be considered as an "incomplete download" candidate.
680 Another instance where you'll get a garbled file if you try to use
681 @samp{-c} is if you have a lame @sc{http} proxy that inserts a
682 ``transfer interrupted'' string into the local file. In the future a
683 ``rollback'' option may be added to deal with this case.
685 Note that @samp{-c} only works with @sc{ftp} servers and with @sc{http}
686 servers that support the @code{Range} header.
688 @cindex progress indicator
690 @item --progress=@var{type}
691 Select the type of the progress indicator you wish to use. Legal
692 indicators are ``dot'' and ``bar''.
694 The ``bar'' indicator is used by default. It draws an @sc{ascii} progress
695 bar graphics (a.k.a ``thermometer'' display) indicating the status of
696 retrieval. If the output is not a TTY, the ``dot'' bar will be used by
699 Use @samp{--progress=dot} to switch to the ``dot'' display. It traces
700 the retrieval by printing dots on the screen, each dot representing a
701 fixed amount of downloaded data.
703 When using the dotted retrieval, you may also set the @dfn{style} by
704 specifying the type as @samp{dot:@var{style}}. Different styles assign
705 different meaning to one dot. With the @code{default} style each dot
706 represents 1K, there are ten dots in a cluster and 50 dots in a line.
707 The @code{binary} style has a more ``computer''-like orientation---8K
708 dots, 16-dots clusters and 48 dots per line (which makes for 384K
709 lines). The @code{mega} style is suitable for downloading very large
710 files---each dot represents 64K retrieved, there are eight dots in a
711 cluster, and 48 dots on each line (so each line contains 3M).
713 Note that you can set the default style using the @code{progress}
714 command in @file{.wgetrc}. That setting may be overridden from the
715 command line. The exception is that, when the output is not a TTY, the
716 ``dot'' progress will be favored over ``bar''. To force the bar output,
717 use @samp{--progress=bar:force}.
720 @itemx --timestamping
721 Turn on time-stamping. @xref{Time-Stamping}, for details.
723 @item --no-use-server-timestamps
724 Don't set the local file's timestamp by the one on the server.
726 By default, when a file is downloaded, it's timestamps are set to
727 match those from the remote file. This allows the use of
728 @samp{--timestamping} on subsequent invocations of wget. However, it
729 is sometimes useful to base the local file's timestamp on when it was
730 actually downloaded; for that purpose, the
731 @samp{--no-use-server-timestamps} option has been provided.
733 @cindex server response, print
735 @itemx --server-response
736 Print the headers sent by @sc{http} servers and responses sent by
739 @cindex Wget as spider
742 When invoked with this option, Wget will behave as a Web @dfn{spider},
743 which means that it will not download the pages, just check that they
744 are there. For example, you can use Wget to check your bookmarks:
747 wget --spider --force-html -i bookmarks.html
750 This feature needs much more work for Wget to get close to the
751 functionality of real web spiders.
755 @itemx --timeout=@var{seconds}
756 Set the network timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. This is equivalent
757 to specifying @samp{--dns-timeout}, @samp{--connect-timeout}, and
758 @samp{--read-timeout}, all at the same time.
760 When interacting with the network, Wget can check for timeout and
761 abort the operation if it takes too long. This prevents anomalies
762 like hanging reads and infinite connects. The only timeout enabled by
763 default is a 900-second read timeout. Setting a timeout to 0 disables
764 it altogether. Unless you know what you are doing, it is best not to
765 change the default timeout settings.
767 All timeout-related options accept decimal values, as well as
768 subsecond values. For example, @samp{0.1} seconds is a legal (though
769 unwise) choice of timeout. Subsecond timeouts are useful for checking
770 server response times or for testing network latency.
774 @item --dns-timeout=@var{seconds}
775 Set the DNS lookup timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. DNS lookups that
776 don't complete within the specified time will fail. By default, there
777 is no timeout on DNS lookups, other than that implemented by system
780 @cindex connect timeout
781 @cindex timeout, connect
782 @item --connect-timeout=@var{seconds}
783 Set the connect timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. TCP connections that
784 take longer to establish will be aborted. By default, there is no
785 connect timeout, other than that implemented by system libraries.
788 @cindex timeout, read
789 @item --read-timeout=@var{seconds}
790 Set the read (and write) timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. The
791 ``time'' of this timeout refers to @dfn{idle time}: if, at any point in
792 the download, no data is received for more than the specified number
793 of seconds, reading fails and the download is restarted. This option
794 does not directly affect the duration of the entire download.
796 Of course, the remote server may choose to terminate the connection
797 sooner than this option requires. The default read timeout is 900
800 @cindex bandwidth, limit
802 @cindex limit bandwidth
803 @item --limit-rate=@var{amount}
804 Limit the download speed to @var{amount} bytes per second. Amount may
805 be expressed in bytes, kilobytes with the @samp{k} suffix, or megabytes
806 with the @samp{m} suffix. For example, @samp{--limit-rate=20k} will
807 limit the retrieval rate to 20KB/s. This is useful when, for whatever
808 reason, you don't want Wget to consume the entire available bandwidth.
810 This option allows the use of decimal numbers, usually in conjunction
811 with power suffixes; for example, @samp{--limit-rate=2.5k} is a legal
814 Note that Wget implements the limiting by sleeping the appropriate
815 amount of time after a network read that took less time than specified
816 by the rate. Eventually this strategy causes the TCP transfer to slow
817 down to approximately the specified rate. However, it may take some
818 time for this balance to be achieved, so don't be surprised if limiting
819 the rate doesn't work well with very small files.
823 @item -w @var{seconds}
824 @itemx --wait=@var{seconds}
825 Wait the specified number of seconds between the retrievals. Use of
826 this option is recommended, as it lightens the server load by making the
827 requests less frequent. Instead of in seconds, the time can be
828 specified in minutes using the @code{m} suffix, in hours using @code{h}
829 suffix, or in days using @code{d} suffix.
831 Specifying a large value for this option is useful if the network or the
832 destination host is down, so that Wget can wait long enough to
833 reasonably expect the network error to be fixed before the retry. The
834 waiting interval specified by this function is influenced by
835 @code{--random-wait}, which see.
837 @cindex retries, waiting between
838 @cindex waiting between retries
839 @item --waitretry=@var{seconds}
840 If you don't want Wget to wait between @emph{every} retrieval, but only
841 between retries of failed downloads, you can use this option. Wget will
842 use @dfn{linear backoff}, waiting 1 second after the first failure on a
843 given file, then waiting 2 seconds after the second failure on that
844 file, up to the maximum number of @var{seconds} you specify. Therefore,
845 a value of 10 will actually make Wget wait up to (1 + 2 + ... + 10) = 55
848 By default, Wget will assume a value of 10 seconds.
853 Some web sites may perform log analysis to identify retrieval programs
854 such as Wget by looking for statistically significant similarities in
855 the time between requests. This option causes the time between requests
856 to vary between 0.5 and 1.5 * @var{wait} seconds, where @var{wait} was
857 specified using the @samp{--wait} option, in order to mask Wget's
858 presence from such analysis.
860 A 2001 article in a publication devoted to development on a popular
861 consumer platform provided code to perform this analysis on the fly.
862 Its author suggested blocking at the class C address level to ensure
863 automated retrieval programs were blocked despite changing DHCP-supplied
866 The @samp{--random-wait} option was inspired by this ill-advised
867 recommendation to block many unrelated users from a web site due to the
872 Don't use proxies, even if the appropriate @code{*_proxy} environment
876 For more information about the use of proxies with Wget, @xref{Proxies}.
881 @itemx --quota=@var{quota}
882 Specify download quota for automatic retrievals. The value can be
883 specified in bytes (default), kilobytes (with @samp{k} suffix), or
884 megabytes (with @samp{m} suffix).
886 Note that quota will never affect downloading a single file. So if you
887 specify @samp{wget -Q10k ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/ls-lR.gz}, all of the
888 @file{ls-lR.gz} will be downloaded. The same goes even when several
889 @sc{url}s are specified on the command-line. However, quota is
890 respected when retrieving either recursively, or from an input file.
891 Thus you may safely type @samp{wget -Q2m -i sites}---download will be
892 aborted when the quota is exceeded.
894 Setting quota to 0 or to @samp{inf} unlimits the download quota.
897 @cindex caching of DNS lookups
899 Turn off caching of DNS lookups. Normally, Wget remembers the IP
900 addresses it looked up from DNS so it doesn't have to repeatedly
901 contact the DNS server for the same (typically small) set of hosts it
902 retrieves from. This cache exists in memory only; a new Wget run will
905 However, it has been reported that in some situations it is not
906 desirable to cache host names, even for the duration of a
907 short-running application like Wget. With this option Wget issues a
908 new DNS lookup (more precisely, a new call to @code{gethostbyname} or
909 @code{getaddrinfo}) each time it makes a new connection. Please note
910 that this option will @emph{not} affect caching that might be
911 performed by the resolving library or by an external caching layer,
914 If you don't understand exactly what this option does, you probably
917 @cindex file names, restrict
918 @cindex Windows file names
919 @item --restrict-file-names=@var{modes}
920 Change which characters found in remote URLs must be escaped during
921 generation of local filenames. Characters that are @dfn{restricted}
922 by this option are escaped, i.e. replaced with @samp{%HH}, where
923 @samp{HH} is the hexadecimal number that corresponds to the restricted
924 character. This option may also be used to force all alphabetical
925 cases to be either lower- or uppercase.
927 By default, Wget escapes the characters that are not valid or safe as
928 part of file names on your operating system, as well as control
929 characters that are typically unprintable. This option is useful for
930 changing these defaults, perhaps because you are downloading to a
931 non-native partition, or because you want to disable escaping of the
932 control characters, or you want to further restrict characters to only
933 those in the @sc{ascii} range of values.
935 The @var{modes} are a comma-separated set of text values. The
936 acceptable values are @samp{unix}, @samp{windows}, @samp{nocontrol},
937 @samp{ascii}, @samp{lowercase}, and @samp{uppercase}. The values
938 @samp{unix} and @samp{windows} are mutually exclusive (one will
939 override the other), as are @samp{lowercase} and
940 @samp{uppercase}. Those last are special cases, as they do not change
941 the set of characters that would be escaped, but rather force local
942 file paths to be converted either to lower- or uppercase.
944 When ``unix'' is specified, Wget escapes the character @samp{/} and
945 the control characters in the ranges 0--31 and 128--159. This is the
946 default on Unix-like operating systems.
948 When ``windows'' is given, Wget escapes the characters @samp{\},
949 @samp{|}, @samp{/}, @samp{:}, @samp{?}, @samp{"}, @samp{*}, @samp{<},
950 @samp{>}, and the control characters in the ranges 0--31 and 128--159.
951 In addition to this, Wget in Windows mode uses @samp{+} instead of
952 @samp{:} to separate host and port in local file names, and uses
953 @samp{@@} instead of @samp{?} to separate the query portion of the file
954 name from the rest. Therefore, a URL that would be saved as
955 @samp{www.xemacs.org:4300/search.pl?input=blah} in Unix mode would be
956 saved as @samp{www.xemacs.org+4300/search.pl@@input=blah} in Windows
957 mode. This mode is the default on Windows.
959 If you specify @samp{nocontrol}, then the escaping of the control
960 characters is also switched off. This option may make sense
961 when you are downloading URLs whose names contain UTF-8 characters, on
962 a system which can save and display filenames in UTF-8 (some possible
963 byte values used in UTF-8 byte sequences fall in the range of values
964 designated by Wget as ``controls'').
966 The @samp{ascii} mode is used to specify that any bytes whose values
967 are outside the range of @sc{ascii} characters (that is, greater than
968 127) shall be escaped. This can be useful when saving filenames
969 whose encoding does not match the one used locally.
976 Force connecting to IPv4 or IPv6 addresses. With @samp{--inet4-only}
977 or @samp{-4}, Wget will only connect to IPv4 hosts, ignoring AAAA
978 records in DNS, and refusing to connect to IPv6 addresses specified in
979 URLs. Conversely, with @samp{--inet6-only} or @samp{-6}, Wget will
980 only connect to IPv6 hosts and ignore A records and IPv4 addresses.
982 Neither options should be needed normally. By default, an IPv6-aware
983 Wget will use the address family specified by the host's DNS record.
984 If the DNS responds with both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses, Wget will try
985 them in sequence until it finds one it can connect to. (Also see
986 @code{--prefer-family} option described below.)
988 These options can be used to deliberately force the use of IPv4 or
989 IPv6 address families on dual family systems, usually to aid debugging
990 or to deal with broken network configuration. Only one of
991 @samp{--inet6-only} and @samp{--inet4-only} may be specified at the
992 same time. Neither option is available in Wget compiled without IPv6
995 @item --prefer-family=none/IPv4/IPv6
996 When given a choice of several addresses, connect to the addresses
997 with specified address family first. The address order returned by
998 DNS is used without change by default.
1000 This avoids spurious errors and connect attempts when accessing hosts
1001 that resolve to both IPv6 and IPv4 addresses from IPv4 networks. For
1002 example, @samp{www.kame.net} resolves to
1003 @samp{2001:200:0:8002:203:47ff:fea5:3085} and to
1004 @samp{203.178.141.194}. When the preferred family is @code{IPv4}, the
1005 IPv4 address is used first; when the preferred family is @code{IPv6},
1006 the IPv6 address is used first; if the specified value is @code{none},
1007 the address order returned by DNS is used without change.
1009 Unlike @samp{-4} and @samp{-6}, this option doesn't inhibit access to
1010 any address family, it only changes the @emph{order} in which the
1011 addresses are accessed. Also note that the reordering performed by
1012 this option is @dfn{stable}---it doesn't affect order of addresses of
1013 the same family. That is, the relative order of all IPv4 addresses
1014 and of all IPv6 addresses remains intact in all cases.
1016 @item --retry-connrefused
1017 Consider ``connection refused'' a transient error and try again.
1018 Normally Wget gives up on a URL when it is unable to connect to the
1019 site because failure to connect is taken as a sign that the server is
1020 not running at all and that retries would not help. This option is
1021 for mirroring unreliable sites whose servers tend to disappear for
1022 short periods of time.
1026 @cindex authentication
1027 @item --user=@var{user}
1028 @itemx --password=@var{password}
1029 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} for both
1030 @sc{ftp} and @sc{http} file retrieval. These parameters can be overridden
1031 using the @samp{--ftp-user} and @samp{--ftp-password} options for
1032 @sc{ftp} connections and the @samp{--http-user} and @samp{--http-password}
1033 options for @sc{http} connections.
1035 @item --ask-password
1036 Prompt for a password for each connection established. Cannot be specified
1037 when @samp{--password} is being used, because they are mutually exclusive.
1043 Turn off internationalized URI (IRI) support. Use @samp{--iri} to
1044 turn it on. IRI support is activated by default.
1046 You can set the default state of IRI support using the @code{iri}
1047 command in @file{.wgetrc}. That setting may be overridden from the
1050 @cindex local encoding
1051 @item --local-encoding=@var{encoding}
1053 Force Wget to use @var{encoding} as the default system encoding. That affects
1054 how Wget converts URLs specified as arguments from locale to @sc{utf-8} for
1057 Wget use the function @code{nl_langinfo()} and then the @code{CHARSET}
1058 environment variable to get the locale. If it fails, @sc{ascii} is used.
1060 You can set the default local encoding using the @code{local_encoding}
1061 command in @file{.wgetrc}. That setting may be overridden from the
1064 @cindex remote encoding
1065 @item --remote-encoding=@var{encoding}
1067 Force Wget to use @var{encoding} as the default remote server encoding.
1068 That affects how Wget converts URIs found in files from remote encoding
1069 to @sc{utf-8} during a recursive fetch. This options is only useful for
1070 IRI support, for the interpretation of non-@sc{ascii} characters.
1072 For HTTP, remote encoding can be found in HTTP @code{Content-Type}
1073 header and in HTML @code{Content-Type http-equiv} meta tag.
1075 You can set the default encoding using the @code{remoteencoding}
1076 command in @file{.wgetrc}. That setting may be overridden from the
1080 @node Directory Options, HTTP Options, Download Options, Invoking
1081 @section Directory Options
1085 @itemx --no-directories
1086 Do not create a hierarchy of directories when retrieving recursively.
1087 With this option turned on, all files will get saved to the current
1088 directory, without clobbering (if a name shows up more than once, the
1089 filenames will get extensions @samp{.n}).
1092 @itemx --force-directories
1093 The opposite of @samp{-nd}---create a hierarchy of directories, even if
1094 one would not have been created otherwise. E.g. @samp{wget -x
1095 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/robots.txt} will save the downloaded file to
1096 @file{fly.srk.fer.hr/robots.txt}.
1099 @itemx --no-host-directories
1100 Disable generation of host-prefixed directories. By default, invoking
1101 Wget with @samp{-r http://fly.srk.fer.hr/} will create a structure of
1102 directories beginning with @file{fly.srk.fer.hr/}. This option disables
1105 @item --protocol-directories
1106 Use the protocol name as a directory component of local file names. For
1107 example, with this option, @samp{wget -r http://@var{host}} will save to
1108 @samp{http/@var{host}/...} rather than just to @samp{@var{host}/...}.
1110 @cindex cut directories
1111 @item --cut-dirs=@var{number}
1112 Ignore @var{number} directory components. This is useful for getting a
1113 fine-grained control over the directory where recursive retrieval will
1116 Take, for example, the directory at
1117 @samp{ftp://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/}. If you retrieve it with
1118 @samp{-r}, it will be saved locally under
1119 @file{ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/}. While the @samp{-nH} option can
1120 remove the @file{ftp.xemacs.org/} part, you are still stuck with
1121 @file{pub/xemacs}. This is where @samp{--cut-dirs} comes in handy; it
1122 makes Wget not ``see'' @var{number} remote directory components. Here
1123 are several examples of how @samp{--cut-dirs} option works.
1127 No options -> ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/
1129 -nH --cut-dirs=1 -> xemacs/
1130 -nH --cut-dirs=2 -> .
1132 --cut-dirs=1 -> ftp.xemacs.org/xemacs/
1137 If you just want to get rid of the directory structure, this option is
1138 similar to a combination of @samp{-nd} and @samp{-P}. However, unlike
1139 @samp{-nd}, @samp{--cut-dirs} does not lose with subdirectories---for
1140 instance, with @samp{-nH --cut-dirs=1}, a @file{beta/} subdirectory will
1141 be placed to @file{xemacs/beta}, as one would expect.
1143 @cindex directory prefix
1144 @item -P @var{prefix}
1145 @itemx --directory-prefix=@var{prefix}
1146 Set directory prefix to @var{prefix}. The @dfn{directory prefix} is the
1147 directory where all other files and subdirectories will be saved to,
1148 i.e. the top of the retrieval tree. The default is @samp{.} (the
1152 @node HTTP Options, HTTPS (SSL/TLS) Options, Directory Options, Invoking
1153 @section HTTP Options
1156 @cindex default page name
1158 @item --default-page=@var{name}
1159 Use @var{name} as the default file name when it isn't known (i.e., for
1160 URLs that end in a slash), instead of @file{index.html}.
1162 @cindex .html extension
1163 @cindex .css extension
1165 @itemx --adjust-extension
1166 If a file of type @samp{application/xhtml+xml} or @samp{text/html} is
1167 downloaded and the URL does not end with the regexp
1168 @samp{\.[Hh][Tt][Mm][Ll]?}, this option will cause the suffix @samp{.html}
1169 to be appended to the local filename. This is useful, for instance, when
1170 you're mirroring a remote site that uses @samp{.asp} pages, but you want
1171 the mirrored pages to be viewable on your stock Apache server. Another
1172 good use for this is when you're downloading CGI-generated materials. A URL
1173 like @samp{http://site.com/article.cgi?25} will be saved as
1174 @file{article.cgi?25.html}.
1176 Note that filenames changed in this way will be re-downloaded every time
1177 you re-mirror a site, because Wget can't tell that the local
1178 @file{@var{X}.html} file corresponds to remote URL @samp{@var{X}} (since
1179 it doesn't yet know that the URL produces output of type
1180 @samp{text/html} or @samp{application/xhtml+xml}. To prevent this
1181 re-downloading, you must use @samp{-k} and @samp{-K} so that the original
1182 version of the file will be saved as @file{@var{X}.orig} (@pxref{Recursive
1183 Retrieval Options}).
1185 As of version 1.12, Wget will also ensure that any downloaded files of
1186 type @samp{text/css} end in the suffix @samp{.css}, and the option was
1187 renamed from @samp{--html-extension}, to better reflect its new
1188 behavior. The old option name is still acceptable, but should now be
1189 considered deprecated.
1191 At some point in the future, this option may well be expanded to
1192 include suffixes for other types of content, including content types
1193 that are not parsed by Wget.
1196 @cindex http password
1197 @cindex authentication
1198 @item --http-user=@var{user}
1199 @itemx --http-password=@var{password}
1200 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} on an
1201 @sc{http} server. According to the type of the challenge, Wget will
1202 encode them using either the @code{basic} (insecure),
1203 the @code{digest}, or the Windows @code{NTLM} authentication scheme.
1205 Another way to specify username and password is in the @sc{url} itself
1206 (@pxref{URL Format}). Either method reveals your password to anyone who
1207 bothers to run @code{ps}. To prevent the passwords from being seen,
1208 store them in @file{.wgetrc} or @file{.netrc}, and make sure to protect
1209 those files from other users with @code{chmod}. If the passwords are
1210 really important, do not leave them lying in those files either---edit
1211 the files and delete them after Wget has started the download.
1214 For more information about security issues with Wget, @xref{Security
1218 @cindex Keep-Alive, turning off
1219 @cindex Persistent Connections, disabling
1220 @item --no-http-keep-alive
1221 Turn off the ``keep-alive'' feature for HTTP downloads. Normally, Wget
1222 asks the server to keep the connection open so that, when you download
1223 more than one document from the same server, they get transferred over
1224 the same TCP connection. This saves time and at the same time reduces
1225 the load on the server.
1227 This option is useful when, for some reason, persistent (keep-alive)
1228 connections don't work for you, for example due to a server bug or due
1229 to the inability of server-side scripts to cope with the connections.
1234 Disable server-side cache. In this case, Wget will send the remote
1235 server an appropriate directive (@samp{Pragma: no-cache}) to get the
1236 file from the remote service, rather than returning the cached version.
1237 This is especially useful for retrieving and flushing out-of-date
1238 documents on proxy servers.
1240 Caching is allowed by default.
1244 Disable the use of cookies. Cookies are a mechanism for maintaining
1245 server-side state. The server sends the client a cookie using the
1246 @code{Set-Cookie} header, and the client responds with the same cookie
1247 upon further requests. Since cookies allow the server owners to keep
1248 track of visitors and for sites to exchange this information, some
1249 consider them a breach of privacy. The default is to use cookies;
1250 however, @emph{storing} cookies is not on by default.
1252 @cindex loading cookies
1253 @cindex cookies, loading
1254 @item --load-cookies @var{file}
1255 Load cookies from @var{file} before the first HTTP retrieval.
1256 @var{file} is a textual file in the format originally used by Netscape's
1257 @file{cookies.txt} file.
1259 You will typically use this option when mirroring sites that require
1260 that you be logged in to access some or all of their content. The login
1261 process typically works by the web server issuing an @sc{http} cookie
1262 upon receiving and verifying your credentials. The cookie is then
1263 resent by the browser when accessing that part of the site, and so
1264 proves your identity.
1266 Mirroring such a site requires Wget to send the same cookies your
1267 browser sends when communicating with the site. This is achieved by
1268 @samp{--load-cookies}---simply point Wget to the location of the
1269 @file{cookies.txt} file, and it will send the same cookies your browser
1270 would send in the same situation. Different browsers keep textual
1271 cookie files in different locations:
1275 The cookies are in @file{~/.netscape/cookies.txt}.
1277 @item Mozilla and Netscape 6.x.
1278 Mozilla's cookie file is also named @file{cookies.txt}, located
1279 somewhere under @file{~/.mozilla}, in the directory of your profile.
1280 The full path usually ends up looking somewhat like
1281 @file{~/.mozilla/default/@var{some-weird-string}/cookies.txt}.
1283 @item Internet Explorer.
1284 You can produce a cookie file Wget can use by using the File menu,
1285 Import and Export, Export Cookies. This has been tested with Internet
1286 Explorer 5; it is not guaranteed to work with earlier versions.
1288 @item Other browsers.
1289 If you are using a different browser to create your cookies,
1290 @samp{--load-cookies} will only work if you can locate or produce a
1291 cookie file in the Netscape format that Wget expects.
1294 If you cannot use @samp{--load-cookies}, there might still be an
1295 alternative. If your browser supports a ``cookie manager'', you can use
1296 it to view the cookies used when accessing the site you're mirroring.
1297 Write down the name and value of the cookie, and manually instruct Wget
1298 to send those cookies, bypassing the ``official'' cookie support:
1301 wget --no-cookies --header "Cookie: @var{name}=@var{value}"
1304 @cindex saving cookies
1305 @cindex cookies, saving
1306 @item --save-cookies @var{file}
1307 Save cookies to @var{file} before exiting. This will not save cookies
1308 that have expired or that have no expiry time (so-called ``session
1309 cookies''), but also see @samp{--keep-session-cookies}.
1311 @cindex cookies, session
1312 @cindex session cookies
1313 @item --keep-session-cookies
1314 When specified, causes @samp{--save-cookies} to also save session
1315 cookies. Session cookies are normally not saved because they are
1316 meant to be kept in memory and forgotten when you exit the browser.
1317 Saving them is useful on sites that require you to log in or to visit
1318 the home page before you can access some pages. With this option,
1319 multiple Wget runs are considered a single browser session as far as
1320 the site is concerned.
1322 Since the cookie file format does not normally carry session cookies,
1323 Wget marks them with an expiry timestamp of 0. Wget's
1324 @samp{--load-cookies} recognizes those as session cookies, but it might
1325 confuse other browsers. Also note that cookies so loaded will be
1326 treated as other session cookies, which means that if you want
1327 @samp{--save-cookies} to preserve them again, you must use
1328 @samp{--keep-session-cookies} again.
1330 @cindex Content-Length, ignore
1331 @cindex ignore length
1332 @item --ignore-length
1333 Unfortunately, some @sc{http} servers (@sc{cgi} programs, to be more
1334 precise) send out bogus @code{Content-Length} headers, which makes Wget
1335 go wild, as it thinks not all the document was retrieved. You can spot
1336 this syndrome if Wget retries getting the same document again and again,
1337 each time claiming that the (otherwise normal) connection has closed on
1340 With this option, Wget will ignore the @code{Content-Length} header---as
1341 if it never existed.
1344 @item --header=@var{header-line}
1345 Send @var{header-line} along with the rest of the headers in each
1346 @sc{http} request. The supplied header is sent as-is, which means it
1347 must contain name and value separated by colon, and must not contain
1350 You may define more than one additional header by specifying
1351 @samp{--header} more than once.
1355 wget --header='Accept-Charset: iso-8859-2' \
1356 --header='Accept-Language: hr' \
1357 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/
1361 Specification of an empty string as the header value will clear all
1362 previous user-defined headers.
1364 As of Wget 1.10, this option can be used to override headers otherwise
1365 generated automatically. This example instructs Wget to connect to
1366 localhost, but to specify @samp{foo.bar} in the @code{Host} header:
1369 wget --header="Host: foo.bar" http://localhost/
1372 In versions of Wget prior to 1.10 such use of @samp{--header} caused
1373 sending of duplicate headers.
1376 @item --max-redirect=@var{number}
1377 Specifies the maximum number of redirections to follow for a resource.
1378 The default is 20, which is usually far more than necessary. However, on
1379 those occasions where you want to allow more (or fewer), this is the
1383 @cindex proxy password
1384 @cindex proxy authentication
1385 @item --proxy-user=@var{user}
1386 @itemx --proxy-password=@var{password}
1387 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} for
1388 authentication on a proxy server. Wget will encode them using the
1389 @code{basic} authentication scheme.
1391 Security considerations similar to those with @samp{--http-password}
1392 pertain here as well.
1394 @cindex http referer
1395 @cindex referer, http
1396 @item --referer=@var{url}
1397 Include `Referer: @var{url}' header in HTTP request. Useful for
1398 retrieving documents with server-side processing that assume they are
1399 always being retrieved by interactive web browsers and only come out
1400 properly when Referer is set to one of the pages that point to them.
1402 @cindex server response, save
1403 @item --save-headers
1404 Save the headers sent by the @sc{http} server to the file, preceding the
1405 actual contents, with an empty line as the separator.
1408 @item -U @var{agent-string}
1409 @itemx --user-agent=@var{agent-string}
1410 Identify as @var{agent-string} to the @sc{http} server.
1412 The @sc{http} protocol allows the clients to identify themselves using a
1413 @code{User-Agent} header field. This enables distinguishing the
1414 @sc{www} software, usually for statistical purposes or for tracing of
1415 protocol violations. Wget normally identifies as
1416 @samp{Wget/@var{version}}, @var{version} being the current version
1419 However, some sites have been known to impose the policy of tailoring
1420 the output according to the @code{User-Agent}-supplied information.
1421 While this is not such a bad idea in theory, it has been abused by
1422 servers denying information to clients other than (historically)
1423 Netscape or, more frequently, Microsoft Internet Explorer. This
1424 option allows you to change the @code{User-Agent} line issued by Wget.
1425 Use of this option is discouraged, unless you really know what you are
1428 Specifying empty user agent with @samp{--user-agent=""} instructs Wget
1429 not to send the @code{User-Agent} header in @sc{http} requests.
1432 @item --post-data=@var{string}
1433 @itemx --post-file=@var{file}
1434 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send the specified
1435 data in the request body. @samp{--post-data} sends @var{string} as
1436 data, whereas @samp{--post-file} sends the contents of @var{file}.
1437 Other than that, they work in exactly the same way. In particular,
1438 they @emph{both} expect content of the form @code{key1=value1&key2=value2},
1439 with percent-encoding for special characters; the only difference is
1440 that one expects its content as a command-line paramter and the other
1441 accepts its content from a file. In particular, @samp{--post-file} is
1442 @emph{not} for transmitting files as form attachments: those must
1443 appear as @code{key=value} data (with appropriate percent-coding) just
1444 like everything else. Wget does not currently support
1445 @code{multipart/form-data} for transmitting POST data; only
1446 @code{application/x-www-form-urlencoded}. Only one of
1447 @samp{--post-data} and @samp{--post-file} should be specified.
1449 Please be aware that Wget needs to know the size of the POST data in
1450 advance. Therefore the argument to @code{--post-file} must be a regular
1451 file; specifying a FIFO or something like @file{/dev/stdin} won't work.
1452 It's not quite clear how to work around this limitation inherent in
1453 HTTP/1.0. Although HTTP/1.1 introduces @dfn{chunked} transfer that
1454 doesn't require knowing the request length in advance, a client can't
1455 use chunked unless it knows it's talking to an HTTP/1.1 server. And it
1456 can't know that until it receives a response, which in turn requires the
1457 request to have been completed -- a chicken-and-egg problem.
1459 Note: if Wget is redirected after the POST request is completed, it
1460 will not send the POST data to the redirected URL. This is because
1461 URLs that process POST often respond with a redirection to a regular
1462 page, which does not desire or accept POST. It is not completely
1463 clear that this behavior is optimal; if it doesn't work out, it might
1464 be changed in the future.
1466 This example shows how to log to a server using POST and then proceed to
1467 download the desired pages, presumably only accessible to authorized
1472 # @r{Log in to the server. This can be done only once.}
1473 wget --save-cookies cookies.txt \
1474 --post-data 'user=foo&password=bar' \
1475 http://server.com/auth.php
1477 # @r{Now grab the page or pages we care about.}
1478 wget --load-cookies cookies.txt \
1479 -p http://server.com/interesting/article.php
1483 If the server is using session cookies to track user authentication,
1484 the above will not work because @samp{--save-cookies} will not save
1485 them (and neither will browsers) and the @file{cookies.txt} file will
1486 be empty. In that case use @samp{--keep-session-cookies} along with
1487 @samp{--save-cookies} to force saving of session cookies.
1489 @cindex Content-Disposition
1490 @item --content-disposition
1492 If this is set to on, experimental (not fully-functional) support for
1493 @code{Content-Disposition} headers is enabled. This can currently result in
1494 extra round-trips to the server for a @code{HEAD} request, and is known
1495 to suffer from a few bugs, which is why it is not currently enabled by default.
1497 This option is useful for some file-downloading CGI programs that use
1498 @code{Content-Disposition} headers to describe what the name of a
1499 downloaded file should be.
1501 @cindex Trust server names
1502 @item --trust-server-names
1504 If this is set to on, on a redirect the last component of the
1505 redirection URL will be used as the local file name. By default it is
1506 used the last component in the original URL.
1508 @cindex authentication
1509 @item --auth-no-challenge
1511 If this option is given, Wget will send Basic HTTP authentication
1512 information (plaintext username and password) for all requests, just
1513 like Wget 1.10.2 and prior did by default.
1515 Use of this option is not recommended, and is intended only to support
1516 some few obscure servers, which never send HTTP authentication
1517 challenges, but accept unsolicited auth info, say, in addition to
1518 form-based authentication.
1522 @node HTTPS (SSL/TLS) Options, FTP Options, HTTP Options, Invoking
1523 @section HTTPS (SSL/TLS) Options
1526 To support encrypted HTTP (HTTPS) downloads, Wget must be compiled
1527 with an external SSL library, currently OpenSSL. If Wget is compiled
1528 without SSL support, none of these options are available.
1531 @cindex SSL protocol, choose
1532 @item --secure-protocol=@var{protocol}
1533 Choose the secure protocol to be used. Legal values are @samp{auto},
1534 @samp{SSLv2}, @samp{SSLv3}, and @samp{TLSv1}. If @samp{auto} is used,
1535 the SSL library is given the liberty of choosing the appropriate
1536 protocol automatically, which is achieved by sending an SSLv2 greeting
1537 and announcing support for SSLv3 and TLSv1. This is the default.
1539 Specifying @samp{SSLv2}, @samp{SSLv3}, or @samp{TLSv1} forces the use
1540 of the corresponding protocol. This is useful when talking to old and
1541 buggy SSL server implementations that make it hard for OpenSSL to
1542 choose the correct protocol version. Fortunately, such servers are
1545 @cindex SSL certificate, check
1546 @item --no-check-certificate
1547 Don't check the server certificate against the available certificate
1548 authorities. Also don't require the URL host name to match the common
1549 name presented by the certificate.
1551 As of Wget 1.10, the default is to verify the server's certificate
1552 against the recognized certificate authorities, breaking the SSL
1553 handshake and aborting the download if the verification fails.
1554 Although this provides more secure downloads, it does break
1555 interoperability with some sites that worked with previous Wget
1556 versions, particularly those using self-signed, expired, or otherwise
1557 invalid certificates. This option forces an ``insecure'' mode of
1558 operation that turns the certificate verification errors into warnings
1559 and allows you to proceed.
1561 If you encounter ``certificate verification'' errors or ones saying
1562 that ``common name doesn't match requested host name'', you can use
1563 this option to bypass the verification and proceed with the download.
1564 @emph{Only use this option if you are otherwise convinced of the
1565 site's authenticity, or if you really don't care about the validity of
1566 its certificate.} It is almost always a bad idea not to check the
1567 certificates when transmitting confidential or important data.
1569 @cindex SSL certificate
1570 @item --certificate=@var{file}
1571 Use the client certificate stored in @var{file}. This is needed for
1572 servers that are configured to require certificates from the clients
1573 that connect to them. Normally a certificate is not required and this
1576 @cindex SSL certificate type, specify
1577 @item --certificate-type=@var{type}
1578 Specify the type of the client certificate. Legal values are
1579 @samp{PEM} (assumed by default) and @samp{DER}, also known as
1582 @item --private-key=@var{file}
1583 Read the private key from @var{file}. This allows you to provide the
1584 private key in a file separate from the certificate.
1586 @item --private-key-type=@var{type}
1587 Specify the type of the private key. Accepted values are @samp{PEM}
1588 (the default) and @samp{DER}.
1590 @item --ca-certificate=@var{file}
1591 Use @var{file} as the file with the bundle of certificate authorities
1592 (``CA'') to verify the peers. The certificates must be in PEM format.
1594 Without this option Wget looks for CA certificates at the
1595 system-specified locations, chosen at OpenSSL installation time.
1597 @cindex SSL certificate authority
1598 @item --ca-directory=@var{directory}
1599 Specifies directory containing CA certificates in PEM format. Each
1600 file contains one CA certificate, and the file name is based on a hash
1601 value derived from the certificate. This is achieved by processing a
1602 certificate directory with the @code{c_rehash} utility supplied with
1603 OpenSSL. Using @samp{--ca-directory} is more efficient than
1604 @samp{--ca-certificate} when many certificates are installed because
1605 it allows Wget to fetch certificates on demand.
1607 Without this option Wget looks for CA certificates at the
1608 system-specified locations, chosen at OpenSSL installation time.
1610 @cindex entropy, specifying source of
1611 @cindex randomness, specifying source of
1612 @item --random-file=@var{file}
1613 Use @var{file} as the source of random data for seeding the
1614 pseudo-random number generator on systems without @file{/dev/random}.
1616 On such systems the SSL library needs an external source of randomness
1617 to initialize. Randomness may be provided by EGD (see
1618 @samp{--egd-file} below) or read from an external source specified by
1619 the user. If this option is not specified, Wget looks for random data
1620 in @code{$RANDFILE} or, if that is unset, in @file{$HOME/.rnd}. If
1621 none of those are available, it is likely that SSL encryption will not
1624 If you're getting the ``Could not seed OpenSSL PRNG; disabling SSL.''
1625 error, you should provide random data using some of the methods
1629 @item --egd-file=@var{file}
1630 Use @var{file} as the EGD socket. EGD stands for @dfn{Entropy
1631 Gathering Daemon}, a user-space program that collects data from
1632 various unpredictable system sources and makes it available to other
1633 programs that might need it. Encryption software, such as the SSL
1634 library, needs sources of non-repeating randomness to seed the random
1635 number generator used to produce cryptographically strong keys.
1637 OpenSSL allows the user to specify his own source of entropy using the
1638 @code{RAND_FILE} environment variable. If this variable is unset, or
1639 if the specified file does not produce enough randomness, OpenSSL will
1640 read random data from EGD socket specified using this option.
1642 If this option is not specified (and the equivalent startup command is
1643 not used), EGD is never contacted. EGD is not needed on modern Unix
1644 systems that support @file{/dev/random}.
1647 @node FTP Options, Recursive Retrieval Options, HTTPS (SSL/TLS) Options, Invoking
1648 @section FTP Options
1652 @cindex ftp password
1653 @cindex ftp authentication
1654 @item --ftp-user=@var{user}
1655 @itemx --ftp-password=@var{password}
1656 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} on an
1657 @sc{ftp} server. Without this, or the corresponding startup option,
1658 the password defaults to @samp{-wget@@}, normally used for anonymous
1661 Another way to specify username and password is in the @sc{url} itself
1662 (@pxref{URL Format}). Either method reveals your password to anyone who
1663 bothers to run @code{ps}. To prevent the passwords from being seen,
1664 store them in @file{.wgetrc} or @file{.netrc}, and make sure to protect
1665 those files from other users with @code{chmod}. If the passwords are
1666 really important, do not leave them lying in those files either---edit
1667 the files and delete them after Wget has started the download.
1670 For more information about security issues with Wget, @xref{Security
1674 @cindex .listing files, removing
1675 @item --no-remove-listing
1676 Don't remove the temporary @file{.listing} files generated by @sc{ftp}
1677 retrievals. Normally, these files contain the raw directory listings
1678 received from @sc{ftp} servers. Not removing them can be useful for
1679 debugging purposes, or when you want to be able to easily check on the
1680 contents of remote server directories (e.g. to verify that a mirror
1681 you're running is complete).
1683 Note that even though Wget writes to a known filename for this file,
1684 this is not a security hole in the scenario of a user making
1685 @file{.listing} a symbolic link to @file{/etc/passwd} or something and
1686 asking @code{root} to run Wget in his or her directory. Depending on
1687 the options used, either Wget will refuse to write to @file{.listing},
1688 making the globbing/recursion/time-stamping operation fail, or the
1689 symbolic link will be deleted and replaced with the actual
1690 @file{.listing} file, or the listing will be written to a
1691 @file{.listing.@var{number}} file.
1693 Even though this situation isn't a problem, though, @code{root} should
1694 never run Wget in a non-trusted user's directory. A user could do
1695 something as simple as linking @file{index.html} to @file{/etc/passwd}
1696 and asking @code{root} to run Wget with @samp{-N} or @samp{-r} so the file
1697 will be overwritten.
1699 @cindex globbing, toggle
1701 Turn off @sc{ftp} globbing. Globbing refers to the use of shell-like
1702 special characters (@dfn{wildcards}), like @samp{*}, @samp{?}, @samp{[}
1703 and @samp{]} to retrieve more than one file from the same directory at
1707 wget ftp://gnjilux.srk.fer.hr/*.msg
1710 By default, globbing will be turned on if the @sc{url} contains a
1711 globbing character. This option may be used to turn globbing on or off
1714 You may have to quote the @sc{url} to protect it from being expanded by
1715 your shell. Globbing makes Wget look for a directory listing, which is
1716 system-specific. This is why it currently works only with Unix @sc{ftp}
1717 servers (and the ones emulating Unix @code{ls} output).
1720 @item --no-passive-ftp
1721 Disable the use of the @dfn{passive} FTP transfer mode. Passive FTP
1722 mandates that the client connect to the server to establish the data
1723 connection rather than the other way around.
1725 If the machine is connected to the Internet directly, both passive and
1726 active FTP should work equally well. Behind most firewall and NAT
1727 configurations passive FTP has a better chance of working. However,
1728 in some rare firewall configurations, active FTP actually works when
1729 passive FTP doesn't. If you suspect this to be the case, use this
1730 option, or set @code{passive_ftp=off} in your init file.
1732 @cindex symbolic links, retrieving
1733 @item --retr-symlinks
1734 Usually, when retrieving @sc{ftp} directories recursively and a symbolic
1735 link is encountered, the linked-to file is not downloaded. Instead, a
1736 matching symbolic link is created on the local filesystem. The
1737 pointed-to file will not be downloaded unless this recursive retrieval
1738 would have encountered it separately and downloaded it anyway.
1740 When @samp{--retr-symlinks} is specified, however, symbolic links are
1741 traversed and the pointed-to files are retrieved. At this time, this
1742 option does not cause Wget to traverse symlinks to directories and
1743 recurse through them, but in the future it should be enhanced to do
1746 Note that when retrieving a file (not a directory) because it was
1747 specified on the command-line, rather than because it was recursed to,
1748 this option has no effect. Symbolic links are always traversed in this
1752 @node Recursive Retrieval Options, Recursive Accept/Reject Options, FTP Options, Invoking
1753 @section Recursive Retrieval Options
1758 Turn on recursive retrieving. @xref{Recursive Download}, for more
1761 @item -l @var{depth}
1762 @itemx --level=@var{depth}
1763 Specify recursion maximum depth level @var{depth} (@pxref{Recursive
1764 Download}). The default maximum depth is 5.
1766 @cindex proxy filling
1767 @cindex delete after retrieval
1768 @cindex filling proxy cache
1769 @item --delete-after
1770 This option tells Wget to delete every single file it downloads,
1771 @emph{after} having done so. It is useful for pre-fetching popular
1772 pages through a proxy, e.g.:
1775 wget -r -nd --delete-after http://whatever.com/~popular/page/
1778 The @samp{-r} option is to retrieve recursively, and @samp{-nd} to not
1781 Note that @samp{--delete-after} deletes files on the local machine. It
1782 does not issue the @samp{DELE} command to remote FTP sites, for
1783 instance. Also note that when @samp{--delete-after} is specified,
1784 @samp{--convert-links} is ignored, so @samp{.orig} files are simply not
1785 created in the first place.
1787 @cindex conversion of links
1788 @cindex link conversion
1790 @itemx --convert-links
1791 After the download is complete, convert the links in the document to
1792 make them suitable for local viewing. This affects not only the visible
1793 hyperlinks, but any part of the document that links to external content,
1794 such as embedded images, links to style sheets, hyperlinks to non-@sc{html}
1797 Each link will be changed in one of the two ways:
1801 The links to files that have been downloaded by Wget will be changed to
1802 refer to the file they point to as a relative link.
1804 Example: if the downloaded file @file{/foo/doc.html} links to
1805 @file{/bar/img.gif}, also downloaded, then the link in @file{doc.html}
1806 will be modified to point to @samp{../bar/img.gif}. This kind of
1807 transformation works reliably for arbitrary combinations of directories.
1810 The links to files that have not been downloaded by Wget will be changed
1811 to include host name and absolute path of the location they point to.
1813 Example: if the downloaded file @file{/foo/doc.html} links to
1814 @file{/bar/img.gif} (or to @file{../bar/img.gif}), then the link in
1815 @file{doc.html} will be modified to point to
1816 @file{http://@var{hostname}/bar/img.gif}.
1819 Because of this, local browsing works reliably: if a linked file was
1820 downloaded, the link will refer to its local name; if it was not
1821 downloaded, the link will refer to its full Internet address rather than
1822 presenting a broken link. The fact that the former links are converted
1823 to relative links ensures that you can move the downloaded hierarchy to
1826 Note that only at the end of the download can Wget know which links have
1827 been downloaded. Because of that, the work done by @samp{-k} will be
1828 performed at the end of all the downloads.
1830 @cindex backing up converted files
1832 @itemx --backup-converted
1833 When converting a file, back up the original version with a @samp{.orig}
1834 suffix. Affects the behavior of @samp{-N} (@pxref{HTTP Time-Stamping
1839 Turn on options suitable for mirroring. This option turns on recursion
1840 and time-stamping, sets infinite recursion depth and keeps @sc{ftp}
1841 directory listings. It is currently equivalent to
1842 @samp{-r -N -l inf --no-remove-listing}.
1844 @cindex page requisites
1845 @cindex required images, downloading
1847 @itemx --page-requisites
1848 This option causes Wget to download all the files that are necessary to
1849 properly display a given @sc{html} page. This includes such things as
1850 inlined images, sounds, and referenced stylesheets.
1852 Ordinarily, when downloading a single @sc{html} page, any requisite documents
1853 that may be needed to display it properly are not downloaded. Using
1854 @samp{-r} together with @samp{-l} can help, but since Wget does not
1855 ordinarily distinguish between external and inlined documents, one is
1856 generally left with ``leaf documents'' that are missing their
1859 For instance, say document @file{1.html} contains an @code{<IMG>} tag
1860 referencing @file{1.gif} and an @code{<A>} tag pointing to external
1861 document @file{2.html}. Say that @file{2.html} is similar but that its
1862 image is @file{2.gif} and it links to @file{3.html}. Say this
1863 continues up to some arbitrarily high number.
1865 If one executes the command:
1868 wget -r -l 2 http://@var{site}/1.html
1871 then @file{1.html}, @file{1.gif}, @file{2.html}, @file{2.gif}, and
1872 @file{3.html} will be downloaded. As you can see, @file{3.html} is
1873 without its requisite @file{3.gif} because Wget is simply counting the
1874 number of hops (up to 2) away from @file{1.html} in order to determine
1875 where to stop the recursion. However, with this command:
1878 wget -r -l 2 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1881 all the above files @emph{and} @file{3.html}'s requisite @file{3.gif}
1882 will be downloaded. Similarly,
1885 wget -r -l 1 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1888 will cause @file{1.html}, @file{1.gif}, @file{2.html}, and @file{2.gif}
1889 to be downloaded. One might think that:
1892 wget -r -l 0 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1895 would download just @file{1.html} and @file{1.gif}, but unfortunately
1896 this is not the case, because @samp{-l 0} is equivalent to
1897 @samp{-l inf}---that is, infinite recursion. To download a single @sc{html}
1898 page (or a handful of them, all specified on the command-line or in a
1899 @samp{-i} @sc{url} input file) and its (or their) requisites, simply leave off
1900 @samp{-r} and @samp{-l}:
1903 wget -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1906 Note that Wget will behave as if @samp{-r} had been specified, but only
1907 that single page and its requisites will be downloaded. Links from that
1908 page to external documents will not be followed. Actually, to download
1909 a single page and all its requisites (even if they exist on separate
1910 websites), and make sure the lot displays properly locally, this author
1911 likes to use a few options in addition to @samp{-p}:
1914 wget -E -H -k -K -p http://@var{site}/@var{document}
1917 To finish off this topic, it's worth knowing that Wget's idea of an
1918 external document link is any URL specified in an @code{<A>} tag, an
1919 @code{<AREA>} tag, or a @code{<LINK>} tag other than @code{<LINK
1922 @cindex @sc{html} comments
1923 @cindex comments, @sc{html}
1924 @item --strict-comments
1925 Turn on strict parsing of @sc{html} comments. The default is to terminate
1926 comments at the first occurrence of @samp{-->}.
1928 According to specifications, @sc{html} comments are expressed as @sc{sgml}
1929 @dfn{declarations}. Declaration is special markup that begins with
1930 @samp{<!} and ends with @samp{>}, such as @samp{<!DOCTYPE ...>}, that
1931 may contain comments between a pair of @samp{--} delimiters. @sc{html}
1932 comments are ``empty declarations'', @sc{sgml} declarations without any
1933 non-comment text. Therefore, @samp{<!--foo-->} is a valid comment, and
1934 so is @samp{<!--one-- --two-->}, but @samp{<!--1--2-->} is not.
1936 On the other hand, most @sc{html} writers don't perceive comments as anything
1937 other than text delimited with @samp{<!--} and @samp{-->}, which is not
1938 quite the same. For example, something like @samp{<!------------>}
1939 works as a valid comment as long as the number of dashes is a multiple
1940 of four (!). If not, the comment technically lasts until the next
1941 @samp{--}, which may be at the other end of the document. Because of
1942 this, many popular browsers completely ignore the specification and
1943 implement what users have come to expect: comments delimited with
1944 @samp{<!--} and @samp{-->}.
1946 Until version 1.9, Wget interpreted comments strictly, which resulted in
1947 missing links in many web pages that displayed fine in browsers, but had
1948 the misfortune of containing non-compliant comments. Beginning with
1949 version 1.9, Wget has joined the ranks of clients that implements
1950 ``naive'' comments, terminating each comment at the first occurrence of
1953 If, for whatever reason, you want strict comment parsing, use this
1954 option to turn it on.
1957 @node Recursive Accept/Reject Options, Exit Status, Recursive Retrieval Options, Invoking
1958 @section Recursive Accept/Reject Options
1961 @item -A @var{acclist} --accept @var{acclist}
1962 @itemx -R @var{rejlist} --reject @var{rejlist}
1963 Specify comma-separated lists of file name suffixes or patterns to
1964 accept or reject (@pxref{Types of Files}). Note that if
1965 any of the wildcard characters, @samp{*}, @samp{?}, @samp{[} or
1966 @samp{]}, appear in an element of @var{acclist} or @var{rejlist},
1967 it will be treated as a pattern, rather than a suffix.
1969 @item -D @var{domain-list}
1970 @itemx --domains=@var{domain-list}
1971 Set domains to be followed. @var{domain-list} is a comma-separated list
1972 of domains. Note that it does @emph{not} turn on @samp{-H}.
1974 @item --exclude-domains @var{domain-list}
1975 Specify the domains that are @emph{not} to be followed.
1976 (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
1978 @cindex follow FTP links
1980 Follow @sc{ftp} links from @sc{html} documents. Without this option,
1981 Wget will ignore all the @sc{ftp} links.
1983 @cindex tag-based recursive pruning
1984 @item --follow-tags=@var{list}
1985 Wget has an internal table of @sc{html} tag / attribute pairs that it
1986 considers when looking for linked documents during a recursive
1987 retrieval. If a user wants only a subset of those tags to be
1988 considered, however, he or she should be specify such tags in a
1989 comma-separated @var{list} with this option.
1991 @item --ignore-tags=@var{list}
1992 This is the opposite of the @samp{--follow-tags} option. To skip
1993 certain @sc{html} tags when recursively looking for documents to download,
1994 specify them in a comma-separated @var{list}.
1996 In the past, this option was the best bet for downloading a single page
1997 and its requisites, using a command-line like:
2000 wget --ignore-tags=a,area -H -k -K -r http://@var{site}/@var{document}
2003 However, the author of this option came across a page with tags like
2004 @code{<LINK REL="home" HREF="/">} and came to the realization that
2005 specifying tags to ignore was not enough. One can't just tell Wget to
2006 ignore @code{<LINK>}, because then stylesheets will not be downloaded.
2007 Now the best bet for downloading a single page and its requisites is the
2008 dedicated @samp{--page-requisites} option.
2013 Ignore case when matching files and directories. This influences the
2014 behavior of -R, -A, -I, and -X options, as well as globbing
2015 implemented when downloading from FTP sites. For example, with this
2016 option, @samp{-A *.txt} will match @samp{file1.txt}, but also
2017 @samp{file2.TXT}, @samp{file3.TxT}, and so on.
2021 Enable spanning across hosts when doing recursive retrieving
2022 (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
2026 Follow relative links only. Useful for retrieving a specific home page
2027 without any distractions, not even those from the same hosts
2028 (@pxref{Relative Links}).
2031 @itemx --include-directories=@var{list}
2032 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to follow when
2033 downloading (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}). Elements
2034 of @var{list} may contain wildcards.
2037 @itemx --exclude-directories=@var{list}
2038 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to exclude from
2039 download (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}). Elements of
2040 @var{list} may contain wildcards.
2044 Do not ever ascend to the parent directory when retrieving recursively.
2045 This is a useful option, since it guarantees that only the files
2046 @emph{below} a certain hierarchy will be downloaded.
2047 @xref{Directory-Based Limits}, for more details.
2052 @node Exit Status, , Recursive Accept/Reject Options, Invoking
2053 @section Exit Status
2055 @c man begin EXITSTATUS
2057 Wget may return one of several error codes if it encounters problems.
2062 No problems occurred.
2068 Parse error---for instance, when parsing command-line options, the
2069 @samp{.wgetrc} or @samp{.netrc}...
2078 SSL verification failure.
2081 Username/password authentication failure.
2087 Server issued an error response.
2091 With the exceptions of 0 and 1, the lower-numbered exit codes take
2092 precedence over higher-numbered ones, when multiple types of errors
2095 In versions of Wget prior to 1.12, Wget's exit status tended to be
2096 unhelpful and inconsistent. Recursive downloads would virtually always
2097 return 0 (success), regardless of any issues encountered, and
2098 non-recursive fetches only returned the status corresponding to the
2099 most recently-attempted download.
2103 @node Recursive Download, Following Links, Invoking, Top
2104 @chapter Recursive Download
2107 @cindex recursive download
2109 GNU Wget is capable of traversing parts of the Web (or a single
2110 @sc{http} or @sc{ftp} server), following links and directory structure.
2111 We refer to this as to @dfn{recursive retrieval}, or @dfn{recursion}.
2113 With @sc{http} @sc{url}s, Wget retrieves and parses the @sc{html} or
2114 @sc{css} from the given @sc{url}, retrieving the files the document
2115 refers to, through markup like @code{href} or @code{src}, or @sc{css}
2116 @sc{uri} values specified using the @samp{url()} functional notation.
2117 If the freshly downloaded file is also of type @code{text/html},
2118 @code{application/xhtml+xml}, or @code{text/css}, it will be parsed
2119 and followed further.
2121 Recursive retrieval of @sc{http} and @sc{html}/@sc{css} content is
2122 @dfn{breadth-first}. This means that Wget first downloads the requested
2123 document, then the documents linked from that document, then the
2124 documents linked by them, and so on. In other words, Wget first
2125 downloads the documents at depth 1, then those at depth 2, and so on
2126 until the specified maximum depth.
2128 The maximum @dfn{depth} to which the retrieval may descend is specified
2129 with the @samp{-l} option. The default maximum depth is five layers.
2131 When retrieving an @sc{ftp} @sc{url} recursively, Wget will retrieve all
2132 the data from the given directory tree (including the subdirectories up
2133 to the specified depth) on the remote server, creating its mirror image
2134 locally. @sc{ftp} retrieval is also limited by the @code{depth}
2135 parameter. Unlike @sc{http} recursion, @sc{ftp} recursion is performed
2138 By default, Wget will create a local directory tree, corresponding to
2139 the one found on the remote server.
2141 Recursive retrieving can find a number of applications, the most
2142 important of which is mirroring. It is also useful for @sc{www}
2143 presentations, and any other opportunities where slow network
2144 connections should be bypassed by storing the files locally.
2146 You should be warned that recursive downloads can overload the remote
2147 servers. Because of that, many administrators frown upon them and may
2148 ban access from your site if they detect very fast downloads of big
2149 amounts of content. When downloading from Internet servers, consider
2150 using the @samp{-w} option to introduce a delay between accesses to the
2151 server. The download will take a while longer, but the server
2152 administrator will not be alarmed by your rudeness.
2154 Of course, recursive download may cause problems on your machine. If
2155 left to run unchecked, it can easily fill up the disk. If downloading
2156 from local network, it can also take bandwidth on the system, as well as
2157 consume memory and CPU.
2159 Try to specify the criteria that match the kind of download you are
2160 trying to achieve. If you want to download only one page, use
2161 @samp{--page-requisites} without any additional recursion. If you want
2162 to download things under one directory, use @samp{-np} to avoid
2163 downloading things from other directories. If you want to download all
2164 the files from one directory, use @samp{-l 1} to make sure the recursion
2165 depth never exceeds one. @xref{Following Links}, for more information
2168 Recursive retrieval should be used with care. Don't say you were not
2171 @node Following Links, Time-Stamping, Recursive Download, Top
2172 @chapter Following Links
2174 @cindex following links
2176 When retrieving recursively, one does not wish to retrieve loads of
2177 unnecessary data. Most of the time the users bear in mind exactly what
2178 they want to download, and want Wget to follow only specific links.
2180 For example, if you wish to download the music archive from
2181 @samp{fly.srk.fer.hr}, you will not want to download all the home pages
2182 that happen to be referenced by an obscure part of the archive.
2184 Wget possesses several mechanisms that allows you to fine-tune which
2185 links it will follow.
2188 * Spanning Hosts:: (Un)limiting retrieval based on host name.
2189 * Types of Files:: Getting only certain files.
2190 * Directory-Based Limits:: Getting only certain directories.
2191 * Relative Links:: Follow relative links only.
2192 * FTP Links:: Following FTP links.
2195 @node Spanning Hosts, Types of Files, Following Links, Following Links
2196 @section Spanning Hosts
2197 @cindex spanning hosts
2198 @cindex hosts, spanning
2200 Wget's recursive retrieval normally refuses to visit hosts different
2201 than the one you specified on the command line. This is a reasonable
2202 default; without it, every retrieval would have the potential to turn
2203 your Wget into a small version of google.
2205 However, visiting different hosts, or @dfn{host spanning,} is sometimes
2206 a useful option. Maybe the images are served from a different server.
2207 Maybe you're mirroring a site that consists of pages interlinked between
2208 three servers. Maybe the server has two equivalent names, and the @sc{html}
2209 pages refer to both interchangeably.
2212 @item Span to any host---@samp{-H}
2214 The @samp{-H} option turns on host spanning, thus allowing Wget's
2215 recursive run to visit any host referenced by a link. Unless sufficient
2216 recursion-limiting criteria are applied depth, these foreign hosts will
2217 typically link to yet more hosts, and so on until Wget ends up sucking
2218 up much more data than you have intended.
2220 @item Limit spanning to certain domains---@samp{-D}
2222 The @samp{-D} option allows you to specify the domains that will be
2223 followed, thus limiting the recursion only to the hosts that belong to
2224 these domains. Obviously, this makes sense only in conjunction with
2225 @samp{-H}. A typical example would be downloading the contents of
2226 @samp{www.server.com}, but allowing downloads from
2227 @samp{images.server.com}, etc.:
2230 wget -rH -Dserver.com http://www.server.com/
2233 You can specify more than one address by separating them with a comma,
2234 e.g. @samp{-Ddomain1.com,domain2.com}.
2236 @item Keep download off certain domains---@samp{--exclude-domains}
2238 If there are domains you want to exclude specifically, you can do it
2239 with @samp{--exclude-domains}, which accepts the same type of arguments
2240 of @samp{-D}, but will @emph{exclude} all the listed domains. For
2241 example, if you want to download all the hosts from @samp{foo.edu}
2242 domain, with the exception of @samp{sunsite.foo.edu}, you can do it like
2246 wget -rH -Dfoo.edu --exclude-domains sunsite.foo.edu \
2252 @node Types of Files, Directory-Based Limits, Spanning Hosts, Following Links
2253 @section Types of Files
2254 @cindex types of files
2256 When downloading material from the web, you will often want to restrict
2257 the retrieval to only certain file types. For example, if you are
2258 interested in downloading @sc{gif}s, you will not be overjoyed to get
2259 loads of PostScript documents, and vice versa.
2261 Wget offers two options to deal with this problem. Each option
2262 description lists a short name, a long name, and the equivalent command
2265 @cindex accept wildcards
2266 @cindex accept suffixes
2267 @cindex wildcards, accept
2268 @cindex suffixes, accept
2270 @item -A @var{acclist}
2271 @itemx --accept @var{acclist}
2272 @itemx accept = @var{acclist}
2273 The argument to @samp{--accept} option is a list of file suffixes or
2274 patterns that Wget will download during recursive retrieval. A suffix
2275 is the ending part of a file, and consists of ``normal'' letters,
2276 e.g. @samp{gif} or @samp{.jpg}. A matching pattern contains shell-like
2277 wildcards, e.g. @samp{books*} or @samp{zelazny*196[0-9]*}.
2279 So, specifying @samp{wget -A gif,jpg} will make Wget download only the
2280 files ending with @samp{gif} or @samp{jpg}, i.e. @sc{gif}s and
2281 @sc{jpeg}s. On the other hand, @samp{wget -A "zelazny*196[0-9]*"} will
2282 download only files beginning with @samp{zelazny} and containing numbers
2283 from 1960 to 1969 anywhere within. Look up the manual of your shell for
2284 a description of how pattern matching works.
2286 Of course, any number of suffixes and patterns can be combined into a
2287 comma-separated list, and given as an argument to @samp{-A}.
2289 @cindex reject wildcards
2290 @cindex reject suffixes
2291 @cindex wildcards, reject
2292 @cindex suffixes, reject
2293 @item -R @var{rejlist}
2294 @itemx --reject @var{rejlist}
2295 @itemx reject = @var{rejlist}
2296 The @samp{--reject} option works the same way as @samp{--accept}, only
2297 its logic is the reverse; Wget will download all files @emph{except} the
2298 ones matching the suffixes (or patterns) in the list.
2300 So, if you want to download a whole page except for the cumbersome
2301 @sc{mpeg}s and @sc{.au} files, you can use @samp{wget -R mpg,mpeg,au}.
2302 Analogously, to download all files except the ones beginning with
2303 @samp{bjork}, use @samp{wget -R "bjork*"}. The quotes are to prevent
2304 expansion by the shell.
2308 The @samp{-A} and @samp{-R} options may be combined to achieve even
2309 better fine-tuning of which files to retrieve. E.g. @samp{wget -A
2310 "*zelazny*" -R .ps} will download all the files having @samp{zelazny} as
2311 a part of their name, but @emph{not} the PostScript files.
2313 Note that these two options do not affect the downloading of @sc{html}
2314 files (as determined by a @samp{.htm} or @samp{.html} filename
2315 prefix). This behavior may not be desirable for all users, and may be
2316 changed for future versions of Wget.
2318 Note, too, that query strings (strings at the end of a URL beginning
2319 with a question mark (@samp{?}) are not included as part of the
2320 filename for accept/reject rules, even though these will actually
2321 contribute to the name chosen for the local file. It is expected that
2322 a future version of Wget will provide an option to allow matching
2323 against query strings.
2325 Finally, it's worth noting that the accept/reject lists are matched
2326 @emph{twice} against downloaded files: once against the URL's filename
2327 portion, to determine if the file should be downloaded in the first
2328 place; then, after it has been accepted and successfully downloaded,
2329 the local file's name is also checked against the accept/reject lists
2330 to see if it should be removed. The rationale was that, since
2331 @samp{.htm} and @samp{.html} files are always downloaded regardless of
2332 accept/reject rules, they should be removed @emph{after} being
2333 downloaded and scanned for links, if they did match the accept/reject
2334 lists. However, this can lead to unexpected results, since the local
2335 filenames can differ from the original URL filenames in the following
2336 ways, all of which can change whether an accept/reject rule matches:
2340 If the local file already exists and @samp{--no-directories} was
2341 specified, a numeric suffix will be appended to the original name.
2343 If @samp{--adjust-extension} was specified, the local filename might have
2344 @samp{.html} appended to it. If Wget is invoked with @samp{-E -A.php},
2345 a filename such as @samp{index.php} will match be accepted, but upon
2346 download will be named @samp{index.php.html}, which no longer matches,
2347 and so the file will be deleted.
2349 Query strings do not contribute to URL matching, but are included in
2350 local filenames, and so @emph{do} contribute to filename matching.
2354 This behavior, too, is considered less-than-desirable, and may change
2355 in a future version of Wget.
2357 @node Directory-Based Limits, Relative Links, Types of Files, Following Links
2358 @section Directory-Based Limits
2360 @cindex directory limits
2362 Regardless of other link-following facilities, it is often useful to
2363 place the restriction of what files to retrieve based on the directories
2364 those files are placed in. There can be many reasons for this---the
2365 home pages may be organized in a reasonable directory structure; or some
2366 directories may contain useless information, e.g. @file{/cgi-bin} or
2367 @file{/dev} directories.
2369 Wget offers three different options to deal with this requirement. Each
2370 option description lists a short name, a long name, and the equivalent
2371 command in @file{.wgetrc}.
2373 @cindex directories, include
2374 @cindex include directories
2375 @cindex accept directories
2378 @itemx --include @var{list}
2379 @itemx include_directories = @var{list}
2380 @samp{-I} option accepts a comma-separated list of directories included
2381 in the retrieval. Any other directories will simply be ignored. The
2382 directories are absolute paths.
2384 So, if you wish to download from @samp{http://host/people/bozo/}
2385 following only links to bozo's colleagues in the @file{/people}
2386 directory and the bogus scripts in @file{/cgi-bin}, you can specify:
2389 wget -I /people,/cgi-bin http://host/people/bozo/
2392 @cindex directories, exclude
2393 @cindex exclude directories
2394 @cindex reject directories
2396 @itemx --exclude @var{list}
2397 @itemx exclude_directories = @var{list}
2398 @samp{-X} option is exactly the reverse of @samp{-I}---this is a list of
2399 directories @emph{excluded} from the download. E.g. if you do not want
2400 Wget to download things from @file{/cgi-bin} directory, specify @samp{-X
2401 /cgi-bin} on the command line.
2403 The same as with @samp{-A}/@samp{-R}, these two options can be combined
2404 to get a better fine-tuning of downloading subdirectories. E.g. if you
2405 want to load all the files from @file{/pub} hierarchy except for
2406 @file{/pub/worthless}, specify @samp{-I/pub -X/pub/worthless}.
2411 @itemx no_parent = on
2412 The simplest, and often very useful way of limiting directories is
2413 disallowing retrieval of the links that refer to the hierarchy
2414 @dfn{above} than the beginning directory, i.e. disallowing ascent to the
2415 parent directory/directories.
2417 The @samp{--no-parent} option (short @samp{-np}) is useful in this case.
2418 Using it guarantees that you will never leave the existing hierarchy.
2419 Supposing you issue Wget with:
2422 wget -r --no-parent http://somehost/~luzer/my-archive/
2425 You may rest assured that none of the references to
2426 @file{/~his-girls-homepage/} or @file{/~luzer/all-my-mpegs/} will be
2427 followed. Only the archive you are interested in will be downloaded.
2428 Essentially, @samp{--no-parent} is similar to
2429 @samp{-I/~luzer/my-archive}, only it handles redirections in a more
2430 intelligent fashion.
2432 @strong{Note} that, for HTTP (and HTTPS), the trailing slash is very
2433 important to @samp{--no-parent}. HTTP has no concept of a ``directory''---Wget
2434 relies on you to indicate what's a directory and what isn't. In
2435 @samp{http://foo/bar/}, Wget will consider @samp{bar} to be a
2436 directory, while in @samp{http://foo/bar} (no trailing slash),
2437 @samp{bar} will be considered a filename (so @samp{--no-parent} would be
2438 meaningless, as its parent is @samp{/}).
2441 @node Relative Links, FTP Links, Directory-Based Limits, Following Links
2442 @section Relative Links
2443 @cindex relative links
2445 When @samp{-L} is turned on, only the relative links are ever followed.
2446 Relative links are here defined those that do not refer to the web
2447 server root. For example, these links are relative:
2451 <a href="foo/bar.gif">
2452 <a href="../foo/bar.gif">
2455 These links are not relative:
2459 <a href="/foo/bar.gif">
2460 <a href="http://www.server.com/foo/bar.gif">
2463 Using this option guarantees that recursive retrieval will not span
2464 hosts, even without @samp{-H}. In simple cases it also allows downloads
2465 to ``just work'' without having to convert links.
2467 This option is probably not very useful and might be removed in a future
2470 @node FTP Links, , Relative Links, Following Links
2471 @section Following FTP Links
2472 @cindex following ftp links
2474 The rules for @sc{ftp} are somewhat specific, as it is necessary for
2475 them to be. @sc{ftp} links in @sc{html} documents are often included
2476 for purposes of reference, and it is often inconvenient to download them
2479 To have @sc{ftp} links followed from @sc{html} documents, you need to
2480 specify the @samp{--follow-ftp} option. Having done that, @sc{ftp}
2481 links will span hosts regardless of @samp{-H} setting. This is logical,
2482 as @sc{ftp} links rarely point to the same host where the @sc{http}
2483 server resides. For similar reasons, the @samp{-L} options has no
2484 effect on such downloads. On the other hand, domain acceptance
2485 (@samp{-D}) and suffix rules (@samp{-A} and @samp{-R}) apply normally.
2487 Also note that followed links to @sc{ftp} directories will not be
2488 retrieved recursively further.
2490 @node Time-Stamping, Startup File, Following Links, Top
2491 @chapter Time-Stamping
2492 @cindex time-stamping
2493 @cindex timestamping
2494 @cindex updating the archives
2495 @cindex incremental updating
2497 One of the most important aspects of mirroring information from the
2498 Internet is updating your archives.
2500 Downloading the whole archive again and again, just to replace a few
2501 changed files is expensive, both in terms of wasted bandwidth and money,
2502 and the time to do the update. This is why all the mirroring tools
2503 offer the option of incremental updating.
2505 Such an updating mechanism means that the remote server is scanned in
2506 search of @dfn{new} files. Only those new files will be downloaded in
2507 the place of the old ones.
2509 A file is considered new if one of these two conditions are met:
2513 A file of that name does not already exist locally.
2516 A file of that name does exist, but the remote file was modified more
2517 recently than the local file.
2520 To implement this, the program needs to be aware of the time of last
2521 modification of both local and remote files. We call this information the
2522 @dfn{time-stamp} of a file.
2524 The time-stamping in GNU Wget is turned on using @samp{--timestamping}
2525 (@samp{-N}) option, or through @code{timestamping = on} directive in
2526 @file{.wgetrc}. With this option, for each file it intends to download,
2527 Wget will check whether a local file of the same name exists. If it
2528 does, and the remote file is not newer, Wget will not download it.
2530 If the local file does not exist, or the sizes of the files do not
2531 match, Wget will download the remote file no matter what the time-stamps
2535 * Time-Stamping Usage::
2536 * HTTP Time-Stamping Internals::
2537 * FTP Time-Stamping Internals::
2540 @node Time-Stamping Usage, HTTP Time-Stamping Internals, Time-Stamping, Time-Stamping
2541 @section Time-Stamping Usage
2542 @cindex time-stamping usage
2543 @cindex usage, time-stamping
2545 The usage of time-stamping is simple. Say you would like to download a
2546 file so that it keeps its date of modification.
2549 wget -S http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/
2552 A simple @code{ls -l} shows that the time stamp on the local file equals
2553 the state of the @code{Last-Modified} header, as returned by the server.
2554 As you can see, the time-stamping info is preserved locally, even
2555 without @samp{-N} (at least for @sc{http}).
2557 Several days later, you would like Wget to check if the remote file has
2558 changed, and download it if it has.
2561 wget -N http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/
2564 Wget will ask the server for the last-modified date. If the local file
2565 has the same timestamp as the server, or a newer one, the remote file
2566 will not be re-fetched. However, if the remote file is more recent,
2567 Wget will proceed to fetch it.
2569 The same goes for @sc{ftp}. For example:
2572 wget "ftp://ftp.ifi.uio.no/pub/emacs/gnus/*"
2575 (The quotes around that URL are to prevent the shell from trying to
2576 interpret the @samp{*}.)
2578 After download, a local directory listing will show that the timestamps
2579 match those on the remote server. Reissuing the command with @samp{-N}
2580 will make Wget re-fetch @emph{only} the files that have been modified
2581 since the last download.
2583 If you wished to mirror the GNU archive every week, you would use a
2584 command like the following, weekly:
2587 wget --timestamping -r ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/
2590 Note that time-stamping will only work for files for which the server
2591 gives a timestamp. For @sc{http}, this depends on getting a
2592 @code{Last-Modified} header. For @sc{ftp}, this depends on getting a
2593 directory listing with dates in a format that Wget can parse
2594 (@pxref{FTP Time-Stamping Internals}).
2596 @node HTTP Time-Stamping Internals, FTP Time-Stamping Internals, Time-Stamping Usage, Time-Stamping
2597 @section HTTP Time-Stamping Internals
2598 @cindex http time-stamping
2600 Time-stamping in @sc{http} is implemented by checking of the
2601 @code{Last-Modified} header. If you wish to retrieve the file
2602 @file{foo.html} through @sc{http}, Wget will check whether
2603 @file{foo.html} exists locally. If it doesn't, @file{foo.html} will be
2604 retrieved unconditionally.
2606 If the file does exist locally, Wget will first check its local
2607 time-stamp (similar to the way @code{ls -l} checks it), and then send a
2608 @code{HEAD} request to the remote server, demanding the information on
2611 The @code{Last-Modified} header is examined to find which file was
2612 modified more recently (which makes it ``newer''). If the remote file
2613 is newer, it will be downloaded; if it is older, Wget will give
2614 up.@footnote{As an additional check, Wget will look at the
2615 @code{Content-Length} header, and compare the sizes; if they are not the
2616 same, the remote file will be downloaded no matter what the time-stamp
2619 When @samp{--backup-converted} (@samp{-K}) is specified in conjunction
2620 with @samp{-N}, server file @samp{@var{X}} is compared to local file
2621 @samp{@var{X}.orig}, if extant, rather than being compared to local file
2622 @samp{@var{X}}, which will always differ if it's been converted by
2623 @samp{--convert-links} (@samp{-k}).
2625 Arguably, @sc{http} time-stamping should be implemented using the
2626 @code{If-Modified-Since} request.
2628 @node FTP Time-Stamping Internals, , HTTP Time-Stamping Internals, Time-Stamping
2629 @section FTP Time-Stamping Internals
2630 @cindex ftp time-stamping
2632 In theory, @sc{ftp} time-stamping works much the same as @sc{http}, only
2633 @sc{ftp} has no headers---time-stamps must be ferreted out of directory
2636 If an @sc{ftp} download is recursive or uses globbing, Wget will use the
2637 @sc{ftp} @code{LIST} command to get a file listing for the directory
2638 containing the desired file(s). It will try to analyze the listing,
2639 treating it like Unix @code{ls -l} output, extracting the time-stamps.
2640 The rest is exactly the same as for @sc{http}. Note that when
2641 retrieving individual files from an @sc{ftp} server without using
2642 globbing or recursion, listing files will not be downloaded (and thus
2643 files will not be time-stamped) unless @samp{-N} is specified.
2645 Assumption that every directory listing is a Unix-style listing may
2646 sound extremely constraining, but in practice it is not, as many
2647 non-Unix @sc{ftp} servers use the Unixoid listing format because most
2648 (all?) of the clients understand it. Bear in mind that @sc{rfc959}
2649 defines no standard way to get a file list, let alone the time-stamps.
2650 We can only hope that a future standard will define this.
2652 Another non-standard solution includes the use of @code{MDTM} command
2653 that is supported by some @sc{ftp} servers (including the popular
2654 @code{wu-ftpd}), which returns the exact time of the specified file.
2655 Wget may support this command in the future.
2657 @node Startup File, Examples, Time-Stamping, Top
2658 @chapter Startup File
2659 @cindex startup file
2665 Once you know how to change default settings of Wget through command
2666 line arguments, you may wish to make some of those settings permanent.
2667 You can do that in a convenient way by creating the Wget startup
2668 file---@file{.wgetrc}.
2670 Besides @file{.wgetrc} is the ``main'' initialization file, it is
2671 convenient to have a special facility for storing passwords. Thus Wget
2672 reads and interprets the contents of @file{$HOME/.netrc}, if it finds
2673 it. You can find @file{.netrc} format in your system manuals.
2675 Wget reads @file{.wgetrc} upon startup, recognizing a limited set of
2679 * Wgetrc Location:: Location of various wgetrc files.
2680 * Wgetrc Syntax:: Syntax of wgetrc.
2681 * Wgetrc Commands:: List of available commands.
2682 * Sample Wgetrc:: A wgetrc example.
2685 @node Wgetrc Location, Wgetrc Syntax, Startup File, Startup File
2686 @section Wgetrc Location
2687 @cindex wgetrc location
2688 @cindex location of wgetrc
2690 When initializing, Wget will look for a @dfn{global} startup file,
2691 @file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default (or some prefix other than
2692 @file{/usr/local}, if Wget was not installed there) and read commands
2693 from there, if it exists.
2695 Then it will look for the user's file. If the environmental variable
2696 @code{WGETRC} is set, Wget will try to load that file. Failing that, no
2697 further attempts will be made.
2699 If @code{WGETRC} is not set, Wget will try to load @file{$HOME/.wgetrc}.
2701 The fact that user's settings are loaded after the system-wide ones
2702 means that in case of collision user's wgetrc @emph{overrides} the
2703 system-wide wgetrc (in @file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default).
2704 Fascist admins, away!
2706 @node Wgetrc Syntax, Wgetrc Commands, Wgetrc Location, Startup File
2707 @section Wgetrc Syntax
2708 @cindex wgetrc syntax
2709 @cindex syntax of wgetrc
2711 The syntax of a wgetrc command is simple:
2717 The @dfn{variable} will also be called @dfn{command}. Valid
2718 @dfn{values} are different for different commands.
2720 The commands are case-insensitive and underscore-insensitive. Thus
2721 @samp{DIr__PrefiX} is the same as @samp{dirprefix}. Empty lines, lines
2722 beginning with @samp{#} and lines containing white-space only are
2725 Commands that expect a comma-separated list will clear the list on an
2726 empty command. So, if you wish to reset the rejection list specified in
2727 global @file{wgetrc}, you can do it with:
2733 @node Wgetrc Commands, Sample Wgetrc, Wgetrc Syntax, Startup File
2734 @section Wgetrc Commands
2735 @cindex wgetrc commands
2737 The complete set of commands is listed below. Legal values are listed
2738 after the @samp{=}. Simple Boolean values can be set or unset using
2739 @samp{on} and @samp{off} or @samp{1} and @samp{0}.
2741 Some commands take pseudo-arbitrary values. @var{address} values can be
2742 hostnames or dotted-quad IP addresses. @var{n} can be any positive
2743 integer, or @samp{inf} for infinity, where appropriate. @var{string}
2744 values can be any non-empty string.
2746 Most of these commands have direct command-line equivalents. Also, any
2747 wgetrc command can be specified on the command line using the
2748 @samp{--execute} switch (@pxref{Basic Startup Options}.)
2751 @item accept/reject = @var{string}
2752 Same as @samp{-A}/@samp{-R} (@pxref{Types of Files}).
2754 @item add_hostdir = on/off
2755 Enable/disable host-prefixed file names. @samp{-nH} disables it.
2757 @item ask_password = on/off
2758 Prompt for a password for each connection established. Cannot be specified
2759 when @samp{--password} is being used, because they are mutually
2760 exclusive. Equivalent to @samp{--ask-password}.
2762 @item auth_no_challenge = on/off
2763 If this option is given, Wget will send Basic HTTP authentication
2764 information (plaintext username and password) for all requests. See
2765 @samp{--auth-no-challenge}.
2767 @item background = on/off
2768 Enable/disable going to background---the same as @samp{-b} (which
2771 @item backup_converted = on/off
2772 Enable/disable saving pre-converted files with the suffix
2773 @samp{.orig}---the same as @samp{-K} (which enables it).
2775 @c @item backups = @var{number}
2776 @c #### Document me!
2778 @item base = @var{string}
2779 Consider relative @sc{url}s in input files (specified via the
2780 @samp{input} command or the @samp{--input-file}/@samp{-i} option,
2781 together with @samp{force_html} or @samp{--force-html})
2782 as being relative to @var{string}---the same as @samp{--base=@var{string}}.
2784 @item bind_address = @var{address}
2785 Bind to @var{address}, like the @samp{--bind-address=@var{address}}.
2787 @item ca_certificate = @var{file}
2788 Set the certificate authority bundle file to @var{file}. The same
2789 as @samp{--ca-certificate=@var{file}}.
2791 @item ca_directory = @var{directory}
2792 Set the directory used for certificate authorities. The same as
2793 @samp{--ca-directory=@var{directory}}.
2795 @item cache = on/off
2796 When set to off, disallow server-caching. See the @samp{--no-cache}
2799 @item certificate = @var{file}
2800 Set the client certificate file name to @var{file}. The same as
2801 @samp{--certificate=@var{file}}.
2803 @item certificate_type = @var{string}
2804 Specify the type of the client certificate, legal values being
2805 @samp{PEM} (the default) and @samp{DER} (aka ASN1). The same as
2806 @samp{--certificate-type=@var{string}}.
2808 @item check_certificate = on/off
2809 If this is set to off, the server certificate is not checked against
2810 the specified client authorities. The default is ``on''. The same as
2811 @samp{--check-certificate}.
2813 @item connect_timeout = @var{n}
2814 Set the connect timeout---the same as @samp{--connect-timeout}.
2816 @item content_disposition = on/off
2817 Turn on recognition of the (non-standard) @samp{Content-Disposition}
2818 HTTP header---if set to @samp{on}, the same as @samp{--content-disposition}.
2820 @item trust_server_names = on/off
2821 If set to on, use the last component of a redirection URL for the local
2824 @item continue = on/off
2825 If set to on, force continuation of preexistent partially retrieved
2826 files. See @samp{-c} before setting it.
2828 @item convert_links = on/off
2829 Convert non-relative links locally. The same as @samp{-k}.
2831 @item cookies = on/off
2832 When set to off, disallow cookies. See the @samp{--cookies} option.
2834 @item cut_dirs = @var{n}
2835 Ignore @var{n} remote directory components. Equivalent to
2836 @samp{--cut-dirs=@var{n}}.
2838 @item debug = on/off
2839 Debug mode, same as @samp{-d}.
2841 @item default_page = @var{string}
2842 Default page name---the same as @samp{--default-page=@var{string}}.
2844 @item delete_after = on/off
2845 Delete after download---the same as @samp{--delete-after}.
2847 @item dir_prefix = @var{string}
2848 Top of directory tree---the same as @samp{-P @var{string}}.
2850 @item dirstruct = on/off
2851 Turning dirstruct on or off---the same as @samp{-x} or @samp{-nd},
2854 @item dns_cache = on/off
2855 Turn DNS caching on/off. Since DNS caching is on by default, this
2856 option is normally used to turn it off and is equivalent to
2857 @samp{--no-dns-cache}.
2859 @item dns_timeout = @var{n}
2860 Set the DNS timeout---the same as @samp{--dns-timeout}.
2862 @item domains = @var{string}
2863 Same as @samp{-D} (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
2865 @item dot_bytes = @var{n}
2866 Specify the number of bytes ``contained'' in a dot, as seen throughout
2867 the retrieval (1024 by default). You can postfix the value with
2868 @samp{k} or @samp{m}, representing kilobytes and megabytes,
2869 respectively. With dot settings you can tailor the dot retrieval to
2870 suit your needs, or you can use the predefined @dfn{styles}
2871 (@pxref{Download Options}).
2873 @item dot_spacing = @var{n}
2874 Specify the number of dots in a single cluster (10 by default).
2876 @item dots_in_line = @var{n}
2877 Specify the number of dots that will be printed in each line throughout
2878 the retrieval (50 by default).
2880 @item egd_file = @var{file}
2881 Use @var{string} as the EGD socket file name. The same as
2882 @samp{--egd-file=@var{file}}.
2884 @item exclude_directories = @var{string}
2885 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to exclude from
2886 download---the same as @samp{-X @var{string}} (@pxref{Directory-Based
2889 @item exclude_domains = @var{string}
2890 Same as @samp{--exclude-domains=@var{string}} (@pxref{Spanning
2893 @item follow_ftp = on/off
2894 Follow @sc{ftp} links from @sc{html} documents---the same as
2895 @samp{--follow-ftp}.
2897 @item follow_tags = @var{string}
2898 Only follow certain @sc{html} tags when doing a recursive retrieval,
2899 just like @samp{--follow-tags=@var{string}}.
2901 @item force_html = on/off
2902 If set to on, force the input filename to be regarded as an @sc{html}
2903 document---the same as @samp{-F}.
2905 @item ftp_password = @var{string}
2906 Set your @sc{ftp} password to @var{string}. Without this setting, the
2907 password defaults to @samp{-wget@@}, which is a useful default for
2908 anonymous @sc{ftp} access.
2910 This command used to be named @code{passwd} prior to Wget 1.10.
2912 @item ftp_proxy = @var{string}
2913 Use @var{string} as @sc{ftp} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2916 @item ftp_user = @var{string}
2917 Set @sc{ftp} user to @var{string}.
2919 This command used to be named @code{login} prior to Wget 1.10.
2922 Turn globbing on/off---the same as @samp{--glob} and @samp{--no-glob}.
2924 @item header = @var{string}
2925 Define a header for HTTP downloads, like using
2926 @samp{--header=@var{string}}.
2928 @item adjust_extension = on/off
2929 Add a @samp{.html} extension to @samp{text/html} or
2930 @samp{application/xhtml+xml} files that lack one, or a @samp{.css}
2931 extension to @samp{text/css} files that lack one, like
2932 @samp{-E}. Previously named @samp{html_extension} (still acceptable,
2935 @item http_keep_alive = on/off
2936 Turn the keep-alive feature on or off (defaults to on). Turning it
2937 off is equivalent to @samp{--no-http-keep-alive}.
2939 @item http_password = @var{string}
2940 Set @sc{http} password, equivalent to
2941 @samp{--http-password=@var{string}}.
2943 @item http_proxy = @var{string}
2944 Use @var{string} as @sc{http} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2947 @item http_user = @var{string}
2948 Set @sc{http} user to @var{string}, equivalent to
2949 @samp{--http-user=@var{string}}.
2951 @item https_proxy = @var{string}
2952 Use @var{string} as @sc{https} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2955 @item ignore_case = on/off
2956 When set to on, match files and directories case insensitively; the
2957 same as @samp{--ignore-case}.
2959 @item ignore_length = on/off
2960 When set to on, ignore @code{Content-Length} header; the same as
2961 @samp{--ignore-length}.
2963 @item ignore_tags = @var{string}
2964 Ignore certain @sc{html} tags when doing a recursive retrieval, like
2965 @samp{--ignore-tags=@var{string}}.
2967 @item include_directories = @var{string}
2968 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to follow when
2969 downloading---the same as @samp{-I @var{string}}.
2972 When set to on, enable internationalized URI (IRI) support; the same as
2975 @item inet4_only = on/off
2976 Force connecting to IPv4 addresses, off by default. You can put this
2977 in the global init file to disable Wget's attempts to resolve and
2978 connect to IPv6 hosts. Available only if Wget was compiled with IPv6
2979 support. The same as @samp{--inet4-only} or @samp{-4}.
2981 @item inet6_only = on/off
2982 Force connecting to IPv6 addresses, off by default. Available only if
2983 Wget was compiled with IPv6 support. The same as @samp{--inet6-only}
2986 @item input = @var{file}
2987 Read the @sc{url}s from @var{string}, like @samp{-i @var{file}}.
2989 @item keep_session_cookies = on/off
2990 When specified, causes @samp{save_cookies = on} to also save session
2991 cookies. See @samp{--keep-session-cookies}.
2993 @item limit_rate = @var{rate}
2994 Limit the download speed to no more than @var{rate} bytes per second.
2995 The same as @samp{--limit-rate=@var{rate}}.
2997 @item load_cookies = @var{file}
2998 Load cookies from @var{file}. See @samp{--load-cookies @var{file}}.
3000 @item local_encoding = @var{encoding}
3001 Force Wget to use @var{encoding} as the default system encoding. See
3002 @samp{--local-encoding}.
3004 @item logfile = @var{file}
3005 Set logfile to @var{file}, the same as @samp{-o @var{file}}.
3007 @item max_redirect = @var{number}
3008 Specifies the maximum number of redirections to follow for a resource.
3009 See @samp{--max-redirect=@var{number}}.
3011 @item mirror = on/off
3012 Turn mirroring on/off. The same as @samp{-m}.
3014 @item netrc = on/off
3015 Turn reading netrc on or off.
3017 @item no_clobber = on/off
3020 @item no_parent = on/off
3021 Disallow retrieving outside the directory hierarchy, like
3022 @samp{--no-parent} (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}).
3024 @item no_proxy = @var{string}
3025 Use @var{string} as the comma-separated list of domains to avoid in
3026 proxy loading, instead of the one specified in environment.
3028 @item output_document = @var{file}
3029 Set the output filename---the same as @samp{-O @var{file}}.
3031 @item page_requisites = on/off
3032 Download all ancillary documents necessary for a single @sc{html} page to
3033 display properly---the same as @samp{-p}.
3035 @item passive_ftp = on/off
3036 Change setting of passive @sc{ftp}, equivalent to the
3037 @samp{--passive-ftp} option.
3039 @itemx password = @var{string}
3040 Specify password @var{string} for both @sc{ftp} and @sc{http} file retrieval.
3041 This command can be overridden using the @samp{ftp_password} and
3042 @samp{http_password} command for @sc{ftp} and @sc{http} respectively.
3044 @item post_data = @var{string}
3045 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send @var{string} in
3046 the request body. The same as @samp{--post-data=@var{string}}.
3048 @item post_file = @var{file}
3049 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send the contents of
3050 @var{file} in the request body. The same as
3051 @samp{--post-file=@var{file}}.
3053 @item prefer_family = none/IPv4/IPv6
3054 When given a choice of several addresses, connect to the addresses
3055 with specified address family first. The address order returned by
3056 DNS is used without change by default. The same as @samp{--prefer-family},
3057 which see for a detailed discussion of why this is useful.
3059 @item private_key = @var{file}
3060 Set the private key file to @var{file}. The same as
3061 @samp{--private-key=@var{file}}.
3063 @item private_key_type = @var{string}
3064 Specify the type of the private key, legal values being @samp{PEM}
3065 (the default) and @samp{DER} (aka ASN1). The same as
3066 @samp{--private-type=@var{string}}.
3068 @item progress = @var{string}
3069 Set the type of the progress indicator. Legal types are @samp{dot}
3070 and @samp{bar}. Equivalent to @samp{--progress=@var{string}}.
3072 @item protocol_directories = on/off
3073 When set, use the protocol name as a directory component of local file
3074 names. The same as @samp{--protocol-directories}.
3076 @item proxy_password = @var{string}
3077 Set proxy authentication password to @var{string}, like
3078 @samp{--proxy-password=@var{string}}.
3080 @item proxy_user = @var{string}
3081 Set proxy authentication user name to @var{string}, like
3082 @samp{--proxy-user=@var{string}}.
3084 @item quiet = on/off
3085 Quiet mode---the same as @samp{-q}.
3087 @item quota = @var{quota}
3088 Specify the download quota, which is useful to put in the global
3089 @file{wgetrc}. When download quota is specified, Wget will stop
3090 retrieving after the download sum has become greater than quota. The
3091 quota can be specified in bytes (default), kbytes @samp{k} appended) or
3092 mbytes (@samp{m} appended). Thus @samp{quota = 5m} will set the quota
3093 to 5 megabytes. Note that the user's startup file overrides system
3096 @item random_file = @var{file}
3097 Use @var{file} as a source of randomness on systems lacking
3100 @item random_wait = on/off
3101 Turn random between-request wait times on or off. The same as
3102 @samp{--random-wait}.
3104 @item read_timeout = @var{n}
3105 Set the read (and write) timeout---the same as
3106 @samp{--read-timeout=@var{n}}.
3108 @item reclevel = @var{n}
3109 Recursion level (depth)---the same as @samp{-l @var{n}}.
3111 @item recursive = on/off
3112 Recursive on/off---the same as @samp{-r}.
3114 @item referer = @var{string}
3115 Set HTTP @samp{Referer:} header just like
3116 @samp{--referer=@var{string}}. (Note that it was the folks who wrote
3117 the @sc{http} spec who got the spelling of ``referrer'' wrong.)
3119 @item relative_only = on/off
3120 Follow only relative links---the same as @samp{-L} (@pxref{Relative
3123 @item remote_encoding = @var{encoding}
3124 Force Wget to use @var{encoding} as the default remote server encoding.
3125 See @samp{--remote-encoding}.
3127 @item remove_listing = on/off
3128 If set to on, remove @sc{ftp} listings downloaded by Wget. Setting it
3129 to off is the same as @samp{--no-remove-listing}.
3131 @item restrict_file_names = unix/windows
3132 Restrict the file names generated by Wget from URLs. See
3133 @samp{--restrict-file-names} for a more detailed description.
3135 @item retr_symlinks = on/off
3136 When set to on, retrieve symbolic links as if they were plain files; the
3137 same as @samp{--retr-symlinks}.
3139 @item retry_connrefused = on/off
3140 When set to on, consider ``connection refused'' a transient
3141 error---the same as @samp{--retry-connrefused}.
3143 @item robots = on/off
3144 Specify whether the norobots convention is respected by Wget, ``on'' by
3145 default. This switch controls both the @file{/robots.txt} and the
3146 @samp{nofollow} aspect of the spec. @xref{Robot Exclusion}, for more
3147 details about this. Be sure you know what you are doing before turning
3150 @item save_cookies = @var{file}
3151 Save cookies to @var{file}. The same as @samp{--save-cookies
3154 @item save_headers = on/off
3155 Same as @samp{--save-headers}.
3157 @item secure_protocol = @var{string}
3158 Choose the secure protocol to be used. Legal values are @samp{auto}
3159 (the default), @samp{SSLv2}, @samp{SSLv3}, and @samp{TLSv1}. The same
3160 as @samp{--secure-protocol=@var{string}}.
3162 @item server_response = on/off
3163 Choose whether or not to print the @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} server
3164 responses---the same as @samp{-S}.
3166 @item span_hosts = on/off
3169 @item spider = on/off
3170 Same as @samp{--spider}.
3172 @item strict_comments = on/off
3173 Same as @samp{--strict-comments}.
3175 @item timeout = @var{n}
3176 Set all applicable timeout values to @var{n}, the same as @samp{-T
3179 @item timestamping = on/off
3180 Turn timestamping on/off. The same as @samp{-N} (@pxref{Time-Stamping}).
3182 @item use_server_timestamps = on/off
3183 If set to @samp{off}, Wget won't set the local file's timestamp by the
3184 one on the server (same as @samp{--no-use-server-timestamps}).
3186 @item tries = @var{n}
3187 Set number of retries per @sc{url}---the same as @samp{-t @var{n}}.
3189 @item use_proxy = on/off
3190 When set to off, don't use proxy even when proxy-related environment
3191 variables are set. In that case it is the same as using
3194 @item user = @var{string}
3195 Specify username @var{string} for both @sc{ftp} and @sc{http} file retrieval.
3196 This command can be overridden using the @samp{ftp_user} and
3197 @samp{http_user} command for @sc{ftp} and @sc{http} respectively.
3199 @item user_agent = @var{string}
3200 User agent identification sent to the HTTP Server---the same as
3201 @samp{--user-agent=@var{string}}.
3203 @item verbose = on/off
3204 Turn verbose on/off---the same as @samp{-v}/@samp{-nv}.
3206 @item wait = @var{n}
3207 Wait @var{n} seconds between retrievals---the same as @samp{-w
3210 @item wait_retry = @var{n}
3211 Wait up to @var{n} seconds between retries of failed retrievals
3212 only---the same as @samp{--waitretry=@var{n}}. Note that this is
3213 turned on by default in the global @file{wgetrc}.
3216 @node Sample Wgetrc, , Wgetrc Commands, Startup File
3217 @section Sample Wgetrc
3218 @cindex sample wgetrc
3220 This is the sample initialization file, as given in the distribution.
3221 It is divided in two section---one for global usage (suitable for global
3222 startup file), and one for local usage (suitable for
3223 @file{$HOME/.wgetrc}). Be careful about the things you change.
3225 Note that almost all the lines are commented out. For a command to have
3226 any effect, you must remove the @samp{#} character at the beginning of
3230 @include sample.wgetrc.munged_for_texi_inclusion
3233 @node Examples, Various, Startup File, Top
3237 @c man begin EXAMPLES
3238 The examples are divided into three sections loosely based on their
3242 * Simple Usage:: Simple, basic usage of the program.
3243 * Advanced Usage:: Advanced tips.
3244 * Very Advanced Usage:: The hairy stuff.
3247 @node Simple Usage, Advanced Usage, Examples, Examples
3248 @section Simple Usage
3252 Say you want to download a @sc{url}. Just type:
3255 wget http://fly.srk.fer.hr/
3259 But what will happen if the connection is slow, and the file is lengthy?
3260 The connection will probably fail before the whole file is retrieved,
3261 more than once. In this case, Wget will try getting the file until it
3262 either gets the whole of it, or exceeds the default number of retries
3263 (this being 20). It is easy to change the number of tries to 45, to
3264 insure that the whole file will arrive safely:
3267 wget --tries=45 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/jpg/flyweb.jpg
3271 Now let's leave Wget to work in the background, and write its progress
3272 to log file @file{log}. It is tiring to type @samp{--tries}, so we
3273 shall use @samp{-t}.
3276 wget -t 45 -o log http://fly.srk.fer.hr/jpg/flyweb.jpg &
3279 The ampersand at the end of the line makes sure that Wget works in the
3280 background. To unlimit the number of retries, use @samp{-t inf}.
3283 The usage of @sc{ftp} is as simple. Wget will take care of login and
3287 wget ftp://gnjilux.srk.fer.hr/welcome.msg
3291 If you specify a directory, Wget will retrieve the directory listing,
3292 parse it and convert it to @sc{html}. Try:
3295 wget ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/
3300 @node Advanced Usage, Very Advanced Usage, Simple Usage, Examples
3301 @section Advanced Usage
3305 You have a file that contains the URLs you want to download? Use the
3312 If you specify @samp{-} as file name, the @sc{url}s will be read from
3316 Create a five levels deep mirror image of the GNU web site, with the
3317 same directory structure the original has, with only one try per
3318 document, saving the log of the activities to @file{gnulog}:
3321 wget -r http://www.gnu.org/ -o gnulog
3325 The same as the above, but convert the links in the downloaded files to
3326 point to local files, so you can view the documents off-line:
3329 wget --convert-links -r http://www.gnu.org/ -o gnulog
3333 Retrieve only one @sc{html} page, but make sure that all the elements needed
3334 for the page to be displayed, such as inline images and external style
3335 sheets, are also downloaded. Also make sure the downloaded page
3336 references the downloaded links.
3339 wget -p --convert-links http://www.server.com/dir/page.html
3342 The @sc{html} page will be saved to @file{www.server.com/dir/page.html}, and
3343 the images, stylesheets, etc., somewhere under @file{www.server.com/},
3344 depending on where they were on the remote server.
3347 The same as the above, but without the @file{www.server.com/} directory.
3348 In fact, I don't want to have all those random server directories
3349 anyway---just save @emph{all} those files under a @file{download/}
3350 subdirectory of the current directory.
3353 wget -p --convert-links -nH -nd -Pdownload \
3354 http://www.server.com/dir/page.html
3358 Retrieve the index.html of @samp{www.lycos.com}, showing the original
3362 wget -S http://www.lycos.com/
3366 Save the server headers with the file, perhaps for post-processing.
3369 wget --save-headers http://www.lycos.com/
3374 Retrieve the first two levels of @samp{wuarchive.wustl.edu}, saving them
3378 wget -r -l2 -P/tmp ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/
3382 You want to download all the @sc{gif}s from a directory on an @sc{http}
3383 server. You tried @samp{wget http://www.server.com/dir/*.gif}, but that
3384 didn't work because @sc{http} retrieval does not support globbing. In
3388 wget -r -l1 --no-parent -A.gif http://www.server.com/dir/
3391 More verbose, but the effect is the same. @samp{-r -l1} means to
3392 retrieve recursively (@pxref{Recursive Download}), with maximum depth
3393 of 1. @samp{--no-parent} means that references to the parent directory
3394 are ignored (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}), and @samp{-A.gif} means to
3395 download only the @sc{gif} files. @samp{-A "*.gif"} would have worked
3399 Suppose you were in the middle of downloading, when Wget was
3400 interrupted. Now you do not want to clobber the files already present.
3404 wget -nc -r http://www.gnu.org/
3408 If you want to encode your own username and password to @sc{http} or
3409 @sc{ftp}, use the appropriate @sc{url} syntax (@pxref{URL Format}).
3412 wget ftp://hniksic:mypassword@@unix.server.com/.emacs
3415 Note, however, that this usage is not advisable on multi-user systems
3416 because it reveals your password to anyone who looks at the output of
3419 @cindex redirecting output
3421 You would like the output documents to go to standard output instead of
3425 wget -O - http://jagor.srce.hr/ http://www.srce.hr/
3428 You can also combine the two options and make pipelines to retrieve the
3429 documents from remote hotlists:
3432 wget -O - http://cool.list.com/ | wget --force-html -i -
3436 @node Very Advanced Usage, , Advanced Usage, Examples
3437 @section Very Advanced Usage
3442 If you wish Wget to keep a mirror of a page (or @sc{ftp}
3443 subdirectories), use @samp{--mirror} (@samp{-m}), which is the shorthand
3444 for @samp{-r -l inf -N}. You can put Wget in the crontab file asking it
3445 to recheck a site each Sunday:
3449 0 0 * * 0 wget --mirror http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
3453 In addition to the above, you want the links to be converted for local
3454 viewing. But, after having read this manual, you know that link
3455 conversion doesn't play well with timestamping, so you also want Wget to
3456 back up the original @sc{html} files before the conversion. Wget invocation
3457 would look like this:
3460 wget --mirror --convert-links --backup-converted \
3461 http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
3465 But you've also noticed that local viewing doesn't work all that well
3466 when @sc{html} files are saved under extensions other than @samp{.html},
3467 perhaps because they were served as @file{index.cgi}. So you'd like
3468 Wget to rename all the files served with content-type @samp{text/html}
3469 or @samp{application/xhtml+xml} to @file{@var{name}.html}.
3472 wget --mirror --convert-links --backup-converted \
3473 --html-extension -o /home/me/weeklog \
3477 Or, with less typing:
3480 wget -m -k -K -E http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
3485 @node Various, Appendices, Examples, Top
3489 This chapter contains all the stuff that could not fit anywhere else.
3492 * Proxies:: Support for proxy servers.
3493 * Distribution:: Getting the latest version.
3494 * Web Site:: GNU Wget's presence on the World Wide Web.
3495 * Mailing Lists:: Wget mailing list for announcements and discussion.
3496 * Internet Relay Chat:: Wget's presence on IRC.
3497 * Reporting Bugs:: How and where to report bugs.
3498 * Portability:: The systems Wget works on.
3499 * Signals:: Signal-handling performed by Wget.
3502 @node Proxies, Distribution, Various, Various
3506 @dfn{Proxies} are special-purpose @sc{http} servers designed to transfer
3507 data from remote servers to local clients. One typical use of proxies
3508 is lightening network load for users behind a slow connection. This is
3509 achieved by channeling all @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} requests through the
3510 proxy which caches the transferred data. When a cached resource is
3511 requested again, proxy will return the data from cache. Another use for
3512 proxies is for companies that separate (for security reasons) their
3513 internal networks from the rest of Internet. In order to obtain
3514 information from the Web, their users connect and retrieve remote data
3515 using an authorized proxy.
3517 Wget supports proxies for both @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} retrievals. The
3518 standard way to specify proxy location, which Wget recognizes, is using
3519 the following environment variables:
3524 If set, the @code{http_proxy} and @code{https_proxy} variables should
3525 contain the @sc{url}s of the proxies for @sc{http} and @sc{https}
3526 connections respectively.
3529 This variable should contain the @sc{url} of the proxy for @sc{ftp}
3530 connections. It is quite common that @code{http_proxy} and
3531 @code{ftp_proxy} are set to the same @sc{url}.
3534 This variable should contain a comma-separated list of domain extensions
3535 proxy should @emph{not} be used for. For instance, if the value of
3536 @code{no_proxy} is @samp{.mit.edu}, proxy will not be used to retrieve
3540 In addition to the environment variables, proxy location and settings
3541 may be specified from within Wget itself.
3545 @itemx proxy = on/off
3546 This option and the corresponding command may be used to suppress the
3547 use of proxy, even if the appropriate environment variables are set.
3549 @item http_proxy = @var{URL}
3550 @itemx https_proxy = @var{URL}
3551 @itemx ftp_proxy = @var{URL}
3552 @itemx no_proxy = @var{string}
3553 These startup file variables allow you to override the proxy settings
3554 specified by the environment.
3557 Some proxy servers require authorization to enable you to use them. The
3558 authorization consists of @dfn{username} and @dfn{password}, which must
3559 be sent by Wget. As with @sc{http} authorization, several
3560 authentication schemes exist. For proxy authorization only the
3561 @code{Basic} authentication scheme is currently implemented.
3563 You may specify your username and password either through the proxy
3564 @sc{url} or through the command-line options. Assuming that the
3565 company's proxy is located at @samp{proxy.company.com} at port 8001, a
3566 proxy @sc{url} location containing authorization data might look like
3570 http://hniksic:mypassword@@proxy.company.com:8001/
3573 Alternatively, you may use the @samp{proxy-user} and
3574 @samp{proxy-password} options, and the equivalent @file{.wgetrc}
3575 settings @code{proxy_user} and @code{proxy_password} to set the proxy
3576 username and password.
3578 @node Distribution, Web Site, Proxies, Various
3579 @section Distribution
3580 @cindex latest version
3582 Like all GNU utilities, the latest version of Wget can be found at the
3583 master GNU archive site ftp.gnu.org, and its mirrors. For example,
3584 Wget @value{VERSION} can be found at
3585 @url{ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/wget/wget-@value{VERSION}.tar.gz}
3587 @node Web Site, Mailing Lists, Distribution, Various
3591 The official web site for GNU Wget is at
3592 @url{http://www.gnu.org/software/wget/}. However, most useful
3593 information resides at ``The Wget Wgiki'',
3594 @url{http://wget.addictivecode.org/}.
3596 @node Mailing Lists, Internet Relay Chat, Web Site, Various
3597 @section Mailing Lists
3598 @cindex mailing list
3601 @unnumberedsubsec Primary List
3603 The primary mailinglist for discussion, bug-reports, or questions
3604 about GNU Wget is at @email{bug-wget@@gnu.org}. To subscribe, send an
3605 email to @email{bug-wget-join@@gnu.org}, or visit
3606 @url{http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-wget}.
3608 You do not need to subscribe to send a message to the list; however,
3609 please note that unsubscribed messages are moderated, and may take a
3610 while before they hit the list---@strong{usually around a day}. If
3611 you want your message to show up immediately, please subscribe to the
3612 list before posting. Archives for the list may be found at
3613 @url{http://lists.gnu.org/pipermail/bug-wget/}.
3615 An NNTP/Usenettish gateway is also available via
3616 @uref{http://gmane.org/about.php,Gmane}. You can see the Gmane
3618 @url{http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.web.wget.general}. Note that the
3619 Gmane archives conveniently include messages from both the current
3620 list, and the previous one. Messages also show up in the Gmane
3621 archives sooner than they do at @url{lists.gnu.org}.
3623 @unnumberedsubsec Bug Notices List
3625 Additionally, there is the @email{wget-notify@@addictivecode.org} mailing
3626 list. This is a non-discussion list that receives bug report
3627 notifications from the bug-tracker. To subscribe to this list,
3628 send an email to @email{wget-notify-join@@addictivecode.org},
3629 or visit @url{http://addictivecode.org/mailman/listinfo/wget-notify}.
3631 @unnumberedsubsec Obsolete Lists
3633 Previously, the mailing list @email{wget@@sunsite.dk} was used as the
3634 main discussion list, and another list,
3635 @email{wget-patches@@sunsite.dk} was used for submitting and
3636 discussing patches to GNU Wget.
3638 Messages from @email{wget@@sunsite.dk} are archived at
3641 @url{http://www.mail-archive.com/wget%40sunsite.dk/} and at
3643 @url{http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.web.wget.general} (which also
3644 continues to archive the current list, @email{bug-wget@@gnu.org}).
3647 Messages from @email{wget-patches@@sunsite.dk} are archived at
3650 @url{http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.web.wget.patches}.
3653 @node Internet Relay Chat, Reporting Bugs, Mailing Lists, Various
3654 @section Internet Relay Chat
3655 @cindex Internet Relay Chat
3659 In addition to the mailinglists, we also have a support channel set up
3660 via IRC at @code{irc.freenode.org}, @code{#wget}. Come check it out!
3662 @node Reporting Bugs, Portability, Internet Relay Chat, Various
3663 @section Reporting Bugs
3665 @cindex reporting bugs
3669 You are welcome to submit bug reports via the GNU Wget bug tracker (see
3670 @url{http://wget.addictivecode.org/BugTracker}).
3672 Before actually submitting a bug report, please try to follow a few
3677 Please try to ascertain that the behavior you see really is a bug. If
3678 Wget crashes, it's a bug. If Wget does not behave as documented,
3679 it's a bug. If things work strange, but you are not sure about the way
3680 they are supposed to work, it might well be a bug, but you might want to
3681 double-check the documentation and the mailing lists (@pxref{Mailing
3685 Try to repeat the bug in as simple circumstances as possible. E.g. if
3686 Wget crashes while downloading @samp{wget -rl0 -kKE -t5 --no-proxy
3687 http://yoyodyne.com -o /tmp/log}, you should try to see if the crash is
3688 repeatable, and if will occur with a simpler set of options. You might
3689 even try to start the download at the page where the crash occurred to
3690 see if that page somehow triggered the crash.
3692 Also, while I will probably be interested to know the contents of your
3693 @file{.wgetrc} file, just dumping it into the debug message is probably
3694 a bad idea. Instead, you should first try to see if the bug repeats
3695 with @file{.wgetrc} moved out of the way. Only if it turns out that
3696 @file{.wgetrc} settings affect the bug, mail me the relevant parts of
3700 Please start Wget with @samp{-d} option and send us the resulting
3701 output (or relevant parts thereof). If Wget was compiled without
3702 debug support, recompile it---it is @emph{much} easier to trace bugs
3703 with debug support on.
3705 Note: please make sure to remove any potentially sensitive information
3706 from the debug log before sending it to the bug address. The
3707 @code{-d} won't go out of its way to collect sensitive information,
3708 but the log @emph{will} contain a fairly complete transcript of Wget's
3709 communication with the server, which may include passwords and pieces
3710 of downloaded data. Since the bug address is publically archived, you
3711 may assume that all bug reports are visible to the public.
3714 If Wget has crashed, try to run it in a debugger, e.g. @code{gdb `which
3715 wget` core} and type @code{where} to get the backtrace. This may not
3716 work if the system administrator has disabled core files, but it is
3721 @node Portability, Signals, Reporting Bugs, Various
3722 @section Portability
3724 @cindex operating systems
3726 Like all GNU software, Wget works on the GNU system. However, since it
3727 uses GNU Autoconf for building and configuring, and mostly avoids using
3728 ``special'' features of any particular Unix, it should compile (and
3729 work) on all common Unix flavors.
3731 Various Wget versions have been compiled and tested under many kinds of
3732 Unix systems, including GNU/Linux, Solaris, SunOS 4.x, Mac OS X, OSF
3733 (aka Digital Unix or Tru64), Ultrix, *BSD, IRIX, AIX, and others. Some
3734 of those systems are no longer in widespread use and may not be able to
3735 support recent versions of Wget. If Wget fails to compile on your
3736 system, we would like to know about it.
3738 Thanks to kind contributors, this version of Wget compiles and works
3739 on 32-bit Microsoft Windows platforms. It has been compiled
3740 successfully using MS Visual C++ 6.0, Watcom, Borland C, and GCC
3741 compilers. Naturally, it is crippled of some features available on
3742 Unix, but it should work as a substitute for people stuck with
3743 Windows. Note that Windows-specific portions of Wget are not
3744 guaranteed to be supported in the future, although this has been the
3745 case in practice for many years now. All questions and problems in
3746 Windows usage should be reported to Wget mailing list at
3747 @email{wget@@sunsite.dk} where the volunteers who maintain the
3748 Windows-related features might look at them.
3750 Support for building on MS-DOS via DJGPP has been contributed by Gisle
3751 Vanem; a port to VMS is maintained by Steven Schweda, and is available
3752 at @url{http://antinode.org/}.
3754 @node Signals, , Portability, Various
3756 @cindex signal handling
3759 Since the purpose of Wget is background work, it catches the hangup
3760 signal (@code{SIGHUP}) and ignores it. If the output was on standard
3761 output, it will be redirected to a file named @file{wget-log}.
3762 Otherwise, @code{SIGHUP} is ignored. This is convenient when you wish
3763 to redirect the output of Wget after having started it.
3766 $ wget http://www.gnus.org/dist/gnus.tar.gz &
3769 SIGHUP received, redirecting output to `wget-log'.
3772 Other than that, Wget will not try to interfere with signals in any way.
3773 @kbd{C-c}, @code{kill -TERM} and @code{kill -KILL} should kill it alike.
3775 @node Appendices, Copying this manual, Various, Top
3778 This chapter contains some references I consider useful.
3781 * Robot Exclusion:: Wget's support for RES.
3782 * Security Considerations:: Security with Wget.
3783 * Contributors:: People who helped.
3786 @node Robot Exclusion, Security Considerations, Appendices, Appendices
3787 @section Robot Exclusion
3788 @cindex robot exclusion
3790 @cindex server maintenance
3792 It is extremely easy to make Wget wander aimlessly around a web site,
3793 sucking all the available data in progress. @samp{wget -r @var{site}},
3794 and you're set. Great? Not for the server admin.
3796 As long as Wget is only retrieving static pages, and doing it at a
3797 reasonable rate (see the @samp{--wait} option), there's not much of a
3798 problem. The trouble is that Wget can't tell the difference between the
3799 smallest static page and the most demanding CGI. A site I know has a
3800 section handled by a CGI Perl script that converts Info files to @sc{html} on
3801 the fly. The script is slow, but works well enough for human users
3802 viewing an occasional Info file. However, when someone's recursive Wget
3803 download stumbles upon the index page that links to all the Info files
3804 through the script, the system is brought to its knees without providing
3805 anything useful to the user (This task of converting Info files could be
3806 done locally and access to Info documentation for all installed GNU
3807 software on a system is available from the @code{info} command).
3809 To avoid this kind of accident, as well as to preserve privacy for
3810 documents that need to be protected from well-behaved robots, the
3811 concept of @dfn{robot exclusion} was invented. The idea is that
3812 the server administrators and document authors can specify which
3813 portions of the site they wish to protect from robots and those
3814 they will permit access.
3816 The most popular mechanism, and the @i{de facto} standard supported by
3817 all the major robots, is the ``Robots Exclusion Standard'' (RES) written
3818 by Martijn Koster et al. in 1994. It specifies the format of a text
3819 file containing directives that instruct the robots which URL paths to
3820 avoid. To be found by the robots, the specifications must be placed in
3821 @file{/robots.txt} in the server root, which the robots are expected to
3824 Although Wget is not a web robot in the strictest sense of the word, it
3825 can download large parts of the site without the user's intervention to
3826 download an individual page. Because of that, Wget honors RES when
3827 downloading recursively. For instance, when you issue:
3830 wget -r http://www.server.com/
3833 First the index of @samp{www.server.com} will be downloaded. If Wget
3834 finds that it wants to download more documents from that server, it will
3835 request @samp{http://www.server.com/robots.txt} and, if found, use it
3836 for further downloads. @file{robots.txt} is loaded only once per each
3839 Until version 1.8, Wget supported the first version of the standard,
3840 written by Martijn Koster in 1994 and available at
3841 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/norobots.html}. As of version 1.8,
3842 Wget has supported the additional directives specified in the internet
3843 draft @samp{<draft-koster-robots-00.txt>} titled ``A Method for Web
3844 Robots Control''. The draft, which has as far as I know never made to
3845 an @sc{rfc}, is available at
3846 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/norobots-rfc.txt}.
3848 This manual no longer includes the text of the Robot Exclusion Standard.
3850 The second, less known mechanism, enables the author of an individual
3851 document to specify whether they want the links from the file to be
3852 followed by a robot. This is achieved using the @code{META} tag, like
3856 <meta name="robots" content="nofollow">
3859 This is explained in some detail at
3860 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/meta-user.html}. Wget supports this
3861 method of robot exclusion in addition to the usual @file{/robots.txt}
3864 If you know what you are doing and really really wish to turn off the
3865 robot exclusion, set the @code{robots} variable to @samp{off} in your
3866 @file{.wgetrc}. You can achieve the same effect from the command line
3867 using the @code{-e} switch, e.g. @samp{wget -e robots=off @var{url}...}.
3869 @node Security Considerations, Contributors, Robot Exclusion, Appendices
3870 @section Security Considerations
3873 When using Wget, you must be aware that it sends unencrypted passwords
3874 through the network, which may present a security problem. Here are the
3875 main issues, and some solutions.
3879 The passwords on the command line are visible using @code{ps}. The best
3880 way around it is to use @code{wget -i -} and feed the @sc{url}s to
3881 Wget's standard input, each on a separate line, terminated by @kbd{C-d}.
3882 Another workaround is to use @file{.netrc} to store passwords; however,
3883 storing unencrypted passwords is also considered a security risk.
3886 Using the insecure @dfn{basic} authentication scheme, unencrypted
3887 passwords are transmitted through the network routers and gateways.
3890 The @sc{ftp} passwords are also in no way encrypted. There is no good
3891 solution for this at the moment.
3894 Although the ``normal'' output of Wget tries to hide the passwords,
3895 debugging logs show them, in all forms. This problem is avoided by
3896 being careful when you send debug logs (yes, even when you send them to
3900 @node Contributors, , Security Considerations, Appendices
3901 @section Contributors
3902 @cindex contributors
3905 GNU Wget was written by Hrvoje Nik@v{s}i@'{c} @email{hniksic@@xemacs.org},
3908 GNU Wget was written by Hrvoje Niksic @email{hniksic@@xemacs.org},
3910 and it is currently maintained by Micah Cowan @email{micah@@cowan.name}.
3912 However, the development of Wget could never have gone as far as it has, were
3913 it not for the help of many people, either with bug reports, feature proposals,
3914 patches, or letters saying ``Thanks!''.
3916 Special thanks goes to the following people (no particular order):
3919 @item Dan Harkless---contributed a lot of code and documentation of
3920 extremely high quality, as well as the @code{--page-requisites} and
3921 related options. He was the principal maintainer for some time and
3924 @item Ian Abbott---contributed bug fixes, Windows-related fixes, and
3925 provided a prototype implementation of the breadth-first recursive
3926 download. Co-maintained Wget during the 1.8 release cycle.
3929 The dotsrc.org crew, in particular Karsten Thygesen---donated system
3930 resources such as the mailing list, web space, @sc{ftp} space, and
3931 version control repositories, along with a lot of time to make these
3932 actually work. Christian Reiniger was of invaluable help with setting
3936 Heiko Herold---provided high-quality Windows builds and contributed
3937 bug and build reports for many years.
3940 Shawn McHorse---bug reports and patches.
3943 Kaveh R. Ghazi---on-the-fly @code{ansi2knr}-ization. Lots of
3947 Gordon Matzigkeit---@file{.netrc} support.
3951 Zlatko @v{C}alu@v{s}i@'{c}, Tomislav Vujec and Dra@v{z}en
3952 Ka@v{c}ar---feature suggestions and ``philosophical'' discussions.
3955 Zlatko Calusic, Tomislav Vujec and Drazen Kacar---feature suggestions
3956 and ``philosophical'' discussions.
3960 Darko Budor---initial port to Windows.
3963 Antonio Rosella---help and suggestions, plus the initial Italian
3968 Tomislav Petrovi@'{c}, Mario Miko@v{c}evi@'{c}---many bug reports and
3972 Tomislav Petrovic, Mario Mikocevic---many bug reports and suggestions.
3977 Fran@,{c}ois Pinard---many thorough bug reports and discussions.
3980 Francois Pinard---many thorough bug reports and discussions.
3984 Karl Eichwalder---lots of help with internationalization, Makefile
3985 layout and many other things.
3988 Junio Hamano---donated support for Opie and @sc{http} @code{Digest}
3992 Mauro Tortonesi---improved IPv6 support, adding support for dual
3993 family systems. Refactored and enhanced FTP IPv6 code. Maintained GNU
3994 Wget from 2004--2007.
3997 Christopher G.@: Lewis---maintenance of the Windows version of GNU WGet.
4000 Gisle Vanem---many helpful patches and improvements, especially for
4001 Windows and MS-DOS support.
4004 Ralf Wildenhues---contributed patches to convert Wget to use Automake as
4005 part of its build process, and various bugfixes.
4008 Steven Schubiger---Many helpful patches, bugfixes and improvements.
4009 Notably, conversion of Wget to use the Gnulib quotes and quoteargs
4010 modules, and the addition of password prompts at the console, via the
4011 Gnulib getpasswd-gnu module.
4014 Ted Mielczarek---donated support for CSS.
4017 Saint Xavier---Support for IRIs (RFC 3987).
4020 People who provided donations for development---including Brian Gough.
4023 The following people have provided patches, bug/build reports, useful
4024 suggestions, beta testing services, fan mail and all the other things
4025 that make maintenance so much fun:
4045 Kristijan @v{C}onka@v{s},
4054 Bertrand Demiddelaer,
4055 Alexander Dergachev,
4068 Aleksandar Erkalovi@'{c},
4071 Aleksandar Erkalovic,
4095 Madhusudan Hosaagrahara,
4099 Erik Magnus Hulthen,
4118 Goran Kezunovi@'{c},
4132 $\Sigma\acute{\iota}\mu o\varsigma\;
4133 \Xi\varepsilon\nu\iota\tau\acute{\epsilon}\lambda\lambda\eta\varsigma$
4134 (Simos KSenitellis),
4143 Nicol@'{a}s Lichtmeier,
4149 Alexander V.@: Lukyanov,
4158 Matthew J.@: Mellon,
4194 @c Texinfo doesn't grok @'{@i}, so we have to use TeX itself.
4196 Juan Jos\'{e} Rodr\'{\i}guez,
4199 Juan Jose Rodriguez,
4201 Maciej W.@: Rozycki,
4208 Steven M.@: Schweda,
4219 Szakacsits Szabolcs,
4234 Douglas E.@: Wegscheid,
4236 Joshua David Williams,
4250 Apologies to all who I accidentally left out, and many thanks to all the
4251 subscribers of the Wget mailing list.
4253 @node Copying this manual, Concept Index, Appendices, Top
4254 @appendix Copying this manual
4257 * GNU Free Documentation License:: Licnse for copying this manual.
4260 @node GNU Free Documentation License, , Copying this manual, Copying this manual
4261 @appendixsec GNU Free Documentation License
4262 @cindex FDL, GNU Free Documentation License
4267 @node Concept Index, , Copying this manual, Top
4268 @unnumbered Concept Index