1 \input texinfo @c -*-texinfo-*-
7 @settitle GNU Wget @value{VERSION} Manual
8 @c Disable the monstrous rectangles beside overfull hbox-es.
10 @c Use `odd' to print double-sided.
15 @c Remove this if you don't use A4 paper.
19 @c Title for man page. The weird way texi2pod.pl is written requires
20 @c the preceding @set.
22 @c man title Wget The non-interactive network downloader.
24 @dircategory Network Applications
26 * Wget: (wget). The non-interactive network downloader.
30 This file documents the the GNU Wget utility for downloading network
33 @c man begin COPYRIGHT
34 Copyright @copyright{} 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 Free
35 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.
42 Permission is granted to process this file through TeX and print the
43 results, provided the printed document carries a copying permission
44 notice identical to this one except for the removal of this paragraph
45 (this paragraph not being relevant to the printed manual).
47 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
48 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or
49 any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with the
50 Invariant Sections being ``GNU General Public License'' and ``GNU Free
51 Documentation License'', with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no
52 Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section
53 entitled ``GNU Free 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 the developers
65 Originally written by Hrvoje Niksic <hniksic@arsdigita.com>.
68 GNU Info entry for @file{wget}.
73 @vskip 0pt plus 1filll
74 Copyright @copyright{} 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2003 Free Software
77 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
78 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or
79 any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with the
80 Invariant Sections being ``GNU General Public License'' and ``GNU Free
81 Documentation License'', with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no
82 Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section
83 entitled ``GNU Free Documentation License''.
87 @node Top, Overview, (dir), (dir)
88 @top Wget @value{VERSION}
90 This manual documents version @value{VERSION} of GNU Wget, the freely
91 available utility for network downloads.
93 Copyright @copyright{} 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2003 Free Software
97 * Overview:: Features of Wget.
98 * Invoking:: Wget command-line arguments.
99 * Recursive Retrieval:: Description of recursive retrieval.
100 * Following Links:: The available methods of chasing links.
101 * Time-Stamping:: Mirroring according to time-stamps.
102 * Startup File:: Wget's initialization file.
103 * Examples:: Examples of usage.
104 * Various:: The stuff that doesn't fit anywhere else.
105 * Appendices:: Some useful references.
106 * Copying:: You may give out copies of Wget and of this manual.
107 * Concept Index:: Topics covered by this manual.
111 @node Overview, Invoking, Top, Top
116 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
117 GNU Wget is a free utility for non-interactive download of files from
118 the Web. It supports @sc{http}, @sc{https}, and @sc{ftp} protocols, as
119 well as retrieval through @sc{http} proxies.
122 This chapter is a partial overview of Wget's features.
126 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
127 Wget is non-interactive, meaning that it can work in the background,
128 while the user is not logged on. This allows you to start a retrieval
129 and disconnect from the system, letting Wget finish the work. By
130 contrast, most of the Web browsers require constant user's presence,
131 which can be a great hindrance when transferring a lot of data.
137 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
141 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
142 Wget can follow links in @sc{html} and @sc{xhtml} pages and create local
143 versions of remote web sites, fully recreating the directory structure of
144 the original site. This is sometimes referred to as ``recursive
145 downloading.'' While doing that, Wget respects the Robot Exclusion
146 Standard (@file{/robots.txt}). Wget can be instructed to convert the
147 links in downloaded @sc{html} files to the local files for offline
153 File name wildcard matching and recursive mirroring of directories are
154 available when retrieving via @sc{ftp}. Wget can read the time-stamp
155 information given by both @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} servers, and store it
156 locally. Thus Wget can see if the remote file has changed since last
157 retrieval, and automatically retrieve the new version if it has. This
158 makes Wget suitable for mirroring of @sc{ftp} sites, as well as home
164 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
168 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
169 Wget has been designed for robustness over slow or unstable network
170 connections; if a download fails due to a network problem, it will
171 keep retrying until the whole file has been retrieved. If the server
172 supports regetting, it will instruct the server to continue the
173 download from where it left off.
178 Wget supports proxy servers, which can lighten the network load, speed
179 up retrieval and provide access behind firewalls. However, if you are
180 behind a firewall that requires that you use a socks style gateway, you
181 can get the socks library and build Wget with support for socks. Wget
182 also supports the passive @sc{ftp} downloading as an option.
186 Built-in features offer mechanisms to tune which links you wish to follow
187 (@pxref{Following Links}).
191 The retrieval is conveniently traced with printing dots, each dot
192 representing a fixed amount of data received (1KB by default). These
193 representations can be customized to your preferences.
197 Most of the features are fully configurable, either through command line
198 options, or via the initialization file @file{.wgetrc} (@pxref{Startup
199 File}). Wget allows you to define @dfn{global} startup files
200 (@file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default) for site settings.
205 @item /usr/local/etc/wgetrc
206 Default location of the @dfn{global} startup file.
216 Finally, GNU Wget is free software. This means that everyone may use
217 it, redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General
218 Public License, as published by the Free Software Foundation
222 @node Invoking, Recursive Retrieval, Overview, Top
229 By default, Wget is very simple to invoke. The basic syntax is:
232 @c man begin SYNOPSIS
233 wget [@var{option}]@dots{} [@var{URL}]@dots{}
237 Wget will simply download all the @sc{url}s specified on the command
238 line. @var{URL} is a @dfn{Uniform Resource Locator}, as defined below.
240 However, you may wish to change some of the default parameters of
241 Wget. You can do it two ways: permanently, adding the appropriate
242 command to @file{.wgetrc} (@pxref{Startup File}), or specifying it on
248 * Basic Startup Options::
249 * Logging and Input File Options::
251 * Directory Options::
254 * Recursive Retrieval Options::
255 * Recursive Accept/Reject Options::
258 @node URL Format, Option Syntax, Invoking, Invoking
263 @dfn{URL} is an acronym for Uniform Resource Locator. A uniform
264 resource locator is a compact string representation for a resource
265 available via the Internet. Wget recognizes the @sc{url} syntax as per
266 @sc{rfc1738}. This is the most widely used form (square brackets denote
270 http://host[:port]/directory/file
271 ftp://host[:port]/directory/file
274 You can also encode your username and password within a @sc{url}:
277 ftp://user:password@@host/path
278 http://user:password@@host/path
281 Either @var{user} or @var{password}, or both, may be left out. If you
282 leave out either the @sc{http} username or password, no authentication
283 will be sent. If you leave out the @sc{ftp} username, @samp{anonymous}
284 will be used. If you leave out the @sc{ftp} password, your email
285 address will be supplied as a default password.@footnote{If you have a
286 @file{.netrc} file in your home directory, password will also be
289 @strong{Important Note}: if you specify a password-containing @sc{url}
290 on the command line, the username and password will be plainly visible
291 to all users on the system, by way of @code{ps}. On multi-user systems,
292 this is a big security risk. To work around it, use @code{wget -i -}
293 and feed the @sc{url}s to Wget's standard input, each on a separate
294 line, terminated by @kbd{C-d}.
296 You can encode unsafe characters in a @sc{url} as @samp{%xy}, @code{xy}
297 being the hexadecimal representation of the character's @sc{ascii}
298 value. Some common unsafe characters include @samp{%} (quoted as
299 @samp{%25}), @samp{:} (quoted as @samp{%3A}), and @samp{@@} (quoted as
300 @samp{%40}). Refer to @sc{rfc1738} for a comprehensive list of unsafe
303 Wget also supports the @code{type} feature for @sc{ftp} @sc{url}s. By
304 default, @sc{ftp} documents are retrieved in the binary mode (type
305 @samp{i}), which means that they are downloaded unchanged. Another
306 useful mode is the @samp{a} (@dfn{ASCII}) mode, which converts the line
307 delimiters between the different operating systems, and is thus useful
308 for text files. Here is an example:
311 ftp://host/directory/file;type=a
314 Two alternative variants of @sc{url} specification are also supported,
315 because of historical (hysterical?) reasons and their widespreaded use.
317 @sc{ftp}-only syntax (supported by @code{NcFTP}):
322 @sc{http}-only syntax (introduced by @code{Netscape}):
327 These two alternative forms are deprecated, and may cease being
328 supported in the future.
330 If you do not understand the difference between these notations, or do
331 not know which one to use, just use the plain ordinary format you use
332 with your favorite browser, like @code{Lynx} or @code{Netscape}.
334 @node Option Syntax, Basic Startup Options, URL Format, Invoking
335 @section Option Syntax
336 @cindex option syntax
337 @cindex syntax of options
339 Since Wget uses GNU getopts to process its arguments, every option has a
340 short form and a long form. Long options are more convenient to
341 remember, but take time to type. You may freely mix different option
342 styles, or specify options after the command-line arguments. Thus you
346 wget -r --tries=10 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/ -o log
349 The space between the option accepting an argument and the argument may
350 be omitted. Instead @samp{-o log} you can write @samp{-olog}.
352 You may put several options that do not require arguments together,
359 This is a complete equivalent of:
362 wget -d -r -c @var{URL}
365 Since the options can be specified after the arguments, you may
366 terminate them with @samp{--}. So the following will try to download
367 @sc{url} @samp{-x}, reporting failure to @file{log}:
373 The options that accept comma-separated lists all respect the convention
374 that specifying an empty list clears its value. This can be useful to
375 clear the @file{.wgetrc} settings. For instance, if your @file{.wgetrc}
376 sets @code{exclude_directories} to @file{/cgi-bin}, the following
377 example will first reset it, and then set it to exclude @file{/~nobody}
378 and @file{/~somebody}. You can also clear the lists in @file{.wgetrc}
379 (@pxref{Wgetrc Syntax}).
382 wget -X '' -X /~nobody,/~somebody
387 @node Basic Startup Options, Logging and Input File Options, Option Syntax, Invoking
388 @section Basic Startup Options
393 Display the version of Wget.
397 Print a help message describing all of Wget's command-line options.
401 Go to background immediately after startup. If no output file is
402 specified via the @samp{-o}, output is redirected to @file{wget-log}.
404 @cindex execute wgetrc command
405 @item -e @var{command}
406 @itemx --execute @var{command}
407 Execute @var{command} as if it were a part of @file{.wgetrc}
408 (@pxref{Startup File}). A command thus invoked will be executed
409 @emph{after} the commands in @file{.wgetrc}, thus taking precedence over
413 @node Logging and Input File Options, Download Options, Basic Startup Options, Invoking
414 @section Logging and Input File Options
419 @item -o @var{logfile}
420 @itemx --output-file=@var{logfile}
421 Log all messages to @var{logfile}. The messages are normally reported
424 @cindex append to log
425 @item -a @var{logfile}
426 @itemx --append-output=@var{logfile}
427 Append to @var{logfile}. This is the same as @samp{-o}, only it appends
428 to @var{logfile} instead of overwriting the old log file. If
429 @var{logfile} does not exist, a new file is created.
434 Turn on debug output, meaning various information important to the
435 developers of Wget if it does not work properly. Your system
436 administrator may have chosen to compile Wget without debug support, in
437 which case @samp{-d} will not work. Please note that compiling with
438 debug support is always safe---Wget compiled with the debug support will
439 @emph{not} print any debug info unless requested with @samp{-d}.
440 @xref{Reporting Bugs}, for more information on how to use @samp{-d} for
446 Turn off Wget's output.
451 Turn on verbose output, with all the available data. The default output
456 Non-verbose output---turn off verbose without being completely quiet
457 (use @samp{-q} for that), which means that error messages and basic
458 information still get printed.
462 @itemx --input-file=@var{file}
463 Read @sc{url}s from @var{file}, in which case no @sc{url}s need to be on
464 the command line. If there are @sc{url}s both on the command line and
465 in an input file, those on the command lines will be the first ones to
466 be retrieved. The @var{file} need not be an @sc{html} document (but no
467 harm if it is)---it is enough if the @sc{url}s are just listed
470 However, if you specify @samp{--force-html}, the document will be
471 regarded as @samp{html}. In that case you may have problems with
472 relative links, which you can solve either by adding @code{<base
473 href="@var{url}">} to the documents or by specifying
474 @samp{--base=@var{url}} on the command line.
479 When input is read from a file, force it to be treated as an @sc{html}
480 file. This enables you to retrieve relative links from existing
481 @sc{html} files on your local disk, by adding @code{<base
482 href="@var{url}">} to @sc{html}, or using the @samp{--base} command-line
485 @cindex base for relative links in input file
487 @itemx --base=@var{URL}
488 When used in conjunction with @samp{-F}, prepends @var{URL} to relative
489 links in the file specified by @samp{-i}.
492 @node Download Options, Directory Options, Logging and Input File Options, Invoking
493 @section Download Options
496 @cindex bind() address
497 @cindex client IP address
498 @cindex IP address, client
499 @item --bind-address=@var{ADDRESS}
500 When making client TCP/IP connections, @code{bind()} to @var{ADDRESS} on
501 the local machine. @var{ADDRESS} may be specified as a hostname or IP
502 address. This option can be useful if your machine is bound to multiple
507 @cindex number of retries
508 @item -t @var{number}
509 @itemx --tries=@var{number}
510 Set number of retries to @var{number}. Specify 0 or @samp{inf} for
511 infinite retrying. The default is to retry 20 times, with the exception
512 of fatal errors like ``connection refused'' or ``not found'' (404),
513 which are not retried.
516 @itemx --output-document=@var{file}
517 The documents will not be written to the appropriate files, but all will
518 be concatenated together and written to @var{file}. If @var{file}
519 already exists, it will be overwritten. If the @var{file} is @samp{-},
520 the documents will be written to standard output. Including this option
521 automatically sets the number of tries to 1.
523 @cindex clobbering, file
524 @cindex downloading multiple times
528 If a file is downloaded more than once in the same directory, Wget's
529 behavior depends on a few options, including @samp{-nc}. In certain
530 cases, the local file will be @dfn{clobbered}, or overwritten, upon
531 repeated download. In other cases it will be preserved.
533 When running Wget without @samp{-N}, @samp{-nc}, or @samp{-r},
534 downloading the same file in the same directory will result in the
535 original copy of @var{file} being preserved and the second copy being
536 named @samp{@var{file}.1}. If that file is downloaded yet again, the
537 third copy will be named @samp{@var{file}.2}, and so on. When
538 @samp{-nc} is specified, this behavior is suppressed, and Wget will
539 refuse to download newer copies of @samp{@var{file}}. Therefore,
540 ``@code{no-clobber}'' is actually a misnomer in this mode---it's not
541 clobbering that's prevented (as the numeric suffixes were already
542 preventing clobbering), but rather the multiple version saving that's
545 When running Wget with @samp{-r}, but without @samp{-N} or @samp{-nc},
546 re-downloading a file will result in the new copy simply overwriting the
547 old. Adding @samp{-nc} will prevent this behavior, instead causing the
548 original version to be preserved and any newer copies on the server to
551 When running Wget with @samp{-N}, with or without @samp{-r}, the
552 decision as to whether or not to download a newer copy of a file depends
553 on the local and remote timestamp and size of the file
554 (@pxref{Time-Stamping}). @samp{-nc} may not be specified at the same
557 Note that when @samp{-nc} is specified, files with the suffixes
558 @samp{.html} or (yuck) @samp{.htm} will be loaded from the local disk
559 and parsed as if they had been retrieved from the Web.
561 @cindex continue retrieval
562 @cindex incomplete downloads
563 @cindex resume download
566 Continue getting a partially-downloaded file. This is useful when you
567 want to finish up a download started by a previous instance of Wget, or
568 by another program. For instance:
571 wget -c ftp://sunsite.doc.ic.ac.uk/ls-lR.Z
574 If there is a file named @file{ls-lR.Z} in the current directory, Wget
575 will assume that it is the first portion of the remote file, and will
576 ask the server to continue the retrieval from an offset equal to the
577 length of the local file.
579 Note that you don't need to specify this option if you just want the
580 current invocation of Wget to retry downloading a file should the
581 connection be lost midway through. This is the default behavior.
582 @samp{-c} only affects resumption of downloads started @emph{prior} to
583 this invocation of Wget, and whose local files are still sitting around.
585 Without @samp{-c}, the previous example would just download the remote
586 file to @file{ls-lR.Z.1}, leaving the truncated @file{ls-lR.Z} file
589 Beginning with Wget 1.7, if you use @samp{-c} on a non-empty file, and
590 it turns out that the server does not support continued downloading,
591 Wget will refuse to start the download from scratch, which would
592 effectively ruin existing contents. If you really want the download to
593 start from scratch, remove the file.
595 Also beginning with Wget 1.7, if you use @samp{-c} on a file which is of
596 equal size as the one on the server, Wget will refuse to download the
597 file and print an explanatory message. The same happens when the file
598 is smaller on the server than locally (presumably because it was changed
599 on the server since your last download attempt)---because ``continuing''
600 is not meaningful, no download occurs.
602 On the other side of the coin, while using @samp{-c}, any file that's
603 bigger on the server than locally will be considered an incomplete
604 download and only @code{(length(remote) - length(local))} bytes will be
605 downloaded and tacked onto the end of the local file. This behavior can
606 be desirable in certain cases---for instance, you can use @samp{wget -c}
607 to download just the new portion that's been appended to a data
608 collection or log file.
610 However, if the file is bigger on the server because it's been
611 @emph{changed}, as opposed to just @emph{appended} to, you'll end up
612 with a garbled file. Wget has no way of verifying that the local file
613 is really a valid prefix of the remote file. You need to be especially
614 careful of this when using @samp{-c} in conjunction with @samp{-r},
615 since every file will be considered as an "incomplete download" candidate.
617 Another instance where you'll get a garbled file if you try to use
618 @samp{-c} is if you have a lame @sc{http} proxy that inserts a
619 ``transfer interrupted'' string into the local file. In the future a
620 ``rollback'' option may be added to deal with this case.
622 Note that @samp{-c} only works with @sc{ftp} servers and with @sc{http}
623 servers that support the @code{Range} header.
625 @cindex progress indicator
627 @item --progress=@var{type}
628 Select the type of the progress indicator you wish to use. Legal
629 indicators are ``dot'' and ``bar''.
631 The ``bar'' indicator is used by default. It draws an @sc{ascii} progress
632 bar graphics (a.k.a ``thermometer'' display) indicating the status of
633 retrieval. If the output is not a TTY, the ``dot'' bar will be used by
636 Use @samp{--progress=dot} to switch to the ``dot'' display. It traces
637 the retrieval by printing dots on the screen, each dot representing a
638 fixed amount of downloaded data.
640 When using the dotted retrieval, you may also set the @dfn{style} by
641 specifying the type as @samp{dot:@var{style}}. Different styles assign
642 different meaning to one dot. With the @code{default} style each dot
643 represents 1K, there are ten dots in a cluster and 50 dots in a line.
644 The @code{binary} style has a more ``computer''-like orientation---8K
645 dots, 16-dots clusters and 48 dots per line (which makes for 384K
646 lines). The @code{mega} style is suitable for downloading very large
647 files---each dot represents 64K retrieved, there are eight dots in a
648 cluster, and 48 dots on each line (so each line contains 3M).
650 Note that you can set the default style using the @code{progress}
651 command in @file{.wgetrc}. That setting may be overridden from the
652 command line. The exception is that, when the output is not a TTY, the
653 ``dot'' progress will be favored over ``bar''. To force the bar output,
654 use @samp{--progress=bar:force}.
657 @itemx --timestamping
658 Turn on time-stamping. @xref{Time-Stamping}, for details.
660 @cindex server response, print
662 @itemx --server-response
663 Print the headers sent by @sc{http} servers and responses sent by
666 @cindex Wget as spider
669 When invoked with this option, Wget will behave as a Web @dfn{spider},
670 which means that it will not download the pages, just check that they
671 are there. For example, you can use Wget to check your bookmarks:
674 wget --spider --force-html -i bookmarks.html
677 This feature needs much more work for Wget to get close to the
678 functionality of real web spiders.
682 @itemx --timeout=@var{seconds}
683 Set the network timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. This is equivalent
684 to specifying @samp{--dns-timeout}, @samp{--connect-timeout}, and
685 @samp{--read-timeout}, all at the same time.
687 Whenever Wget connects to or reads from a remote host, it checks for a
688 timeout and aborts the operation if the time expires. This prevents
689 anomalous occurrences such as hanging reads or infinite connects. The
690 only timeout enabled by default is a 900-second timeout for reading.
691 Setting timeout to 0 disables checking for timeouts.
693 Unless you know what you are doing, it is best not to set any of the
694 timeout-related options.
698 @item --dns-timeout=@var{seconds}
699 Set the DNS lookup timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. DNS lookups that
700 don't complete within the specified time will fail. By default, there
701 is no timeout on DNS lookups, other than that implemented by system
704 @cindex connect timeout
705 @cindex timeout, connect
706 @item --connect-timeout=@var{seconds}
707 Set the connect timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. TCP connections that
708 take longer to establish will be aborted. By default, there is no
709 connect timeout, other than that implemented by system libraries.
712 @cindex timeout, read
713 @item --read-timeout=@var{seconds}
714 Set the read (and write) timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. Reads that
715 take longer will fail. The default value for read timeout is 900
718 @cindex bandwidth, limit
720 @cindex limit bandwidth
721 @item --limit-rate=@var{amount}
722 Limit the download speed to @var{amount} bytes per second. Amount may
723 be expressed in bytes, kilobytes with the @samp{k} suffix, or megabytes
724 with the @samp{m} suffix. For example, @samp{--limit-rate=20k} will
725 limit the retrieval rate to 20KB/s. This kind of thing is useful when,
726 for whatever reason, you don't want Wget to consume the entire available
729 Note that Wget implements the limiting by sleeping the appropriate
730 amount of time after a network read that took less time than specified
731 by the rate. Eventually this strategy causes the TCP transfer to slow
732 down to approximately the specified rate. However, it may take some
733 time for this balance to be achieved, so don't be surprised if limiting
734 the rate doesn't work well with very small files.
738 @item -w @var{seconds}
739 @itemx --wait=@var{seconds}
740 Wait the specified number of seconds between the retrievals. Use of
741 this option is recommended, as it lightens the server load by making the
742 requests less frequent. Instead of in seconds, the time can be
743 specified in minutes using the @code{m} suffix, in hours using @code{h}
744 suffix, or in days using @code{d} suffix.
746 Specifying a large value for this option is useful if the network or the
747 destination host is down, so that Wget can wait long enough to
748 reasonably expect the network error to be fixed before the retry.
750 @cindex retries, waiting between
751 @cindex waiting between retries
752 @item --waitretry=@var{seconds}
753 If you don't want Wget to wait between @emph{every} retrieval, but only
754 between retries of failed downloads, you can use this option. Wget will
755 use @dfn{linear backoff}, waiting 1 second after the first failure on a
756 given file, then waiting 2 seconds after the second failure on that
757 file, up to the maximum number of @var{seconds} you specify. Therefore,
758 a value of 10 will actually make Wget wait up to (1 + 2 + ... + 10) = 55
761 Note that this option is turned on by default in the global
767 Some web sites may perform log analysis to identify retrieval programs
768 such as Wget by looking for statistically significant similarities in
769 the time between requests. This option causes the time between requests
770 to vary between 0 and 2 * @var{wait} seconds, where @var{wait} was
771 specified using the @samp{--wait} option, in order to mask Wget's
772 presence from such analysis.
774 A recent article in a publication devoted to development on a popular
775 consumer platform provided code to perform this analysis on the fly.
776 Its author suggested blocking at the class C address level to ensure
777 automated retrieval programs were blocked despite changing DHCP-supplied
780 The @samp{--random-wait} option was inspired by this ill-advised
781 recommendation to block many unrelated users from a web site due to the
786 @itemx --proxy=on/off
787 Turn proxy support on or off. The proxy is on by default if the
788 appropriate environment variable is defined.
790 For more information about the use of proxies with Wget, @xref{Proxies}.
794 @itemx --quota=@var{quota}
795 Specify download quota for automatic retrievals. The value can be
796 specified in bytes (default), kilobytes (with @samp{k} suffix), or
797 megabytes (with @samp{m} suffix).
799 Note that quota will never affect downloading a single file. So if you
800 specify @samp{wget -Q10k ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/ls-lR.gz}, all of the
801 @file{ls-lR.gz} will be downloaded. The same goes even when several
802 @sc{url}s are specified on the command-line. However, quota is
803 respected when retrieving either recursively, or from an input file.
804 Thus you may safely type @samp{wget -Q2m -i sites}---download will be
805 aborted when the quota is exceeded.
807 Setting quota to 0 or to @samp{inf} unlimits the download quota.
810 @cindex caching of DNS lookups
811 @item --dns-cache=off
812 Turn off caching of DNS lookups. Normally, Wget remembers the addresses
813 it looked up from DNS so it doesn't have to repeatedly contact the DNS
814 server for the same (typically small) set of addresses it retrieves
815 from. This cache exists in memory only; a new Wget run will contact DNS
818 However, in some cases it is not desirable to cache host names, even for
819 the duration of a short-running application like Wget. For example,
820 some HTTP servers are hosted on machines with dynamically allocated IP
821 addresses that change from time to time. Their DNS entries are updated
822 along with each change. When Wget's download from such a host gets
823 interrupted by IP address change, Wget retries the download, but (due to
824 DNS caching) it contacts the old address. With the DNS cache turned
825 off, Wget will repeat the DNS lookup for every connect and will thus get
826 the correct dynamic address every time---at the cost of additional DNS
827 lookups where they're probably not needed.
829 If you don't understand the above description, you probably won't need
832 @cindex file names, restrict
833 @cindex Windows file names
834 @item --restrict-file-names=@var{mode}
835 Change which characters found in remote URLs may show up in local file
836 names generated from those URLs. Characters that are @dfn{restricted}
837 by this option are escaped, i.e. replaced with @samp{%HH}, where
838 @samp{HH} is the hexadecimal number that corresponds to the restricted
841 By default, Wget escapes the characters that are not valid as part of
842 file names on your operating system, as well as control characters that
843 are typically unprintable. This option is useful for changing these
844 defaults, either because you are downloading to a non-native partition,
845 or because you want to disable escaping of the control characters.
847 When mode is set to ``unix'', Wget escapes the character @samp{/} and
848 the control characters in the ranges 0--31 and 128--159. This is the
849 default on Unix-like OS'es.
851 When mode is set to ``windows'', Wget escapes the characters @samp{\},
852 @samp{|}, @samp{/}, @samp{:}, @samp{?}, @samp{"}, @samp{*}, @samp{<},
853 @samp{>}, and the control characters in the ranges 0--31 and 128--159.
854 In addition to this, Wget in Windows mode uses @samp{+} instead of
855 @samp{:} to separate host and port in local file names, and uses
856 @samp{@@} instead of @samp{?} to separate the query portion of the file
857 name from the rest. Therefore, a URL that would be saved as
858 @samp{www.xemacs.org:4300/search.pl?input=blah} in Unix mode would be
859 saved as @samp{www.xemacs.org+4300/search.pl@@input=blah} in Windows
860 mode. This mode is the default on Windows.
862 If you append @samp{,nocontrol} to the mode, as in
863 @samp{unix,nocontrol}, escaping of the control characters is also
864 switched off. You can use @samp{--restrict-file-names=nocontrol} to
865 turn off escaping of control characters without affecting the choice of
866 the OS to use as file name restriction mode.
869 @node Directory Options, HTTP Options, Download Options, Invoking
870 @section Directory Options
874 @itemx --no-directories
875 Do not create a hierarchy of directories when retrieving recursively.
876 With this option turned on, all files will get saved to the current
877 directory, without clobbering (if a name shows up more than once, the
878 filenames will get extensions @samp{.n}).
881 @itemx --force-directories
882 The opposite of @samp{-nd}---create a hierarchy of directories, even if
883 one would not have been created otherwise. E.g. @samp{wget -x
884 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/robots.txt} will save the downloaded file to
885 @file{fly.srk.fer.hr/robots.txt}.
888 @itemx --no-host-directories
889 Disable generation of host-prefixed directories. By default, invoking
890 Wget with @samp{-r http://fly.srk.fer.hr/} will create a structure of
891 directories beginning with @file{fly.srk.fer.hr/}. This option disables
894 @cindex cut directories
895 @item --cut-dirs=@var{number}
896 Ignore @var{number} directory components. This is useful for getting a
897 fine-grained control over the directory where recursive retrieval will
900 Take, for example, the directory at
901 @samp{ftp://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/}. If you retrieve it with
902 @samp{-r}, it will be saved locally under
903 @file{ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/}. While the @samp{-nH} option can
904 remove the @file{ftp.xemacs.org/} part, you are still stuck with
905 @file{pub/xemacs}. This is where @samp{--cut-dirs} comes in handy; it
906 makes Wget not ``see'' @var{number} remote directory components. Here
907 are several examples of how @samp{--cut-dirs} option works.
911 No options -> ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/
913 -nH --cut-dirs=1 -> xemacs/
914 -nH --cut-dirs=2 -> .
916 --cut-dirs=1 -> ftp.xemacs.org/xemacs/
921 If you just want to get rid of the directory structure, this option is
922 similar to a combination of @samp{-nd} and @samp{-P}. However, unlike
923 @samp{-nd}, @samp{--cut-dirs} does not lose with subdirectories---for
924 instance, with @samp{-nH --cut-dirs=1}, a @file{beta/} subdirectory will
925 be placed to @file{xemacs/beta}, as one would expect.
927 @cindex directory prefix
928 @item -P @var{prefix}
929 @itemx --directory-prefix=@var{prefix}
930 Set directory prefix to @var{prefix}. The @dfn{directory prefix} is the
931 directory where all other files and subdirectories will be saved to,
932 i.e. the top of the retrieval tree. The default is @samp{.} (the
936 @node HTTP Options, FTP Options, Directory Options, Invoking
937 @section HTTP Options
940 @cindex .html extension
942 @itemx --html-extension
943 If a file of type @samp{application/xhtml+xml} or @samp{text/html} is
944 downloaded and the URL does not end with the regexp
945 @samp{\.[Hh][Tt][Mm][Ll]?}, this option will cause the suffix @samp{.html}
946 to be appended to the local filename. This is useful, for instance, when
947 you're mirroring a remote site that uses @samp{.asp} pages, but you want
948 the mirrored pages to be viewable on your stock Apache server. Another
949 good use for this is when you're downloading CGI-generated materials. A URL
950 like @samp{http://site.com/article.cgi?25} will be saved as
951 @file{article.cgi?25.html}.
953 Note that filenames changed in this way will be re-downloaded every time
954 you re-mirror a site, because Wget can't tell that the local
955 @file{@var{X}.html} file corresponds to remote URL @samp{@var{X}} (since
956 it doesn't yet know that the URL produces output of type
957 @samp{text/html} or @samp{application/xhtml+xml}. To prevent this
958 re-downloading, you must use @samp{-k} and @samp{-K} so that the original
959 version of the file will be saved as @file{@var{X}.orig} (@pxref{Recursive
963 @cindex http password
964 @cindex authentication
965 @item --http-user=@var{user}
966 @itemx --http-passwd=@var{password}
967 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} on an
968 @sc{http} server. According to the type of the challenge, Wget will
969 encode them using either the @code{basic} (insecure) or the
970 @code{digest} authentication scheme.
972 Another way to specify username and password is in the @sc{url} itself
973 (@pxref{URL Format}). Either method reveals your password to anyone who
974 bothers to run @code{ps}. To prevent the passwords from being seen,
975 store them in @file{.wgetrc} or @file{.netrc}, and make sure to protect
976 those files from other users with @code{chmod}. If the passwords are
977 really important, do not leave them lying in those files either---edit
978 the files and delete them after Wget has started the download.
980 For more information about security issues with Wget, @xref{Security
986 @itemx --cache=on/off
987 When set to off, disable server-side cache. In this case, Wget will
988 send the remote server an appropriate directive (@samp{Pragma:
989 no-cache}) to get the file from the remote service, rather than
990 returning the cached version. This is especially useful for retrieving
991 and flushing out-of-date documents on proxy servers.
993 Caching is allowed by default.
996 @item --cookies=on/off
997 When set to off, disable the use of cookies. Cookies are a mechanism
998 for maintaining server-side state. The server sends the client a cookie
999 using the @code{Set-Cookie} header, and the client responds with the
1000 same cookie upon further requests. Since cookies allow the server
1001 owners to keep track of visitors and for sites to exchange this
1002 information, some consider them a breach of privacy. The default is to
1003 use cookies; however, @emph{storing} cookies is not on by default.
1005 @cindex loading cookies
1006 @cindex cookies, loading
1007 @item --load-cookies @var{file}
1008 Load cookies from @var{file} before the first HTTP retrieval.
1009 @var{file} is a textual file in the format originally used by Netscape's
1010 @file{cookies.txt} file.
1012 You will typically use this option when mirroring sites that require
1013 that you be logged in to access some or all of their content. The login
1014 process typically works by the web server issuing an @sc{http} cookie
1015 upon receiving and verifying your credentials. The cookie is then
1016 resent by the browser when accessing that part of the site, and so
1017 proves your identity.
1019 Mirroring such a site requires Wget to send the same cookies your
1020 browser sends when communicating with the site. This is achieved by
1021 @samp{--load-cookies}---simply point Wget to the location of the
1022 @file{cookies.txt} file, and it will send the same cookies your browser
1023 would send in the same situation. Different browsers keep textual
1024 cookie files in different locations:
1028 The cookies are in @file{~/.netscape/cookies.txt}.
1030 @item Mozilla and Netscape 6.x.
1031 Mozilla's cookie file is also named @file{cookies.txt}, located
1032 somewhere under @file{~/.mozilla}, in the directory of your profile.
1033 The full path usually ends up looking somewhat like
1034 @file{~/.mozilla/default/@var{some-weird-string}/cookies.txt}.
1036 @item Internet Explorer.
1037 You can produce a cookie file Wget can use by using the File menu,
1038 Import and Export, Export Cookies. This has been tested with Internet
1039 Explorer 5; it is not guaranteed to work with earlier versions.
1041 @item Other browsers.
1042 If you are using a different browser to create your cookies,
1043 @samp{--load-cookies} will only work if you can locate or produce a
1044 cookie file in the Netscape format that Wget expects.
1047 If you cannot use @samp{--load-cookies}, there might still be an
1048 alternative. If your browser supports a ``cookie manager'', you can use
1049 it to view the cookies used when accessing the site you're mirroring.
1050 Write down the name and value of the cookie, and manually instruct Wget
1051 to send those cookies, bypassing the ``official'' cookie support:
1054 wget --cookies=off --header "Cookie: @var{name}=@var{value}"
1057 @cindex saving cookies
1058 @cindex cookies, saving
1059 @item --save-cookies @var{file}
1060 Save cookies to @var{file} before exiting. This will not save cookies
1061 that have expired or that have no expiry time (so-called ``session
1062 cookies''), but also see @samp{--keep-session-cookies}.
1064 @cindex cookies, session
1065 @cindex session cookies
1066 @item --keep-session-cookies
1068 When specified, causes @samp{--save-cookies} to also save session
1069 cookies. Session cookies are normally not save because they are
1070 supposed to be forgotten when you exit the browser. Saving them is
1071 useful on sites that require you to log in or to visit the home page
1072 before you can access some pages. With this option, multiple Wget runs
1073 are considered a single browser session as far as the site is concerned.
1075 Since the cookie file format does not normally carry session cookies,
1076 Wget marks them with an expiry timestamp of 0. Wget's
1077 @samp{--load-cookies} recognizes those as session cookies, but it might
1078 confuse other browsers. Also note that cookies so loaded will be
1079 treated as other session cookies, which means that if you want
1080 @samp{--save-cookies} to preserve them again, you must use
1081 @samp{--keep-session-cookies} again.
1083 @cindex Content-Length, ignore
1084 @cindex ignore length
1085 @item --ignore-length
1086 Unfortunately, some @sc{http} servers (@sc{cgi} programs, to be more
1087 precise) send out bogus @code{Content-Length} headers, which makes Wget
1088 go wild, as it thinks not all the document was retrieved. You can spot
1089 this syndrome if Wget retries getting the same document again and again,
1090 each time claiming that the (otherwise normal) connection has closed on
1093 With this option, Wget will ignore the @code{Content-Length} header---as
1094 if it never existed.
1097 @item --header=@var{additional-header}
1098 Define an @var{additional-header} to be passed to the @sc{http} servers.
1099 Headers must contain a @samp{:} preceded by one or more non-blank
1100 characters, and must not contain newlines.
1102 You may define more than one additional header by specifying
1103 @samp{--header} more than once.
1107 wget --header='Accept-Charset: iso-8859-2' \
1108 --header='Accept-Language: hr' \
1109 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/
1113 Specification of an empty string as the header value will clear all
1114 previous user-defined headers.
1117 @cindex proxy password
1118 @cindex proxy authentication
1119 @item --proxy-user=@var{user}
1120 @itemx --proxy-passwd=@var{password}
1121 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} for
1122 authentication on a proxy server. Wget will encode them using the
1123 @code{basic} authentication scheme.
1125 Security considerations similar to those with @samp{--http-passwd}
1126 pertain here as well.
1128 @cindex http referer
1129 @cindex referer, http
1130 @item --referer=@var{url}
1131 Include `Referer: @var{url}' header in HTTP request. Useful for
1132 retrieving documents with server-side processing that assume they are
1133 always being retrieved by interactive web browsers and only come out
1134 properly when Referer is set to one of the pages that point to them.
1136 @cindex server response, save
1138 @itemx --save-headers
1139 Save the headers sent by the @sc{http} server to the file, preceding the
1140 actual contents, with an empty line as the separator.
1143 @item -U @var{agent-string}
1144 @itemx --user-agent=@var{agent-string}
1145 Identify as @var{agent-string} to the @sc{http} server.
1147 The @sc{http} protocol allows the clients to identify themselves using a
1148 @code{User-Agent} header field. This enables distinguishing the
1149 @sc{www} software, usually for statistical purposes or for tracing of
1150 protocol violations. Wget normally identifies as
1151 @samp{Wget/@var{version}}, @var{version} being the current version
1154 However, some sites have been known to impose the policy of tailoring
1155 the output according to the @code{User-Agent}-supplied information.
1156 While conceptually this is not such a bad idea, it has been abused by
1157 servers denying information to clients other than @code{Mozilla} or
1158 Microsoft @code{Internet Explorer}. This option allows you to change
1159 the @code{User-Agent} line issued by Wget. Use of this option is
1160 discouraged, unless you really know what you are doing.
1163 @item --post-data=@var{string}
1164 @itemx --post-file=@var{file}
1165 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send the specified data
1166 in the request body. @code{--post-data} sends @var{string} as data,
1167 whereas @code{--post-file} sends the contents of @var{file}. Other than
1168 that, they work in exactly the same way.
1170 Please be aware that Wget needs to know the size of the POST data in
1171 advance. Therefore the argument to @code{--post-file} must be a regular
1172 file; specifying a FIFO or something like @file{/dev/stdin} won't work.
1173 It's not quite clear how to work around this limitation inherent in
1174 HTTP/1.0. Although HTTP/1.1 introduces @dfn{chunked} transfer that
1175 doesn't require knowing the request length in advance, a client can't
1176 use chunked unless it knows it's talking to an HTTP/1.1 server. And it
1177 can't know that until it receives a response, which in turn requires the
1178 request to have been completed -- a chicken-and-egg problem.
1180 Note: if Wget is redirected after the POST request is completed, it will
1181 not send the POST data to the redirected URL. This is because URLs that
1182 process POST often respond with a redirection to a regular page
1183 (although that's technically disallowed), which does not desire or
1184 accept POST. It is not yet clear that this behavior is optimal; if it
1185 doesn't work out, it will be changed.
1187 This example shows how to log to a server using POST and then proceed to
1188 download the desired pages, presumably only accessible to authorized
1193 # @r{Log in to the server. This can be done only once.}
1194 wget --save-cookies cookies.txt \
1195 --post-data 'user=foo&password=bar' \
1196 http://server.com/auth.php
1198 # @r{Now grab the page or pages we care about.}
1199 wget --load-cookies cookies.txt \
1200 -p http://server.com/interesting/article.php
1205 @node FTP Options, Recursive Retrieval Options, HTTP Options, Invoking
1206 @section FTP Options
1209 @cindex .listing files, removing
1211 @itemx --dont-remove-listing
1212 Don't remove the temporary @file{.listing} files generated by @sc{ftp}
1213 retrievals. Normally, these files contain the raw directory listings
1214 received from @sc{ftp} servers. Not removing them can be useful for
1215 debugging purposes, or when you want to be able to easily check on the
1216 contents of remote server directories (e.g. to verify that a mirror
1217 you're running is complete).
1219 Note that even though Wget writes to a known filename for this file,
1220 this is not a security hole in the scenario of a user making
1221 @file{.listing} a symbolic link to @file{/etc/passwd} or something and
1222 asking @code{root} to run Wget in his or her directory. Depending on
1223 the options used, either Wget will refuse to write to @file{.listing},
1224 making the globbing/recursion/time-stamping operation fail, or the
1225 symbolic link will be deleted and replaced with the actual
1226 @file{.listing} file, or the listing will be written to a
1227 @file{.listing.@var{number}} file.
1229 Even though this situation isn't a problem, though, @code{root} should
1230 never run Wget in a non-trusted user's directory. A user could do
1231 something as simple as linking @file{index.html} to @file{/etc/passwd}
1232 and asking @code{root} to run Wget with @samp{-N} or @samp{-r} so the file
1233 will be overwritten.
1235 @cindex globbing, toggle
1237 @itemx --glob=on/off
1238 Turn @sc{ftp} globbing on or off. Globbing means you may use the
1239 shell-like special characters (@dfn{wildcards}), like @samp{*},
1240 @samp{?}, @samp{[} and @samp{]} to retrieve more than one file from the
1241 same directory at once, like:
1244 wget ftp://gnjilux.srk.fer.hr/*.msg
1247 By default, globbing will be turned on if the @sc{url} contains a
1248 globbing character. This option may be used to turn globbing on or off
1251 You may have to quote the @sc{url} to protect it from being expanded by
1252 your shell. Globbing makes Wget look for a directory listing, which is
1253 system-specific. This is why it currently works only with Unix @sc{ftp}
1254 servers (and the ones emulating Unix @code{ls} output).
1258 Use the @dfn{passive} @sc{ftp} retrieval scheme, in which the client
1259 initiates the data connection. This is sometimes required for @sc{ftp}
1260 to work behind firewalls.
1262 @cindex symbolic links, retrieving
1263 @item --retr-symlinks
1264 Usually, when retrieving @sc{ftp} directories recursively and a symbolic
1265 link is encountered, the linked-to file is not downloaded. Instead, a
1266 matching symbolic link is created on the local filesystem. The
1267 pointed-to file will not be downloaded unless this recursive retrieval
1268 would have encountered it separately and downloaded it anyway.
1270 When @samp{--retr-symlinks} is specified, however, symbolic links are
1271 traversed and the pointed-to files are retrieved. At this time, this
1272 option does not cause Wget to traverse symlinks to directories and
1273 recurse through them, but in the future it should be enhanced to do
1276 Note that when retrieving a file (not a directory) because it was
1277 specified on the command-line, rather than because it was recursed to,
1278 this option has no effect. Symbolic links are always traversed in this
1282 @node Recursive Retrieval Options, Recursive Accept/Reject Options, FTP Options, Invoking
1283 @section Recursive Retrieval Options
1288 Turn on recursive retrieving. @xref{Recursive Retrieval}, for more
1291 @item -l @var{depth}
1292 @itemx --level=@var{depth}
1293 Specify recursion maximum depth level @var{depth} (@pxref{Recursive
1294 Retrieval}). The default maximum depth is 5.
1296 @cindex proxy filling
1297 @cindex delete after retrieval
1298 @cindex filling proxy cache
1299 @item --delete-after
1300 This option tells Wget to delete every single file it downloads,
1301 @emph{after} having done so. It is useful for pre-fetching popular
1302 pages through a proxy, e.g.:
1305 wget -r -nd --delete-after http://whatever.com/~popular/page/
1308 The @samp{-r} option is to retrieve recursively, and @samp{-nd} to not
1311 Note that @samp{--delete-after} deletes files on the local machine. It
1312 does not issue the @samp{DELE} command to remote FTP sites, for
1313 instance. Also note that when @samp{--delete-after} is specified,
1314 @samp{--convert-links} is ignored, so @samp{.orig} files are simply not
1315 created in the first place.
1317 @cindex conversion of links
1318 @cindex link conversion
1320 @itemx --convert-links
1321 After the download is complete, convert the links in the document to
1322 make them suitable for local viewing. This affects not only the visible
1323 hyperlinks, but any part of the document that links to external content,
1324 such as embedded images, links to style sheets, hyperlinks to non-@sc{html}
1327 Each link will be changed in one of the two ways:
1331 The links to files that have been downloaded by Wget will be changed to
1332 refer to the file they point to as a relative link.
1334 Example: if the downloaded file @file{/foo/doc.html} links to
1335 @file{/bar/img.gif}, also downloaded, then the link in @file{doc.html}
1336 will be modified to point to @samp{../bar/img.gif}. This kind of
1337 transformation works reliably for arbitrary combinations of directories.
1340 The links to files that have not been downloaded by Wget will be changed
1341 to include host name and absolute path of the location they point to.
1343 Example: if the downloaded file @file{/foo/doc.html} links to
1344 @file{/bar/img.gif} (or to @file{../bar/img.gif}), then the link in
1345 @file{doc.html} will be modified to point to
1346 @file{http://@var{hostname}/bar/img.gif}.
1349 Because of this, local browsing works reliably: if a linked file was
1350 downloaded, the link will refer to its local name; if it was not
1351 downloaded, the link will refer to its full Internet address rather than
1352 presenting a broken link. The fact that the former links are converted
1353 to relative links ensures that you can move the downloaded hierarchy to
1356 Note that only at the end of the download can Wget know which links have
1357 been downloaded. Because of that, the work done by @samp{-k} will be
1358 performed at the end of all the downloads.
1360 @cindex backing up converted files
1362 @itemx --backup-converted
1363 When converting a file, back up the original version with a @samp{.orig}
1364 suffix. Affects the behavior of @samp{-N} (@pxref{HTTP Time-Stamping
1369 Turn on options suitable for mirroring. This option turns on recursion
1370 and time-stamping, sets infinite recursion depth and keeps @sc{ftp}
1371 directory listings. It is currently equivalent to
1372 @samp{-r -N -l inf -nr}.
1374 @cindex page requisites
1375 @cindex required images, downloading
1377 @itemx --page-requisites
1378 This option causes Wget to download all the files that are necessary to
1379 properly display a given @sc{html} page. This includes such things as
1380 inlined images, sounds, and referenced stylesheets.
1382 Ordinarily, when downloading a single @sc{html} page, any requisite documents
1383 that may be needed to display it properly are not downloaded. Using
1384 @samp{-r} together with @samp{-l} can help, but since Wget does not
1385 ordinarily distinguish between external and inlined documents, one is
1386 generally left with ``leaf documents'' that are missing their
1389 For instance, say document @file{1.html} contains an @code{<IMG>} tag
1390 referencing @file{1.gif} and an @code{<A>} tag pointing to external
1391 document @file{2.html}. Say that @file{2.html} is similar but that its
1392 image is @file{2.gif} and it links to @file{3.html}. Say this
1393 continues up to some arbitrarily high number.
1395 If one executes the command:
1398 wget -r -l 2 http://@var{site}/1.html
1401 then @file{1.html}, @file{1.gif}, @file{2.html}, @file{2.gif}, and
1402 @file{3.html} will be downloaded. As you can see, @file{3.html} is
1403 without its requisite @file{3.gif} because Wget is simply counting the
1404 number of hops (up to 2) away from @file{1.html} in order to determine
1405 where to stop the recursion. However, with this command:
1408 wget -r -l 2 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1411 all the above files @emph{and} @file{3.html}'s requisite @file{3.gif}
1412 will be downloaded. Similarly,
1415 wget -r -l 1 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1418 will cause @file{1.html}, @file{1.gif}, @file{2.html}, and @file{2.gif}
1419 to be downloaded. One might think that:
1422 wget -r -l 0 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1425 would download just @file{1.html} and @file{1.gif}, but unfortunately
1426 this is not the case, because @samp{-l 0} is equivalent to
1427 @samp{-l inf}---that is, infinite recursion. To download a single @sc{html}
1428 page (or a handful of them, all specified on the command-line or in a
1429 @samp{-i} @sc{url} input file) and its (or their) requisites, simply leave off
1430 @samp{-r} and @samp{-l}:
1433 wget -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1436 Note that Wget will behave as if @samp{-r} had been specified, but only
1437 that single page and its requisites will be downloaded. Links from that
1438 page to external documents will not be followed. Actually, to download
1439 a single page and all its requisites (even if they exist on separate
1440 websites), and make sure the lot displays properly locally, this author
1441 likes to use a few options in addition to @samp{-p}:
1444 wget -E -H -k -K -p http://@var{site}/@var{document}
1447 To finish off this topic, it's worth knowing that Wget's idea of an
1448 external document link is any URL specified in an @code{<A>} tag, an
1449 @code{<AREA>} tag, or a @code{<LINK>} tag other than @code{<LINK
1452 @cindex @sc{html} comments
1453 @cindex comments, @sc{html}
1454 @item --strict-comments
1455 Turn on strict parsing of @sc{html} comments. The default is to terminate
1456 comments at the first occurrence of @samp{-->}.
1458 According to specifications, @sc{html} comments are expressed as @sc{sgml}
1459 @dfn{declarations}. Declaration is special markup that begins with
1460 @samp{<!} and ends with @samp{>}, such as @samp{<!DOCTYPE ...>}, that
1461 may contain comments between a pair of @samp{--} delimiters. @sc{html}
1462 comments are ``empty declarations'', @sc{sgml} declarations without any
1463 non-comment text. Therefore, @samp{<!--foo-->} is a valid comment, and
1464 so is @samp{<!--one-- --two-->}, but @samp{<!--1--2-->} is not.
1466 On the other hand, most @sc{html} writers don't perceive comments as anything
1467 other than text delimited with @samp{<!--} and @samp{-->}, which is not
1468 quite the same. For example, something like @samp{<!------------>}
1469 works as a valid comment as long as the number of dashes is a multiple
1470 of four (!). If not, the comment technically lasts until the next
1471 @samp{--}, which may be at the other end of the document. Because of
1472 this, many popular browsers completely ignore the specification and
1473 implement what users have come to expect: comments delimited with
1474 @samp{<!--} and @samp{-->}.
1476 Until version 1.9, Wget interpreted comments strictly, which resulted in
1477 missing links in many web pages that displayed fine in browsers, but had
1478 the misfortune of containing non-compliant comments. Beginning with
1479 version 1.9, Wget has joined the ranks of clients that implements
1480 ``naive'' comments, terminating each comment at the first occurrence of
1483 If, for whatever reason, you want strict comment parsing, use this
1484 option to turn it on.
1487 @node Recursive Accept/Reject Options, , Recursive Retrieval Options, Invoking
1488 @section Recursive Accept/Reject Options
1491 @item -A @var{acclist} --accept @var{acclist}
1492 @itemx -R @var{rejlist} --reject @var{rejlist}
1493 Specify comma-separated lists of file name suffixes or patterns to
1494 accept or reject (@pxref{Types of Files} for more details).
1496 @item -D @var{domain-list}
1497 @itemx --domains=@var{domain-list}
1498 Set domains to be followed. @var{domain-list} is a comma-separated list
1499 of domains. Note that it does @emph{not} turn on @samp{-H}.
1501 @item --exclude-domains @var{domain-list}
1502 Specify the domains that are @emph{not} to be followed.
1503 (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
1505 @cindex follow FTP links
1507 Follow @sc{ftp} links from @sc{html} documents. Without this option,
1508 Wget will ignore all the @sc{ftp} links.
1510 @cindex tag-based recursive pruning
1511 @item --follow-tags=@var{list}
1512 Wget has an internal table of @sc{html} tag / attribute pairs that it
1513 considers when looking for linked documents during a recursive
1514 retrieval. If a user wants only a subset of those tags to be
1515 considered, however, he or she should be specify such tags in a
1516 comma-separated @var{list} with this option.
1519 @itemx --ignore-tags=@var{list}
1520 This is the opposite of the @samp{--follow-tags} option. To skip
1521 certain @sc{html} tags when recursively looking for documents to download,
1522 specify them in a comma-separated @var{list}.
1524 In the past, the @samp{-G} option was the best bet for downloading a
1525 single page and its requisites, using a command-line like:
1528 wget -Ga,area -H -k -K -r http://@var{site}/@var{document}
1531 However, the author of this option came across a page with tags like
1532 @code{<LINK REL="home" HREF="/">} and came to the realization that
1533 @samp{-G} was not enough. One can't just tell Wget to ignore
1534 @code{<LINK>}, because then stylesheets will not be downloaded. Now the
1535 best bet for downloading a single page and its requisites is the
1536 dedicated @samp{--page-requisites} option.
1540 Enable spanning across hosts when doing recursive retrieving
1541 (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
1545 Follow relative links only. Useful for retrieving a specific home page
1546 without any distractions, not even those from the same hosts
1547 (@pxref{Relative Links}).
1550 @itemx --include-directories=@var{list}
1551 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to follow when
1552 downloading (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits} for more details.) Elements
1553 of @var{list} may contain wildcards.
1556 @itemx --exclude-directories=@var{list}
1557 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to exclude from
1558 download (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits} for more details.) Elements of
1559 @var{list} may contain wildcards.
1563 Do not ever ascend to the parent directory when retrieving recursively.
1564 This is a useful option, since it guarantees that only the files
1565 @emph{below} a certain hierarchy will be downloaded.
1566 @xref{Directory-Based Limits}, for more details.
1571 @node Recursive Retrieval, Following Links, Invoking, Top
1572 @chapter Recursive Retrieval
1575 @cindex recursive retrieval
1577 GNU Wget is capable of traversing parts of the Web (or a single
1578 @sc{http} or @sc{ftp} server), following links and directory structure.
1579 We refer to this as to @dfn{recursive retrieval}, or @dfn{recursion}.
1581 With @sc{http} @sc{url}s, Wget retrieves and parses the @sc{html} from
1582 the given @sc{url}, documents, retrieving the files the @sc{html}
1583 document was referring to, through markup like @code{href}, or
1584 @code{src}. If the freshly downloaded file is also of type
1585 @code{text/html} or @code{application/xhtml+xml}, it will be parsed and
1588 Recursive retrieval of @sc{http} and @sc{html} content is
1589 @dfn{breadth-first}. This means that Wget first downloads the requested
1590 @sc{html} document, then the documents linked from that document, then the
1591 documents linked by them, and so on. In other words, Wget first
1592 downloads the documents at depth 1, then those at depth 2, and so on
1593 until the specified maximum depth.
1595 The maximum @dfn{depth} to which the retrieval may descend is specified
1596 with the @samp{-l} option. The default maximum depth is five layers.
1598 When retrieving an @sc{ftp} @sc{url} recursively, Wget will retrieve all
1599 the data from the given directory tree (including the subdirectories up
1600 to the specified depth) on the remote server, creating its mirror image
1601 locally. @sc{ftp} retrieval is also limited by the @code{depth}
1602 parameter. Unlike @sc{http} recursion, @sc{ftp} recursion is performed
1605 By default, Wget will create a local directory tree, corresponding to
1606 the one found on the remote server.
1608 Recursive retrieving can find a number of applications, the most
1609 important of which is mirroring. It is also useful for @sc{www}
1610 presentations, and any other opportunities where slow network
1611 connections should be bypassed by storing the files locally.
1613 You should be warned that recursive downloads can overload the remote
1614 servers. Because of that, many administrators frown upon them and may
1615 ban access from your site if they detect very fast downloads of big
1616 amounts of content. When downloading from Internet servers, consider
1617 using the @samp{-w} option to introduce a delay between accesses to the
1618 server. The download will take a while longer, but the server
1619 administrator will not be alarmed by your rudeness.
1621 Of course, recursive download may cause problems on your machine. If
1622 left to run unchecked, it can easily fill up the disk. If downloading
1623 from local network, it can also take bandwidth on the system, as well as
1624 consume memory and CPU.
1626 Try to specify the criteria that match the kind of download you are
1627 trying to achieve. If you want to download only one page, use
1628 @samp{--page-requisites} without any additional recursion. If you want
1629 to download things under one directory, use @samp{-np} to avoid
1630 downloading things from other directories. If you want to download all
1631 the files from one directory, use @samp{-l 1} to make sure the recursion
1632 depth never exceeds one. @xref{Following Links}, for more information
1635 Recursive retrieval should be used with care. Don't say you were not
1638 @node Following Links, Time-Stamping, Recursive Retrieval, Top
1639 @chapter Following Links
1641 @cindex following links
1643 When retrieving recursively, one does not wish to retrieve loads of
1644 unnecessary data. Most of the time the users bear in mind exactly what
1645 they want to download, and want Wget to follow only specific links.
1647 For example, if you wish to download the music archive from
1648 @samp{fly.srk.fer.hr}, you will not want to download all the home pages
1649 that happen to be referenced by an obscure part of the archive.
1651 Wget possesses several mechanisms that allows you to fine-tune which
1652 links it will follow.
1655 * Spanning Hosts:: (Un)limiting retrieval based on host name.
1656 * Types of Files:: Getting only certain files.
1657 * Directory-Based Limits:: Getting only certain directories.
1658 * Relative Links:: Follow relative links only.
1659 * FTP Links:: Following FTP links.
1662 @node Spanning Hosts, Types of Files, Following Links, Following Links
1663 @section Spanning Hosts
1664 @cindex spanning hosts
1665 @cindex hosts, spanning
1667 Wget's recursive retrieval normally refuses to visit hosts different
1668 than the one you specified on the command line. This is a reasonable
1669 default; without it, every retrieval would have the potential to turn
1670 your Wget into a small version of google.
1672 However, visiting different hosts, or @dfn{host spanning,} is sometimes
1673 a useful option. Maybe the images are served from a different server.
1674 Maybe you're mirroring a site that consists of pages interlinked between
1675 three servers. Maybe the server has two equivalent names, and the @sc{html}
1676 pages refer to both interchangeably.
1679 @item Span to any host---@samp{-H}
1681 The @samp{-H} option turns on host spanning, thus allowing Wget's
1682 recursive run to visit any host referenced by a link. Unless sufficient
1683 recursion-limiting criteria are applied depth, these foreign hosts will
1684 typically link to yet more hosts, and so on until Wget ends up sucking
1685 up much more data than you have intended.
1687 @item Limit spanning to certain domains---@samp{-D}
1689 The @samp{-D} option allows you to specify the domains that will be
1690 followed, thus limiting the recursion only to the hosts that belong to
1691 these domains. Obviously, this makes sense only in conjunction with
1692 @samp{-H}. A typical example would be downloading the contents of
1693 @samp{www.server.com}, but allowing downloads from
1694 @samp{images.server.com}, etc.:
1697 wget -rH -Dserver.com http://www.server.com/
1700 You can specify more than one address by separating them with a comma,
1701 e.g. @samp{-Ddomain1.com,domain2.com}.
1703 @item Keep download off certain domains---@samp{--exclude-domains}
1705 If there are domains you want to exclude specifically, you can do it
1706 with @samp{--exclude-domains}, which accepts the same type of arguments
1707 of @samp{-D}, but will @emph{exclude} all the listed domains. For
1708 example, if you want to download all the hosts from @samp{foo.edu}
1709 domain, with the exception of @samp{sunsite.foo.edu}, you can do it like
1713 wget -rH -Dfoo.edu --exclude-domains sunsite.foo.edu \
1719 @node Types of Files, Directory-Based Limits, Spanning Hosts, Following Links
1720 @section Types of Files
1721 @cindex types of files
1723 When downloading material from the web, you will often want to restrict
1724 the retrieval to only certain file types. For example, if you are
1725 interested in downloading @sc{gif}s, you will not be overjoyed to get
1726 loads of PostScript documents, and vice versa.
1728 Wget offers two options to deal with this problem. Each option
1729 description lists a short name, a long name, and the equivalent command
1732 @cindex accept wildcards
1733 @cindex accept suffixes
1734 @cindex wildcards, accept
1735 @cindex suffixes, accept
1737 @item -A @var{acclist}
1738 @itemx --accept @var{acclist}
1739 @itemx accept = @var{acclist}
1740 The argument to @samp{--accept} option is a list of file suffixes or
1741 patterns that Wget will download during recursive retrieval. A suffix
1742 is the ending part of a file, and consists of ``normal'' letters,
1743 e.g. @samp{gif} or @samp{.jpg}. A matching pattern contains shell-like
1744 wildcards, e.g. @samp{books*} or @samp{zelazny*196[0-9]*}.
1746 So, specifying @samp{wget -A gif,jpg} will make Wget download only the
1747 files ending with @samp{gif} or @samp{jpg}, i.e. @sc{gif}s and
1748 @sc{jpeg}s. On the other hand, @samp{wget -A "zelazny*196[0-9]*"} will
1749 download only files beginning with @samp{zelazny} and containing numbers
1750 from 1960 to 1969 anywhere within. Look up the manual of your shell for
1751 a description of how pattern matching works.
1753 Of course, any number of suffixes and patterns can be combined into a
1754 comma-separated list, and given as an argument to @samp{-A}.
1756 @cindex reject wildcards
1757 @cindex reject suffixes
1758 @cindex wildcards, reject
1759 @cindex suffixes, reject
1760 @item -R @var{rejlist}
1761 @itemx --reject @var{rejlist}
1762 @itemx reject = @var{rejlist}
1763 The @samp{--reject} option works the same way as @samp{--accept}, only
1764 its logic is the reverse; Wget will download all files @emph{except} the
1765 ones matching the suffixes (or patterns) in the list.
1767 So, if you want to download a whole page except for the cumbersome
1768 @sc{mpeg}s and @sc{.au} files, you can use @samp{wget -R mpg,mpeg,au}.
1769 Analogously, to download all files except the ones beginning with
1770 @samp{bjork}, use @samp{wget -R "bjork*"}. The quotes are to prevent
1771 expansion by the shell.
1774 The @samp{-A} and @samp{-R} options may be combined to achieve even
1775 better fine-tuning of which files to retrieve. E.g. @samp{wget -A
1776 "*zelazny*" -R .ps} will download all the files having @samp{zelazny} as
1777 a part of their name, but @emph{not} the PostScript files.
1779 Note that these two options do not affect the downloading of @sc{html}
1780 files; Wget must load all the @sc{html}s to know where to go at
1781 all---recursive retrieval would make no sense otherwise.
1783 @node Directory-Based Limits, Relative Links, Types of Files, Following Links
1784 @section Directory-Based Limits
1786 @cindex directory limits
1788 Regardless of other link-following facilities, it is often useful to
1789 place the restriction of what files to retrieve based on the directories
1790 those files are placed in. There can be many reasons for this---the
1791 home pages may be organized in a reasonable directory structure; or some
1792 directories may contain useless information, e.g. @file{/cgi-bin} or
1793 @file{/dev} directories.
1795 Wget offers three different options to deal with this requirement. Each
1796 option description lists a short name, a long name, and the equivalent
1797 command in @file{.wgetrc}.
1799 @cindex directories, include
1800 @cindex include directories
1801 @cindex accept directories
1804 @itemx --include @var{list}
1805 @itemx include_directories = @var{list}
1806 @samp{-I} option accepts a comma-separated list of directories included
1807 in the retrieval. Any other directories will simply be ignored. The
1808 directories are absolute paths.
1810 So, if you wish to download from @samp{http://host/people/bozo/}
1811 following only links to bozo's colleagues in the @file{/people}
1812 directory and the bogus scripts in @file{/cgi-bin}, you can specify:
1815 wget -I /people,/cgi-bin http://host/people/bozo/
1818 @cindex directories, exclude
1819 @cindex exclude directories
1820 @cindex reject directories
1822 @itemx --exclude @var{list}
1823 @itemx exclude_directories = @var{list}
1824 @samp{-X} option is exactly the reverse of @samp{-I}---this is a list of
1825 directories @emph{excluded} from the download. E.g. if you do not want
1826 Wget to download things from @file{/cgi-bin} directory, specify @samp{-X
1827 /cgi-bin} on the command line.
1829 The same as with @samp{-A}/@samp{-R}, these two options can be combined
1830 to get a better fine-tuning of downloading subdirectories. E.g. if you
1831 want to load all the files from @file{/pub} hierarchy except for
1832 @file{/pub/worthless}, specify @samp{-I/pub -X/pub/worthless}.
1837 @itemx no_parent = on
1838 The simplest, and often very useful way of limiting directories is
1839 disallowing retrieval of the links that refer to the hierarchy
1840 @dfn{above} than the beginning directory, i.e. disallowing ascent to the
1841 parent directory/directories.
1843 The @samp{--no-parent} option (short @samp{-np}) is useful in this case.
1844 Using it guarantees that you will never leave the existing hierarchy.
1845 Supposing you issue Wget with:
1848 wget -r --no-parent http://somehost/~luzer/my-archive/
1851 You may rest assured that none of the references to
1852 @file{/~his-girls-homepage/} or @file{/~luzer/all-my-mpegs/} will be
1853 followed. Only the archive you are interested in will be downloaded.
1854 Essentially, @samp{--no-parent} is similar to
1855 @samp{-I/~luzer/my-archive}, only it handles redirections in a more
1856 intelligent fashion.
1859 @node Relative Links, FTP Links, Directory-Based Limits, Following Links
1860 @section Relative Links
1861 @cindex relative links
1863 When @samp{-L} is turned on, only the relative links are ever followed.
1864 Relative links are here defined those that do not refer to the web
1865 server root. For example, these links are relative:
1869 <a href="foo/bar.gif">
1870 <a href="../foo/bar.gif">
1873 These links are not relative:
1877 <a href="/foo/bar.gif">
1878 <a href="http://www.server.com/foo/bar.gif">
1881 Using this option guarantees that recursive retrieval will not span
1882 hosts, even without @samp{-H}. In simple cases it also allows downloads
1883 to ``just work'' without having to convert links.
1885 This option is probably not very useful and might be removed in a future
1888 @node FTP Links, , Relative Links, Following Links
1889 @section Following FTP Links
1890 @cindex following ftp links
1892 The rules for @sc{ftp} are somewhat specific, as it is necessary for
1893 them to be. @sc{ftp} links in @sc{html} documents are often included
1894 for purposes of reference, and it is often inconvenient to download them
1897 To have @sc{ftp} links followed from @sc{html} documents, you need to
1898 specify the @samp{--follow-ftp} option. Having done that, @sc{ftp}
1899 links will span hosts regardless of @samp{-H} setting. This is logical,
1900 as @sc{ftp} links rarely point to the same host where the @sc{http}
1901 server resides. For similar reasons, the @samp{-L} options has no
1902 effect on such downloads. On the other hand, domain acceptance
1903 (@samp{-D}) and suffix rules (@samp{-A} and @samp{-R}) apply normally.
1905 Also note that followed links to @sc{ftp} directories will not be
1906 retrieved recursively further.
1908 @node Time-Stamping, Startup File, Following Links, Top
1909 @chapter Time-Stamping
1910 @cindex time-stamping
1911 @cindex timestamping
1912 @cindex updating the archives
1913 @cindex incremental updating
1915 One of the most important aspects of mirroring information from the
1916 Internet is updating your archives.
1918 Downloading the whole archive again and again, just to replace a few
1919 changed files is expensive, both in terms of wasted bandwidth and money,
1920 and the time to do the update. This is why all the mirroring tools
1921 offer the option of incremental updating.
1923 Such an updating mechanism means that the remote server is scanned in
1924 search of @dfn{new} files. Only those new files will be downloaded in
1925 the place of the old ones.
1927 A file is considered new if one of these two conditions are met:
1931 A file of that name does not already exist locally.
1934 A file of that name does exist, but the remote file was modified more
1935 recently than the local file.
1938 To implement this, the program needs to be aware of the time of last
1939 modification of both local and remote files. We call this information the
1940 @dfn{time-stamp} of a file.
1942 The time-stamping in GNU Wget is turned on using @samp{--timestamping}
1943 (@samp{-N}) option, or through @code{timestamping = on} directive in
1944 @file{.wgetrc}. With this option, for each file it intends to download,
1945 Wget will check whether a local file of the same name exists. If it
1946 does, and the remote file is older, Wget will not download it.
1948 If the local file does not exist, or the sizes of the files do not
1949 match, Wget will download the remote file no matter what the time-stamps
1953 * Time-Stamping Usage::
1954 * HTTP Time-Stamping Internals::
1955 * FTP Time-Stamping Internals::
1958 @node Time-Stamping Usage, HTTP Time-Stamping Internals, Time-Stamping, Time-Stamping
1959 @section Time-Stamping Usage
1960 @cindex time-stamping usage
1961 @cindex usage, time-stamping
1963 The usage of time-stamping is simple. Say you would like to download a
1964 file so that it keeps its date of modification.
1967 wget -S http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/
1970 A simple @code{ls -l} shows that the time stamp on the local file equals
1971 the state of the @code{Last-Modified} header, as returned by the server.
1972 As you can see, the time-stamping info is preserved locally, even
1973 without @samp{-N} (at least for @sc{http}).
1975 Several days later, you would like Wget to check if the remote file has
1976 changed, and download it if it has.
1979 wget -N http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/
1982 Wget will ask the server for the last-modified date. If the local file
1983 has the same timestamp as the server, or a newer one, the remote file
1984 will not be re-fetched. However, if the remote file is more recent,
1985 Wget will proceed to fetch it.
1987 The same goes for @sc{ftp}. For example:
1990 wget "ftp://ftp.ifi.uio.no/pub/emacs/gnus/*"
1993 (The quotes around that URL are to prevent the shell from trying to
1994 interpret the @samp{*}.)
1996 After download, a local directory listing will show that the timestamps
1997 match those on the remote server. Reissuing the command with @samp{-N}
1998 will make Wget re-fetch @emph{only} the files that have been modified
1999 since the last download.
2001 If you wished to mirror the GNU archive every week, you would use a
2002 command like the following, weekly:
2005 wget --timestamping -r ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/
2008 Note that time-stamping will only work for files for which the server
2009 gives a timestamp. For @sc{http}, this depends on getting a
2010 @code{Last-Modified} header. For @sc{ftp}, this depends on getting a
2011 directory listing with dates in a format that Wget can parse
2012 (@pxref{FTP Time-Stamping Internals}).
2014 @node HTTP Time-Stamping Internals, FTP Time-Stamping Internals, Time-Stamping Usage, Time-Stamping
2015 @section HTTP Time-Stamping Internals
2016 @cindex http time-stamping
2018 Time-stamping in @sc{http} is implemented by checking of the
2019 @code{Last-Modified} header. If you wish to retrieve the file
2020 @file{foo.html} through @sc{http}, Wget will check whether
2021 @file{foo.html} exists locally. If it doesn't, @file{foo.html} will be
2022 retrieved unconditionally.
2024 If the file does exist locally, Wget will first check its local
2025 time-stamp (similar to the way @code{ls -l} checks it), and then send a
2026 @code{HEAD} request to the remote server, demanding the information on
2029 The @code{Last-Modified} header is examined to find which file was
2030 modified more recently (which makes it ``newer''). If the remote file
2031 is newer, it will be downloaded; if it is older, Wget will give
2032 up.@footnote{As an additional check, Wget will look at the
2033 @code{Content-Length} header, and compare the sizes; if they are not the
2034 same, the remote file will be downloaded no matter what the time-stamp
2037 When @samp{--backup-converted} (@samp{-K}) is specified in conjunction
2038 with @samp{-N}, server file @samp{@var{X}} is compared to local file
2039 @samp{@var{X}.orig}, if extant, rather than being compared to local file
2040 @samp{@var{X}}, which will always differ if it's been converted by
2041 @samp{--convert-links} (@samp{-k}).
2043 Arguably, @sc{http} time-stamping should be implemented using the
2044 @code{If-Modified-Since} request.
2046 @node FTP Time-Stamping Internals, , HTTP Time-Stamping Internals, Time-Stamping
2047 @section FTP Time-Stamping Internals
2048 @cindex ftp time-stamping
2050 In theory, @sc{ftp} time-stamping works much the same as @sc{http}, only
2051 @sc{ftp} has no headers---time-stamps must be ferreted out of directory
2054 If an @sc{ftp} download is recursive or uses globbing, Wget will use the
2055 @sc{ftp} @code{LIST} command to get a file listing for the directory
2056 containing the desired file(s). It will try to analyze the listing,
2057 treating it like Unix @code{ls -l} output, extracting the time-stamps.
2058 The rest is exactly the same as for @sc{http}. Note that when
2059 retrieving individual files from an @sc{ftp} server without using
2060 globbing or recursion, listing files will not be downloaded (and thus
2061 files will not be time-stamped) unless @samp{-N} is specified.
2063 Assumption that every directory listing is a Unix-style listing may
2064 sound extremely constraining, but in practice it is not, as many
2065 non-Unix @sc{ftp} servers use the Unixoid listing format because most
2066 (all?) of the clients understand it. Bear in mind that @sc{rfc959}
2067 defines no standard way to get a file list, let alone the time-stamps.
2068 We can only hope that a future standard will define this.
2070 Another non-standard solution includes the use of @code{MDTM} command
2071 that is supported by some @sc{ftp} servers (including the popular
2072 @code{wu-ftpd}), which returns the exact time of the specified file.
2073 Wget may support this command in the future.
2075 @node Startup File, Examples, Time-Stamping, Top
2076 @chapter Startup File
2077 @cindex startup file
2083 Once you know how to change default settings of Wget through command
2084 line arguments, you may wish to make some of those settings permanent.
2085 You can do that in a convenient way by creating the Wget startup
2086 file---@file{.wgetrc}.
2088 Besides @file{.wgetrc} is the ``main'' initialization file, it is
2089 convenient to have a special facility for storing passwords. Thus Wget
2090 reads and interprets the contents of @file{$HOME/.netrc}, if it finds
2091 it. You can find @file{.netrc} format in your system manuals.
2093 Wget reads @file{.wgetrc} upon startup, recognizing a limited set of
2097 * Wgetrc Location:: Location of various wgetrc files.
2098 * Wgetrc Syntax:: Syntax of wgetrc.
2099 * Wgetrc Commands:: List of available commands.
2100 * Sample Wgetrc:: A wgetrc example.
2103 @node Wgetrc Location, Wgetrc Syntax, Startup File, Startup File
2104 @section Wgetrc Location
2105 @cindex wgetrc location
2106 @cindex location of wgetrc
2108 When initializing, Wget will look for a @dfn{global} startup file,
2109 @file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default (or some prefix other than
2110 @file{/usr/local}, if Wget was not installed there) and read commands
2111 from there, if it exists.
2113 Then it will look for the user's file. If the environmental variable
2114 @code{WGETRC} is set, Wget will try to load that file. Failing that, no
2115 further attempts will be made.
2117 If @code{WGETRC} is not set, Wget will try to load @file{$HOME/.wgetrc}.
2119 The fact that user's settings are loaded after the system-wide ones
2120 means that in case of collision user's wgetrc @emph{overrides} the
2121 system-wide wgetrc (in @file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default).
2122 Fascist admins, away!
2124 @node Wgetrc Syntax, Wgetrc Commands, Wgetrc Location, Startup File
2125 @section Wgetrc Syntax
2126 @cindex wgetrc syntax
2127 @cindex syntax of wgetrc
2129 The syntax of a wgetrc command is simple:
2135 The @dfn{variable} will also be called @dfn{command}. Valid
2136 @dfn{values} are different for different commands.
2138 The commands are case-insensitive and underscore-insensitive. Thus
2139 @samp{DIr__PrefiX} is the same as @samp{dirprefix}. Empty lines, lines
2140 beginning with @samp{#} and lines containing white-space only are
2143 Commands that expect a comma-separated list will clear the list on an
2144 empty command. So, if you wish to reset the rejection list specified in
2145 global @file{wgetrc}, you can do it with:
2151 @node Wgetrc Commands, Sample Wgetrc, Wgetrc Syntax, Startup File
2152 @section Wgetrc Commands
2153 @cindex wgetrc commands
2155 The complete set of commands is listed below. Legal values are listed
2156 after the @samp{=}. Simple Boolean values can be set or unset using
2157 @samp{on} and @samp{off} or @samp{1} and @samp{0}. A fancier kind of
2158 Boolean allowed in some cases is the @dfn{lockable Boolean}, which may
2159 be set to @samp{on}, @samp{off}, @samp{always}, or @samp{never}. If an
2160 option is set to @samp{always} or @samp{never}, that value will be
2161 locked in for the duration of the Wget invocation---command-line options
2164 Some commands take pseudo-arbitrary values. @var{address} values can be
2165 hostnames or dotted-quad IP addresses. @var{n} can be any positive
2166 integer, or @samp{inf} for infinity, where appropriate. @var{string}
2167 values can be any non-empty string.
2169 Most of these commands have command-line equivalents (@pxref{Invoking}),
2170 though some of the more obscure or rarely used ones do not.
2173 @item accept/reject = @var{string}
2174 Same as @samp{-A}/@samp{-R} (@pxref{Types of Files}).
2176 @item add_hostdir = on/off
2177 Enable/disable host-prefixed file names. @samp{-nH} disables it.
2179 @item continue = on/off
2180 If set to on, force continuation of preexistent partially retrieved
2181 files. See @samp{-c} before setting it.
2183 @item background = on/off
2184 Enable/disable going to background---the same as @samp{-b} (which
2187 @item backup_converted = on/off
2188 Enable/disable saving pre-converted files with the suffix
2189 @samp{.orig}---the same as @samp{-K} (which enables it).
2191 @c @item backups = @var{number}
2192 @c #### Document me!
2194 @item base = @var{string}
2195 Consider relative @sc{url}s in @sc{url} input files forced to be
2196 interpreted as @sc{html} as being relative to @var{string}---the same as
2199 @item bind_address = @var{address}
2200 Bind to @var{address}, like the @samp{--bind-address} option.
2202 @item cache = on/off
2203 When set to off, disallow server-caching. See the @samp{-C} option.
2205 @item convert_links = on/off
2206 Convert non-relative links locally. The same as @samp{-k}.
2208 @item cookies = on/off
2209 When set to off, disallow cookies. See the @samp{--cookies} option.
2211 @item load_cookies = @var{file}
2212 Load cookies from @var{file}. See @samp{--load-cookies}.
2214 @item save_cookies = @var{file}
2215 Save cookies to @var{file}. See @samp{--save-cookies}.
2217 @item connect_timeout = @var{n}
2218 Set the connect timeout---the same as @samp{--connect-timeout}.
2220 @item cut_dirs = @var{n}
2221 Ignore @var{n} remote directory components.
2223 @item debug = on/off
2224 Debug mode, same as @samp{-d}.
2226 @item delete_after = on/off
2227 Delete after download---the same as @samp{--delete-after}.
2229 @item dir_prefix = @var{string}
2230 Top of directory tree---the same as @samp{-P}.
2232 @item dirstruct = on/off
2233 Turning dirstruct on or off---the same as @samp{-x} or @samp{-nd},
2236 @item dns_cache = on/off
2237 Turn DNS caching on/off. Since DNS caching is on by default, this
2238 option is normally used to turn it off. Same as @samp{--dns-cache}.
2240 @item dns_timeout = @var{n}
2241 Set the DNS timeout---the same as @samp{--dns-timeout}.
2243 @item domains = @var{string}
2244 Same as @samp{-D} (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
2246 @item dot_bytes = @var{n}
2247 Specify the number of bytes ``contained'' in a dot, as seen throughout
2248 the retrieval (1024 by default). You can postfix the value with
2249 @samp{k} or @samp{m}, representing kilobytes and megabytes,
2250 respectively. With dot settings you can tailor the dot retrieval to
2251 suit your needs, or you can use the predefined @dfn{styles}
2252 (@pxref{Download Options}).
2254 @item dots_in_line = @var{n}
2255 Specify the number of dots that will be printed in each line throughout
2256 the retrieval (50 by default).
2258 @item dot_spacing = @var{n}
2259 Specify the number of dots in a single cluster (10 by default).
2261 @item exclude_directories = @var{string}
2262 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to exclude from
2263 download---the same as @samp{-X} (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}).
2265 @item exclude_domains = @var{string}
2266 Same as @samp{--exclude-domains} (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
2268 @item follow_ftp = on/off
2269 Follow @sc{ftp} links from @sc{html} documents---the same as
2270 @samp{--follow-ftp}.
2272 @item follow_tags = @var{string}
2273 Only follow certain @sc{html} tags when doing a recursive retrieval, just like
2274 @samp{--follow-tags}.
2276 @item force_html = on/off
2277 If set to on, force the input filename to be regarded as an @sc{html}
2278 document---the same as @samp{-F}.
2280 @item ftp_proxy = @var{string}
2281 Use @var{string} as @sc{ftp} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2285 Turn globbing on/off---the same as @samp{-g}.
2287 @item header = @var{string}
2288 Define an additional header, like @samp{--header}.
2290 @item html_extension = on/off
2291 Add a @samp{.html} extension to @samp{text/html} or
2292 @samp{application/xhtml+xml} files without it, like
2295 @item http_passwd = @var{string}
2296 Set @sc{http} password.
2298 @item http_proxy = @var{string}
2299 Use @var{string} as @sc{http} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2302 @item http_user = @var{string}
2303 Set @sc{http} user to @var{string}.
2305 @item ignore_length = on/off
2306 When set to on, ignore @code{Content-Length} header; the same as
2307 @samp{--ignore-length}.
2309 @item ignore_tags = @var{string}
2310 Ignore certain @sc{html} tags when doing a recursive retrieval, just like
2311 @samp{-G} / @samp{--ignore-tags}.
2313 @item include_directories = @var{string}
2314 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to follow when
2315 downloading---the same as @samp{-I}.
2317 @item input = @var{string}
2318 Read the @sc{url}s from @var{string}, like @samp{-i}.
2320 @item kill_longer = on/off
2321 Consider data longer than specified in content-length header as invalid
2322 (and retry getting it). The default behavior is to save as much data
2323 as there is, provided there is more than or equal to the value in
2324 @code{Content-Length}.
2326 @item limit_rate = @var{rate}
2327 Limit the download speed to no more than @var{rate} bytes per second.
2328 The same as @samp{--limit-rate}.
2330 @item logfile = @var{string}
2331 Set logfile---the same as @samp{-o}.
2333 @item login = @var{string}
2334 Your user name on the remote machine, for @sc{ftp}. Defaults to
2337 @item mirror = on/off
2338 Turn mirroring on/off. The same as @samp{-m}.
2340 @item netrc = on/off
2341 Turn reading netrc on or off.
2343 @item noclobber = on/off
2346 @item no_parent = on/off
2347 Disallow retrieving outside the directory hierarchy, like
2348 @samp{--no-parent} (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}).
2350 @item no_proxy = @var{string}
2351 Use @var{string} as the comma-separated list of domains to avoid in
2352 proxy loading, instead of the one specified in environment.
2354 @item output_document = @var{string}
2355 Set the output filename---the same as @samp{-O}.
2357 @item page_requisites = on/off
2358 Download all ancillary documents necessary for a single @sc{html} page to
2359 display properly---the same as @samp{-p}.
2361 @item passive_ftp = on/off/always/never
2362 Set passive @sc{ftp}---the same as @samp{--passive-ftp}. Some scripts
2363 and @samp{.pm} (Perl module) files download files using @samp{wget
2364 --passive-ftp}. If your firewall does not allow this, you can set
2365 @samp{passive_ftp = never} to override the command-line.
2367 @item passwd = @var{string}
2368 Set your @sc{ftp} password to @var{password}. Without this setting, the
2369 password defaults to @samp{username@@hostname.domainname}.
2371 @item post_data = @var{string}
2372 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send @var{string} in
2373 the request body. The same as @samp{--post-data}.
2375 @item post_file = @var{file}
2376 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send the contents of
2377 @var{file} in the request body. The same as @samp{--post-file}.
2379 @item progress = @var{string}
2380 Set the type of the progress indicator. Legal types are ``dot'' and
2383 @item proxy_user = @var{string}
2384 Set proxy authentication user name to @var{string}, like @samp{--proxy-user}.
2386 @item proxy_passwd = @var{string}
2387 Set proxy authentication password to @var{string}, like @samp{--proxy-passwd}.
2389 @item referer = @var{string}
2390 Set HTTP @samp{Referer:} header just like @samp{--referer}. (Note it
2391 was the folks who wrote the @sc{http} spec who got the spelling of
2392 ``referrer'' wrong.)
2394 @item quiet = on/off
2395 Quiet mode---the same as @samp{-q}.
2397 @item quota = @var{quota}
2398 Specify the download quota, which is useful to put in the global
2399 @file{wgetrc}. When download quota is specified, Wget will stop
2400 retrieving after the download sum has become greater than quota. The
2401 quota can be specified in bytes (default), kbytes @samp{k} appended) or
2402 mbytes (@samp{m} appended). Thus @samp{quota = 5m} will set the quota
2403 to 5 mbytes. Note that the user's startup file overrides system
2406 @item read_timeout = @var{n}
2407 Set the read (and write) timeout---the same as @samp{--read-timeout}.
2409 @item reclevel = @var{n}
2410 Recursion level---the same as @samp{-l}.
2412 @item recursive = on/off
2413 Recursive on/off---the same as @samp{-r}.
2415 @item relative_only = on/off
2416 Follow only relative links---the same as @samp{-L} (@pxref{Relative
2419 @item remove_listing = on/off
2420 If set to on, remove @sc{ftp} listings downloaded by Wget. Setting it
2421 to off is the same as @samp{-nr}.
2423 @item restrict_file_names = unix/windows
2424 Restrict the file names generated by Wget from URLs. See
2425 @samp{--restrict-file-names} for a more detailed description.
2427 @item retr_symlinks = on/off
2428 When set to on, retrieve symbolic links as if they were plain files; the
2429 same as @samp{--retr-symlinks}.
2431 @item robots = on/off
2432 Specify whether the norobots convention is respected by Wget, ``on'' by
2433 default. This switch controls both the @file{/robots.txt} and the
2434 @samp{nofollow} aspect of the spec. @xref{Robot Exclusion}, for more
2435 details about this. Be sure you know what you are doing before turning
2438 @item server_response = on/off
2439 Choose whether or not to print the @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} server
2440 responses---the same as @samp{-S}.
2442 @item span_hosts = on/off
2445 @item strict_comments = on/off
2446 Same as @samp{--strict-comments}.
2448 @item timeout = @var{n}
2449 Set timeout value---the same as @samp{-T}.
2451 @item timestamping = on/off
2452 Turn timestamping on/off. The same as @samp{-N} (@pxref{Time-Stamping}).
2454 @item tries = @var{n}
2455 Set number of retries per @sc{url}---the same as @samp{-t}.
2457 @item use_proxy = on/off
2458 Turn proxy support on/off. The same as @samp{-Y}.
2460 @item verbose = on/off
2461 Turn verbose on/off---the same as @samp{-v}/@samp{-nv}.
2463 @item wait = @var{n}
2464 Wait @var{n} seconds between retrievals---the same as @samp{-w}.
2466 @item waitretry = @var{n}
2467 Wait up to @var{n} seconds between retries of failed retrievals
2468 only---the same as @samp{--waitretry}. Note that this is turned on by
2469 default in the global @file{wgetrc}.
2471 @item randomwait = on/off
2472 Turn random between-request wait times on or off. The same as
2473 @samp{--random-wait}.
2476 @node Sample Wgetrc, , Wgetrc Commands, Startup File
2477 @section Sample Wgetrc
2478 @cindex sample wgetrc
2480 This is the sample initialization file, as given in the distribution.
2481 It is divided in two section---one for global usage (suitable for global
2482 startup file), and one for local usage (suitable for
2483 @file{$HOME/.wgetrc}). Be careful about the things you change.
2485 Note that almost all the lines are commented out. For a command to have
2486 any effect, you must remove the @samp{#} character at the beginning of
2490 @include sample.wgetrc.munged_for_texi_inclusion
2493 @node Examples, Various, Startup File, Top
2497 @c man begin EXAMPLES
2498 The examples are divided into three sections loosely based on their
2502 * Simple Usage:: Simple, basic usage of the program.
2503 * Advanced Usage:: Advanced tips.
2504 * Very Advanced Usage:: The hairy stuff.
2507 @node Simple Usage, Advanced Usage, Examples, Examples
2508 @section Simple Usage
2512 Say you want to download a @sc{url}. Just type:
2515 wget http://fly.srk.fer.hr/
2519 But what will happen if the connection is slow, and the file is lengthy?
2520 The connection will probably fail before the whole file is retrieved,
2521 more than once. In this case, Wget will try getting the file until it
2522 either gets the whole of it, or exceeds the default number of retries
2523 (this being 20). It is easy to change the number of tries to 45, to
2524 insure that the whole file will arrive safely:
2527 wget --tries=45 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/jpg/flyweb.jpg
2531 Now let's leave Wget to work in the background, and write its progress
2532 to log file @file{log}. It is tiring to type @samp{--tries}, so we
2533 shall use @samp{-t}.
2536 wget -t 45 -o log http://fly.srk.fer.hr/jpg/flyweb.jpg &
2539 The ampersand at the end of the line makes sure that Wget works in the
2540 background. To unlimit the number of retries, use @samp{-t inf}.
2543 The usage of @sc{ftp} is as simple. Wget will take care of login and
2547 wget ftp://gnjilux.srk.fer.hr/welcome.msg
2551 If you specify a directory, Wget will retrieve the directory listing,
2552 parse it and convert it to @sc{html}. Try:
2555 wget ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/
2560 @node Advanced Usage, Very Advanced Usage, Simple Usage, Examples
2561 @section Advanced Usage
2565 You have a file that contains the URLs you want to download? Use the
2572 If you specify @samp{-} as file name, the @sc{url}s will be read from
2576 Create a five levels deep mirror image of the GNU web site, with the
2577 same directory structure the original has, with only one try per
2578 document, saving the log of the activities to @file{gnulog}:
2581 wget -r http://www.gnu.org/ -o gnulog
2585 The same as the above, but convert the links in the @sc{html} files to
2586 point to local files, so you can view the documents off-line:
2589 wget --convert-links -r http://www.gnu.org/ -o gnulog
2593 Retrieve only one @sc{html} page, but make sure that all the elements needed
2594 for the page to be displayed, such as inline images and external style
2595 sheets, are also downloaded. Also make sure the downloaded page
2596 references the downloaded links.
2599 wget -p --convert-links http://www.server.com/dir/page.html
2602 The @sc{html} page will be saved to @file{www.server.com/dir/page.html}, and
2603 the images, stylesheets, etc., somewhere under @file{www.server.com/},
2604 depending on where they were on the remote server.
2607 The same as the above, but without the @file{www.server.com/} directory.
2608 In fact, I don't want to have all those random server directories
2609 anyway---just save @emph{all} those files under a @file{download/}
2610 subdirectory of the current directory.
2613 wget -p --convert-links -nH -nd -Pdownload \
2614 http://www.server.com/dir/page.html
2618 Retrieve the index.html of @samp{www.lycos.com}, showing the original
2622 wget -S http://www.lycos.com/
2626 Save the server headers with the file, perhaps for post-processing.
2629 wget -s http://www.lycos.com/
2634 Retrieve the first two levels of @samp{wuarchive.wustl.edu}, saving them
2638 wget -r -l2 -P/tmp ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/
2642 You want to download all the @sc{gif}s from a directory on an @sc{http}
2643 server. You tried @samp{wget http://www.server.com/dir/*.gif}, but that
2644 didn't work because @sc{http} retrieval does not support globbing. In
2648 wget -r -l1 --no-parent -A.gif http://www.server.com/dir/
2651 More verbose, but the effect is the same. @samp{-r -l1} means to
2652 retrieve recursively (@pxref{Recursive Retrieval}), with maximum depth
2653 of 1. @samp{--no-parent} means that references to the parent directory
2654 are ignored (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}), and @samp{-A.gif} means to
2655 download only the @sc{gif} files. @samp{-A "*.gif"} would have worked
2659 Suppose you were in the middle of downloading, when Wget was
2660 interrupted. Now you do not want to clobber the files already present.
2664 wget -nc -r http://www.gnu.org/
2668 If you want to encode your own username and password to @sc{http} or
2669 @sc{ftp}, use the appropriate @sc{url} syntax (@pxref{URL Format}).
2672 wget ftp://hniksic:mypassword@@unix.server.com/.emacs
2675 Note, however, that this usage is not advisable on multi-user systems
2676 because it reveals your password to anyone who looks at the output of
2679 @cindex redirecting output
2681 You would like the output documents to go to standard output instead of
2685 wget -O - http://jagor.srce.hr/ http://www.srce.hr/
2688 You can also combine the two options and make pipelines to retrieve the
2689 documents from remote hotlists:
2692 wget -O - http://cool.list.com/ | wget --force-html -i -
2696 @node Very Advanced Usage, , Advanced Usage, Examples
2697 @section Very Advanced Usage
2702 If you wish Wget to keep a mirror of a page (or @sc{ftp}
2703 subdirectories), use @samp{--mirror} (@samp{-m}), which is the shorthand
2704 for @samp{-r -l inf -N}. You can put Wget in the crontab file asking it
2705 to recheck a site each Sunday:
2709 0 0 * * 0 wget --mirror http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2713 In addition to the above, you want the links to be converted for local
2714 viewing. But, after having read this manual, you know that link
2715 conversion doesn't play well with timestamping, so you also want Wget to
2716 back up the original @sc{html} files before the conversion. Wget invocation
2717 would look like this:
2720 wget --mirror --convert-links --backup-converted \
2721 http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2725 But you've also noticed that local viewing doesn't work all that well
2726 when @sc{html} files are saved under extensions other than @samp{.html},
2727 perhaps because they were served as @file{index.cgi}. So you'd like
2728 Wget to rename all the files served with content-type @samp{text/html}
2729 or @samp{application/xhtml+xml} to @file{@var{name}.html}.
2732 wget --mirror --convert-links --backup-converted \
2733 --html-extension -o /home/me/weeklog \
2737 Or, with less typing:
2740 wget -m -k -K -E http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2745 @node Various, Appendices, Examples, Top
2749 This chapter contains all the stuff that could not fit anywhere else.
2752 * Proxies:: Support for proxy servers
2753 * Distribution:: Getting the latest version.
2754 * Mailing List:: Wget mailing list for announcements and discussion.
2755 * Reporting Bugs:: How and where to report bugs.
2756 * Portability:: The systems Wget works on.
2757 * Signals:: Signal-handling performed by Wget.
2760 @node Proxies, Distribution, Various, Various
2764 @dfn{Proxies} are special-purpose @sc{http} servers designed to transfer
2765 data from remote servers to local clients. One typical use of proxies
2766 is lightening network load for users behind a slow connection. This is
2767 achieved by channeling all @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} requests through the
2768 proxy which caches the transferred data. When a cached resource is
2769 requested again, proxy will return the data from cache. Another use for
2770 proxies is for companies that separate (for security reasons) their
2771 internal networks from the rest of Internet. In order to obtain
2772 information from the Web, their users connect and retrieve remote data
2773 using an authorized proxy.
2775 Wget supports proxies for both @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} retrievals. The
2776 standard way to specify proxy location, which Wget recognizes, is using
2777 the following environment variables:
2781 This variable should contain the @sc{url} of the proxy for @sc{http}
2785 This variable should contain the @sc{url} of the proxy for @sc{ftp}
2786 connections. It is quite common that @sc{http_proxy} and @sc{ftp_proxy}
2787 are set to the same @sc{url}.
2790 This variable should contain a comma-separated list of domain extensions
2791 proxy should @emph{not} be used for. For instance, if the value of
2792 @code{no_proxy} is @samp{.mit.edu}, proxy will not be used to retrieve
2796 In addition to the environment variables, proxy location and settings
2797 may be specified from within Wget itself.
2801 @itemx --proxy=on/off
2802 @itemx proxy = on/off
2803 This option may be used to turn the proxy support on or off. Proxy
2804 support is on by default, provided that the appropriate environment
2807 @item http_proxy = @var{URL}
2808 @itemx ftp_proxy = @var{URL}
2809 @itemx no_proxy = @var{string}
2810 These startup file variables allow you to override the proxy settings
2811 specified by the environment.
2814 Some proxy servers require authorization to enable you to use them. The
2815 authorization consists of @dfn{username} and @dfn{password}, which must
2816 be sent by Wget. As with @sc{http} authorization, several
2817 authentication schemes exist. For proxy authorization only the
2818 @code{Basic} authentication scheme is currently implemented.
2820 You may specify your username and password either through the proxy
2821 @sc{url} or through the command-line options. Assuming that the
2822 company's proxy is located at @samp{proxy.company.com} at port 8001, a
2823 proxy @sc{url} location containing authorization data might look like
2827 http://hniksic:mypassword@@proxy.company.com:8001/
2830 Alternatively, you may use the @samp{proxy-user} and
2831 @samp{proxy-password} options, and the equivalent @file{.wgetrc}
2832 settings @code{proxy_user} and @code{proxy_passwd} to set the proxy
2833 username and password.
2835 @node Distribution, Mailing List, Proxies, Various
2836 @section Distribution
2837 @cindex latest version
2839 Like all GNU utilities, the latest version of Wget can be found at the
2840 master GNU archive site ftp.gnu.org, and its mirrors. For example,
2841 Wget @value{VERSION} can be found at
2842 @url{ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/wget/wget-@value{VERSION}.tar.gz}
2844 @node Mailing List, Reporting Bugs, Distribution, Various
2845 @section Mailing List
2846 @cindex mailing list
2849 Wget has its own mailing list at @email{wget@@sunsite.dk}, thanks
2850 to Karsten Thygesen. The mailing list is for discussion of Wget
2851 features and web, reporting Wget bugs (those that you think may be of
2852 interest to the public) and mailing announcements. You are welcome to
2853 subscribe. The more people on the list, the better!
2855 To subscribe, simply send mail to @email{wget-subscribe@@sunsite.dk}.
2856 Unsubscribe by mailing to @email{wget-unsubscribe@@sunsite.dk}.
2858 The mailing list is archived at @url{http://fly.srk.fer.hr/archive/wget}.
2859 Alternative archive is available at
2860 @url{http://www.mail-archive.com/wget%40sunsite.auc.dk/}.
2862 @node Reporting Bugs, Portability, Mailing List, Various
2863 @section Reporting Bugs
2865 @cindex reporting bugs
2869 You are welcome to send bug reports about GNU Wget to
2870 @email{bug-wget@@gnu.org}.
2872 Before actually submitting a bug report, please try to follow a few
2877 Please try to ascertain that the behavior you see really is a bug. If
2878 Wget crashes, it's a bug. If Wget does not behave as documented,
2879 it's a bug. If things work strange, but you are not sure about the way
2880 they are supposed to work, it might well be a bug.
2883 Try to repeat the bug in as simple circumstances as possible. E.g. if
2884 Wget crashes while downloading @samp{wget -rl0 -kKE -t5 -Y0
2885 http://yoyodyne.com -o /tmp/log}, you should try to see if the crash is
2886 repeatable, and if will occur with a simpler set of options. You might
2887 even try to start the download at the page where the crash occurred to
2888 see if that page somehow triggered the crash.
2890 Also, while I will probably be interested to know the contents of your
2891 @file{.wgetrc} file, just dumping it into the debug message is probably
2892 a bad idea. Instead, you should first try to see if the bug repeats
2893 with @file{.wgetrc} moved out of the way. Only if it turns out that
2894 @file{.wgetrc} settings affect the bug, mail me the relevant parts of
2898 Please start Wget with @samp{-d} option and send the log (or the
2899 relevant parts of it). If Wget was compiled without debug support,
2900 recompile it. It is @emph{much} easier to trace bugs with debug support
2904 If Wget has crashed, try to run it in a debugger, e.g. @code{gdb `which
2905 wget` core} and type @code{where} to get the backtrace.
2909 @node Portability, Signals, Reporting Bugs, Various
2910 @section Portability
2912 @cindex operating systems
2914 Since Wget uses GNU Autoconf for building and configuring, and avoids
2915 using ``special'' ultra--mega--cool features of any particular Unix, it
2916 should compile (and work) on all common Unix flavors.
2918 Various Wget versions have been compiled and tested under many kinds of
2919 Unix systems, including Solaris, Linux, SunOS, OSF (aka Digital Unix),
2920 Ultrix, *BSD, IRIX, and others; refer to the file @file{MACHINES} in the
2921 distribution directory for a comprehensive list. If you compile it on
2922 an architecture not listed there, please let me know so I can update it.
2924 Wget should also compile on the other Unix systems, not listed in
2925 @file{MACHINES}. If it doesn't, please let me know.
2927 Thanks to kind contributors, this version of Wget compiles and works on
2928 Microsoft Windows 95 and Windows NT platforms. It has been compiled
2929 successfully using MS Visual C++ 4.0, Watcom, and Borland C compilers,
2930 with Winsock as networking software. Naturally, it is crippled of some
2931 features available on Unix, but it should work as a substitute for
2932 people stuck with Windows. Note that the Windows port is
2933 @strong{neither tested nor maintained} by me---all questions and
2934 problems should be reported to Wget mailing list at
2935 @email{wget@@sunsite.dk} where the maintainers will look at them.
2937 @node Signals, , Portability, Various
2939 @cindex signal handling
2942 Since the purpose of Wget is background work, it catches the hangup
2943 signal (@code{SIGHUP}) and ignores it. If the output was on standard
2944 output, it will be redirected to a file named @file{wget-log}.
2945 Otherwise, @code{SIGHUP} is ignored. This is convenient when you wish
2946 to redirect the output of Wget after having started it.
2949 $ wget http://www.ifi.uio.no/~larsi/gnus.tar.gz &
2950 $ kill -HUP %% # Redirect the output to wget-log
2953 Other than that, Wget will not try to interfere with signals in any way.
2954 @kbd{C-c}, @code{kill -TERM} and @code{kill -KILL} should kill it alike.
2956 @node Appendices, Copying, Various, Top
2959 This chapter contains some references I consider useful.
2962 * Robot Exclusion:: Wget's support for RES.
2963 * Security Considerations:: Security with Wget.
2964 * Contributors:: People who helped.
2967 @node Robot Exclusion, Security Considerations, Appendices, Appendices
2968 @section Robot Exclusion
2969 @cindex robot exclusion
2971 @cindex server maintenance
2973 It is extremely easy to make Wget wander aimlessly around a web site,
2974 sucking all the available data in progress. @samp{wget -r @var{site}},
2975 and you're set. Great? Not for the server admin.
2977 As long as Wget is only retrieving static pages, and doing it at a
2978 reasonable rate (see the @samp{--wait} option), there's not much of a
2979 problem. The trouble is that Wget can't tell the difference between the
2980 smallest static page and the most demanding CGI. A site I know has a
2981 section handled by a CGI Perl script that converts Info files to @sc{html} on
2982 the fly. The script is slow, but works well enough for human users
2983 viewing an occasional Info file. However, when someone's recursive Wget
2984 download stumbles upon the index page that links to all the Info files
2985 through the script, the system is brought to its knees without providing
2986 anything useful to the user (This task of converting Info files could be
2987 done locally and access to Info documentation for all installed GNU
2988 software on a system is available from the @code{info} command).
2990 To avoid this kind of accident, as well as to preserve privacy for
2991 documents that need to be protected from well-behaved robots, the
2992 concept of @dfn{robot exclusion} was invented. The idea is that
2993 the server administrators and document authors can specify which
2994 portions of the site they wish to protect from robots and those
2995 they will permit access.
2997 The most popular mechanism, and the @i{de facto} standard supported by
2998 all the major robots, is the ``Robots Exclusion Standard'' (RES) written
2999 by Martijn Koster et al. in 1994. It specifies the format of a text
3000 file containing directives that instruct the robots which URL paths to
3001 avoid. To be found by the robots, the specifications must be placed in
3002 @file{/robots.txt} in the server root, which the robots are expected to
3005 Although Wget is not a web robot in the strictest sense of the word, it
3006 can downloads large parts of the site without the user's intervention to
3007 download an individual page. Because of that, Wget honors RES when
3008 downloading recursively. For instance, when you issue:
3011 wget -r http://www.server.com/
3014 First the index of @samp{www.server.com} will be downloaded. If Wget
3015 finds that it wants to download more documents from that server, it will
3016 request @samp{http://www.server.com/robots.txt} and, if found, use it
3017 for further downloads. @file{robots.txt} is loaded only once per each
3020 Until version 1.8, Wget supported the first version of the standard,
3021 written by Martijn Koster in 1994 and available at
3022 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/norobots.html}. As of version 1.8,
3023 Wget has supported the additional directives specified in the internet
3024 draft @samp{<draft-koster-robots-00.txt>} titled ``A Method for Web
3025 Robots Control''. The draft, which has as far as I know never made to
3026 an @sc{rfc}, is available at
3027 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/norobots-rfc.txt}.
3029 This manual no longer includes the text of the Robot Exclusion Standard.
3031 The second, less known mechanism, enables the author of an individual
3032 document to specify whether they want the links from the file to be
3033 followed by a robot. This is achieved using the @code{META} tag, like
3037 <meta name="robots" content="nofollow">
3040 This is explained in some detail at
3041 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/meta-user.html}. Wget supports this
3042 method of robot exclusion in addition to the usual @file{/robots.txt}
3045 If you know what you are doing and really really wish to turn off the
3046 robot exclusion, set the @code{robots} variable to @samp{off} in your
3047 @file{.wgetrc}. You can achieve the same effect from the command line
3048 using the @code{-e} switch, e.g. @samp{wget -e robots=off @var{url}...}.
3050 @node Security Considerations, Contributors, Robot Exclusion, Appendices
3051 @section Security Considerations
3054 When using Wget, you must be aware that it sends unencrypted passwords
3055 through the network, which may present a security problem. Here are the
3056 main issues, and some solutions.
3059 @item The passwords on the command line are visible using @code{ps}.
3060 The best way around it is to use @code{wget -i -} and feed the @sc{url}s
3061 to Wget's standard input, each on a separate line, terminated by
3062 @kbd{C-d}. Another workaround is to use @file{.netrc} to store
3063 passwords; however, storing unencrypted passwords is also considered a
3067 Using the insecure @dfn{basic} authentication scheme, unencrypted
3068 passwords are transmitted through the network routers and gateways.
3071 The @sc{ftp} passwords are also in no way encrypted. There is no good
3072 solution for this at the moment.
3075 Although the ``normal'' output of Wget tries to hide the passwords,
3076 debugging logs show them, in all forms. This problem is avoided by
3077 being careful when you send debug logs (yes, even when you send them to
3081 @node Contributors, , Security Considerations, Appendices
3082 @section Contributors
3083 @cindex contributors
3086 GNU Wget was written by Hrvoje Nik@v{s}i@'{c} @email{hniksic@@arsdigita.com}.
3089 GNU Wget was written by Hrvoje Niksic @email{hniksic@@arsdigita.com}.
3091 However, its development could never have gone as far as it has, were it
3092 not for the help of many people, either with bug reports, feature
3093 proposals, patches, or letters saying ``Thanks!''.
3095 Special thanks goes to the following people (no particular order):
3099 Karsten Thygesen---donated system resources such as the mailing list,
3100 web space, and @sc{ftp} space, along with a lot of time to make these
3104 Shawn McHorse---bug reports and patches.
3107 Kaveh R. Ghazi---on-the-fly @code{ansi2knr}-ization. Lots of
3111 Gordon Matzigkeit---@file{.netrc} support.
3115 Zlatko @v{C}alu@v{s}i@'{c}, Tomislav Vujec and Dra@v{z}en
3116 Ka@v{c}ar---feature suggestions and ``philosophical'' discussions.
3119 Zlatko Calusic, Tomislav Vujec and Drazen Kacar---feature suggestions
3120 and ``philosophical'' discussions.
3124 Darko Budor---initial port to Windows.
3127 Antonio Rosella---help and suggestions, plus the Italian translation.
3131 Tomislav Petrovi@'{c}, Mario Miko@v{c}evi@'{c}---many bug reports and
3135 Tomislav Petrovic, Mario Mikocevic---many bug reports and suggestions.
3140 Fran@,{c}ois Pinard---many thorough bug reports and discussions.
3143 Francois Pinard---many thorough bug reports and discussions.
3147 Karl Eichwalder---lots of help with internationalization and other
3151 Junio Hamano---donated support for Opie and @sc{http} @code{Digest}
3155 The people who provided donations for development, including Brian
3159 The following people have provided patches, bug/build reports, useful
3160 suggestions, beta testing services, fan mail and all the other things
3161 that make maintenance so much fun:
3180 Kristijan @v{C}onka@v{s},
3199 Aleksandar Erkalovi@'{c},
3202 Aleksandar Erkalovic,
3219 Erik Magnus Hulthen,
3237 Goran Kezunovi@'{c},
3248 $\Sigma\acute{\iota}\mu o\varsigma\;
3249 \Xi\varepsilon\nu\iota\tau\acute{\epsilon}\lambda\lambda\eta\varsigma$
3250 (Simos KSenitellis),
3258 Nicol@'{a}s Lichtmeier,
3264 Alexander V. Lukyanov,
3292 @c Texinfo doesn't grok @'{@i}, so we have to use TeX itself.
3294 Juan Jos\'{e} Rodr\'{\i}gues,
3297 Juan Jose Rodrigues,
3310 Szakacsits Szabolcs,
3318 Douglas E. Wegscheid,
3328 Apologies to all who I accidentally left out, and many thanks to all the
3329 subscribers of the Wget mailing list.
3331 @node Copying, Concept Index, Appendices, Top
3336 @cindex free software
3338 GNU Wget is licensed under the GNU GPL, which makes it @dfn{free
3341 Please note that ``free'' in ``free software'' refers to liberty, not
3342 price. As some GNU project advocates like to point out, think of ``free
3343 speech'' rather than ``free beer''. The exact and legally binding
3344 distribution terms are spelled out below; in short, you have the right
3345 (freedom) to run and change Wget and distribute it to other people, and
3346 even---if you want---charge money for doing either. The important
3347 restriction is that you have to grant your recipients the same rights
3348 and impose the same restrictions.
3350 This method of licensing software is also known as @dfn{open source}
3351 because, among other things, it makes sure that all recipients will
3352 receive the source code along with the program, and be able to improve
3353 it. The GNU project prefers the term ``free software'' for reasons
3355 @url{http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html}.
3357 The exact license terms are defined by this paragraph and the GNU
3358 General Public License it refers to:
3361 GNU Wget is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
3362 under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the
3363 Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your
3364 option) any later version.
3366 GNU Wget is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
3367 ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or
3368 FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License
3371 A copy of the GNU General Public License is included as part of this
3372 manual; if you did not receive it, write to the Free Software
3373 Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
3376 In addition to this, this manual is free in the same sense:
3379 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
3380 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or
3381 any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with the
3382 Invariant Sections being ``GNU General Public License'' and ``GNU Free
3383 Documentation License'', with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no
3384 Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section
3385 entitled ``GNU Free Documentation License''.
3388 @c #### Maybe we should wrap these licenses in ifinfo? Stallman says
3389 @c that the GFDL needs to be present in the manual, and to me it would
3390 @c suck to include the license for the manual and not the license for
3393 The full texts of the GNU General Public License and of the GNU Free
3394 Documentation License are available below.
3397 * GNU General Public License::
3398 * GNU Free Documentation License::
3401 @node GNU General Public License, GNU Free Documentation License, Copying, Copying
3402 @section GNU General Public License
3403 @center Version 2, June 1991
3406 Copyright @copyright{} 1989, 1991 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3407 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
3409 Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
3410 of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
3413 @unnumberedsec Preamble
3415 The licenses for most software are designed to take away your
3416 freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public
3417 License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free
3418 software---to make sure the software is free for all its users. This
3419 General Public License applies to most of the Free Software
3420 Foundation's software and to any other program whose authors commit to
3421 using it. (Some other Free Software Foundation software is covered by
3422 the GNU Library General Public License instead.) You can apply it to
3425 When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not
3426 price. Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you
3427 have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for
3428 this service if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it
3429 if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it
3430 in new free programs; and that you know you can do these things.
3432 To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid
3433 anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights.
3434 These restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you
3435 distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it.
3437 For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether
3438 gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that
3439 you have. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the
3440 source code. And you must show them these terms so they know their
3443 We protect your rights with two steps: (1) copyright the software, and
3444 (2) offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy,
3445 distribute and/or modify the software.
3447 Also, for each author's protection and ours, we want to make certain
3448 that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free
3449 software. If the software is modified by someone else and passed on, we
3450 want its recipients to know that what they have is not the original, so
3451 that any problems introduced by others will not reflect on the original
3452 authors' reputations.
3454 Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software
3455 patents. We wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free
3456 program will individually obtain patent licenses, in effect making the
3457 program proprietary. To prevent this, we have made it clear that any
3458 patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all.
3460 The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and
3461 modification follow.
3464 @unnumberedsec TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
3467 @center TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
3472 This License applies to any program or other work which contains
3473 a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed
3474 under the terms of this General Public License. The ``Program'', below,
3475 refers to any such program or work, and a ``work based on the Program''
3476 means either the Program or any derivative work under copyright law:
3477 that is to say, a work containing the Program or a portion of it,
3478 either verbatim or with modifications and/or translated into another
3479 language. (Hereinafter, translation is included without limitation in
3480 the term ``modification''.) Each licensee is addressed as ``you''.
3482 Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not
3483 covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of
3484 running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program
3485 is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the
3486 Program (independent of having been made by running the Program).
3487 Whether that is true depends on what the Program does.
3490 You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program's
3491 source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you
3492 conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate
3493 copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the
3494 notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty;
3495 and give any other recipients of the Program a copy of this License
3496 along with the Program.
3498 You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and
3499 you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.
3502 You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion
3503 of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and
3504 distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1
3505 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
3509 You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices
3510 stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
3513 You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
3514 whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
3515 part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
3516 parties under the terms of this License.
3519 If the modified program normally reads commands interactively
3520 when run, you must cause it, when started running for such
3521 interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an
3522 announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a
3523 notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide
3524 a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under
3525 these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this
3526 License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but
3527 does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on
3528 the Program is not required to print an announcement.)
3531 These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If
3532 identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program,
3533 and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in
3534 themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those
3535 sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you
3536 distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based
3537 on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of
3538 this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the
3539 entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.
3541 Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest
3542 your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to
3543 exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or
3544 collective works based on the Program.
3546 In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program
3547 with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of
3548 a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under
3549 the scope of this License.
3552 You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it,
3553 under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of
3554 Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:
3558 Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable
3559 source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections
3560 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
3563 Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three
3564 years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your
3565 cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete
3566 machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be
3567 distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium
3568 customarily used for software interchange; or,
3571 Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer
3572 to distribute corresponding source code. (This alternative is
3573 allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you
3574 received the program in object code or executable form with such
3575 an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)
3578 The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for
3579 making modifications to it. For an executable work, complete source
3580 code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any
3581 associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to
3582 control compilation and installation of the executable. However, as a
3583 special exception, the source code distributed need not include
3584 anything that is normally distributed (in either source or binary
3585 form) with the major components (compiler, kernel, and so on) of the
3586 operating system on which the executable runs, unless that component
3587 itself accompanies the executable.
3589 If distribution of executable or object code is made by offering
3590 access to copy from a designated place, then offering equivalent
3591 access to copy the source code from the same place counts as
3592 distribution of the source code, even though third parties are not
3593 compelled to copy the source along with the object code.
3596 You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program
3597 except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt
3598 otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is
3599 void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License.
3600 However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under
3601 this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such
3602 parties remain in full compliance.
3605 You are not required to accept this License, since you have not
3606 signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or
3607 distribute the Program or its derivative works. These actions are
3608 prohibited by law if you do not accept this License. Therefore, by
3609 modifying or distributing the Program (or any work based on the
3610 Program), you indicate your acceptance of this License to do so, and
3611 all its terms and conditions for copying, distributing or modifying
3612 the Program or works based on it.
3615 Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the
3616 Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the
3617 original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to
3618 these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further
3619 restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
3620 You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to
3624 If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent
3625 infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues),
3626 conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or
3627 otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not
3628 excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot
3629 distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this
3630 License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you
3631 may not distribute the Program at all. For example, if a patent
3632 license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Program by
3633 all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then
3634 the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to
3635 refrain entirely from distribution of the Program.
3637 If any portion of this section is held invalid or unenforceable under
3638 any particular circumstance, the balance of the section is intended to
3639 apply and the section as a whole is intended to apply in other
3642 It is not the purpose of this section to induce you to infringe any
3643 patents or other property right claims or to contest validity of any
3644 such claims; this section has the sole purpose of protecting the
3645 integrity of the free software distribution system, which is
3646 implemented by public license practices. Many people have made
3647 generous contributions to the wide range of software distributed
3648 through that system in reliance on consistent application of that
3649 system; it is up to the author/donor to decide if he or she is willing
3650 to distribute software through any other system and a licensee cannot
3653 This section is intended to make thoroughly clear what is believed to
3654 be a consequence of the rest of this License.
3657 If the distribution and/or use of the Program is restricted in
3658 certain countries either by patents or by copyrighted interfaces, the
3659 original copyright holder who places the Program under this License
3660 may add an explicit geographical distribution limitation excluding
3661 those countries, so that distribution is permitted only in or among
3662 countries not thus excluded. In such case, this License incorporates
3663 the limitation as if written in the body of this License.
3666 The Free Software Foundation may publish revised and/or new versions
3667 of the General Public License from time to time. Such new versions will
3668 be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to
3669 address new problems or concerns.
3671 Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program
3672 specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and ``any
3673 later version'', you have the option of following the terms and conditions
3674 either of that version or of any later version published by the Free
3675 Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of
3676 this License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software
3680 If you wish to incorporate parts of the Program into other free
3681 programs whose distribution conditions are different, write to the author
3682 to ask for permission. For software which is copyrighted by the Free
3683 Software Foundation, write to the Free Software Foundation; we sometimes
3684 make exceptions for this. Our decision will be guided by the two goals
3685 of preserving the free status of all derivatives of our free software and
3686 of promoting the sharing and reuse of software generally.
3689 @heading NO WARRANTY
3697 BECAUSE THE PROGRAM IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY
3698 FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. EXCEPT WHEN
3699 OTHERWISE STATED IN WRITING THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND/OR OTHER PARTIES
3700 PROVIDE THE PROGRAM ``AS IS'' WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED
3701 OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
3702 MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS
3703 TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM IS WITH YOU. SHOULD THE
3704 PROGRAM PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING,
3705 REPAIR OR CORRECTION.
3708 IN NO EVENT UNLESS REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW OR AGREED TO IN WRITING
3709 WILL ANY COPYRIGHT HOLDER, OR ANY OTHER PARTY WHO MAY MODIFY AND/OR
3710 REDISTRIBUTE THE PROGRAM AS PERMITTED ABOVE, BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR DAMAGES,
3711 INCLUDING ANY GENERAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING
3712 OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THE PROGRAM (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED
3713 TO LOSS OF DATA OR DATA BEING RENDERED INACCURATE OR LOSSES SUSTAINED BY
3714 YOU OR THIRD PARTIES OR A FAILURE OF THE PROGRAM TO OPERATE WITH ANY OTHER
3715 PROGRAMS), EVEN IF SUCH HOLDER OR OTHER PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE
3716 POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
3720 @heading END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
3723 @center END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
3727 @unnumberedsec How to Apply These Terms to Your New Programs
3729 If you develop a new program, and you want it to be of the greatest
3730 possible use to the public, the best way to achieve this is to make it
3731 free software which everyone can redistribute and change under these terms.
3733 To do so, attach the following notices to the program. It is safest
3734 to attach them to the start of each source file to most effectively
3735 convey the exclusion of warranty; and each file should have at least
3736 the ``copyright'' line and a pointer to where the full notice is found.
3739 @var{one line to give the program's name and an idea of what it does.}
3740 Copyright (C) 19@var{yy} @var{name of author}
3742 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
3743 modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License
3744 as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2
3745 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
3747 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
3748 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
3749 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
3750 GNU General Public License for more details.
3752 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
3753 along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
3754 Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
3757 Also add information on how to contact you by electronic and paper mail.
3759 If the program is interactive, make it output a short notice like this
3760 when it starts in an interactive mode:
3763 Gnomovision version 69, Copyright (C) 19@var{yy} @var{name of author}
3764 Gnomovision comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details
3765 type `show w'. This is free software, and you are welcome
3766 to redistribute it under certain conditions; type `show c'
3770 The hypothetical commands @samp{show w} and @samp{show c} should show
3771 the appropriate parts of the General Public License. Of course, the
3772 commands you use may be called something other than @samp{show w} and
3773 @samp{show c}; they could even be mouse-clicks or menu items---whatever
3776 You should also get your employer (if you work as a programmer) or your
3777 school, if any, to sign a ``copyright disclaimer'' for the program, if
3778 necessary. Here is a sample; alter the names:
3782 Yoyodyne, Inc., hereby disclaims all copyright
3783 interest in the program `Gnomovision'
3784 (which makes passes at compilers) written
3787 @var{signature of Ty Coon}, 1 April 1989
3788 Ty Coon, President of Vice
3792 This General Public License does not permit incorporating your program into
3793 proprietary programs. If your program is a subroutine library, you may
3794 consider it more useful to permit linking proprietary applications with the
3795 library. If this is what you want to do, use the GNU Library General
3796 Public License instead of this License.
3798 @node GNU Free Documentation License, , GNU General Public License, Copying
3799 @section GNU Free Documentation License
3800 @center Version 1.1, March 2000
3803 Copyright (C) 2000 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3804 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA
3806 Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
3807 of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
3814 The purpose of this License is to make a manual, textbook, or other
3815 written document ``free'' in the sense of freedom: to assure everyone
3816 the effective freedom to copy and redistribute it, with or without
3817 modifying it, either commercially or noncommercially. Secondarily,
3818 this License preserves for the author and publisher a way to get
3819 credit for their work, while not being considered responsible for
3820 modifications made by others.
3822 This License is a kind of ``copyleft'', which means that derivative
3823 works of the document must themselves be free in the same sense. It
3824 complements the GNU General Public License, which is a copyleft
3825 license designed for free software.
3827 We have designed this License in order to use it for manuals for free
3828 software, because free software needs free documentation: a free
3829 program should come with manuals providing the same freedoms that the
3830 software does. But this License is not limited to software manuals;
3831 it can be used for any textual work, regardless of subject matter or
3832 whether it is published as a printed book. We recommend this License
3833 principally for works whose purpose is instruction or reference.
3837 APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS
3839 This License applies to any manual or other work that contains a
3840 notice placed by the copyright holder saying it can be distributed
3841 under the terms of this License. The ``Document'', below, refers to any
3842 such manual or work. Any member of the public is a licensee, and is
3843 addressed as ``you''.
3845 A ``Modified Version'' of the Document means any work containing the
3846 Document or a portion of it, either copied verbatim, or with
3847 modifications and/or translated into another language.
3849 A ``Secondary Section'' is a named appendix or a front-matter section of
3850 the Document that deals exclusively with the relationship of the
3851 publishers or authors of the Document to the Document's overall subject
3852 (or to related matters) and contains nothing that could fall directly
3853 within that overall subject. (For example, if the Document is in part a
3854 textbook of mathematics, a Secondary Section may not explain any
3855 mathematics.) The relationship could be a matter of historical
3856 connection with the subject or with related matters, or of legal,
3857 commercial, philosophical, ethical or political position regarding
3860 The ``Invariant Sections'' are certain Secondary Sections whose titles
3861 are designated, as being those of Invariant Sections, in the notice
3862 that says that the Document is released under this License.
3864 The ``Cover Texts'' are certain short passages of text that are listed,
3865 as Front-Cover Texts or Back-Cover Texts, in the notice that says that
3866 the Document is released under this License.
3868 A ``Transparent'' copy of the Document means a machine-readable copy,
3869 represented in a format whose specification is available to the
3870 general public, whose contents can be viewed and edited directly and
3871 straightforwardly with generic text editors or (for images composed of
3872 pixels) generic paint programs or (for drawings) some widely available
3873 drawing editor, and that is suitable for input to text formatters or
3874 for automatic translation to a variety of formats suitable for input
3875 to text formatters. A copy made in an otherwise Transparent file
3876 format whose markup has been designed to thwart or discourage
3877 subsequent modification by readers is not Transparent. A copy that is
3878 not ``Transparent'' is called ``Opaque''.
3880 Examples of suitable formats for Transparent copies include plain
3881 @sc{ascii} without markup, Texinfo input format, LaTeX input format, @sc{sgml}
3882 or @sc{xml} using a publicly available @sc{dtd}, and standard-conforming simple
3883 @sc{html} designed for human modification. Opaque formats include
3884 PostScript, @sc{pdf}, proprietary formats that can be read and edited only
3885 by proprietary word processors, @sc{sgml} or @sc{xml} for which the @sc{dtd} and/or
3886 processing tools are not generally available, and the
3887 machine-generated @sc{html} produced by some word processors for output
3890 The ``Title Page'' means, for a printed book, the title page itself,
3891 plus such following pages as are needed to hold, legibly, the material
3892 this License requires to appear in the title page. For works in
3893 formats which do not have any title page as such, ``Title Page'' means
3894 the text near the most prominent appearance of the work's title,
3895 preceding the beginning of the body of the text.
3900 You may copy and distribute the Document in any medium, either
3901 commercially or noncommercially, provided that this License, the
3902 copyright notices, and the license notice saying this License applies
3903 to the Document are reproduced in all copies, and that you add no other
3904 conditions whatsoever to those of this License. You may not use
3905 technical measures to obstruct or control the reading or further
3906 copying of the copies you make or distribute. However, you may accept
3907 compensation in exchange for copies. If you distribute a large enough
3908 number of copies you must also follow the conditions in section 3.
3910 You may also lend copies, under the same conditions stated above, and
3911 you may publicly display copies.
3916 If you publish printed copies of the Document numbering more than 100,
3917 and the Document's license notice requires Cover Texts, you must enclose
3918 the copies in covers that carry, clearly and legibly, all these Cover
3919 Texts: Front-Cover Texts on the front cover, and Back-Cover Texts on
3920 the back cover. Both covers must also clearly and legibly identify
3921 you as the publisher of these copies. The front cover must present
3922 the full title with all words of the title equally prominent and
3923 visible. You may add other material on the covers in addition.
3924 Copying with changes limited to the covers, as long as they preserve
3925 the title of the Document and satisfy these conditions, can be treated
3926 as verbatim copying in other respects.
3928 If the required texts for either cover are too voluminous to fit
3929 legibly, you should put the first ones listed (as many as fit
3930 reasonably) on the actual cover, and continue the rest onto adjacent
3933 If you publish or distribute Opaque copies of the Document numbering
3934 more than 100, you must either include a machine-readable Transparent
3935 copy along with each Opaque copy, or state in or with each Opaque copy
3936 a publicly-accessible computer-network location containing a complete
3937 Transparent copy of the Document, free of added material, which the
3938 general network-using public has access to download anonymously at no
3939 charge using public-standard network protocols. If you use the latter
3940 option, you must take reasonably prudent steps, when you begin
3941 distribution of Opaque copies in quantity, to ensure that this
3942 Transparent copy will remain thus accessible at the stated location
3943 until at least one year after the last time you distribute an Opaque
3944 copy (directly or through your agents or retailers) of that edition to
3947 It is requested, but not required, that you contact the authors of the
3948 Document well before redistributing any large number of copies, to give
3949 them a chance to provide you with an updated version of the Document.
3954 You may copy and distribute a Modified Version of the Document under
3955 the conditions of sections 2 and 3 above, provided that you release
3956 the Modified Version under precisely this License, with the Modified
3957 Version filling the role of the Document, thus licensing distribution
3958 and modification of the Modified Version to whoever possesses a copy
3959 of it. In addition, you must do these things in the Modified Version:
3961 A. Use in the Title Page (and on the covers, if any) a title distinct
3962 from that of the Document, and from those of previous versions
3963 (which should, if there were any, be listed in the History section
3964 of the Document). You may use the same title as a previous version
3965 if the original publisher of that version gives permission.@*
3966 B. List on the Title Page, as authors, one or more persons or entities
3967 responsible for authorship of the modifications in the Modified
3968 Version, together with at least five of the principal authors of the
3969 Document (all of its principal authors, if it has less than five).@*
3970 C. State on the Title page the name of the publisher of the
3971 Modified Version, as the publisher.@*
3972 D. Preserve all the copyright notices of the Document.@*
3973 E. Add an appropriate copyright notice for your modifications
3974 adjacent to the other copyright notices.@*
3975 F. Include, immediately after the copyright notices, a license notice
3976 giving the public permission to use the Modified Version under the
3977 terms of this License, in the form shown in the Addendum below.@*
3978 G. Preserve in that license notice the full lists of Invariant Sections
3979 and required Cover Texts given in the Document's license notice.@*
3980 H. Include an unaltered copy of this License.@*
3981 I. Preserve the section entitled ``History'', and its title, and add to
3982 it an item stating at least the title, year, new authors, and
3983 publisher of the Modified Version as given on the Title Page. If
3984 there is no section entitled ``History'' in the Document, create one
3985 stating the title, year, authors, and publisher of the Document as
3986 given on its Title Page, then add an item describing the Modified
3987 Version as stated in the previous sentence.@*
3988 J. Preserve the network location, if any, given in the Document for
3989 public access to a Transparent copy of the Document, and likewise
3990 the network locations given in the Document for previous versions
3991 it was based on. These may be placed in the ``History'' section.
3992 You may omit a network location for a work that was published at
3993 least four years before the Document itself, or if the original
3994 publisher of the version it refers to gives permission.@*
3995 K. In any section entitled ``Acknowledgements'' or ``Dedications'',
3996 preserve the section's title, and preserve in the section all the
3997 substance and tone of each of the contributor acknowledgements
3998 and/or dedications given therein.@*
3999 L. Preserve all the Invariant Sections of the Document,
4000 unaltered in their text and in their titles. Section numbers
4001 or the equivalent are not considered part of the section titles.@*
4002 M. Delete any section entitled ``Endorsements''. Such a section
4003 may not be included in the Modified Version.@*
4004 N. Do not retitle any existing section as ``Endorsements''
4005 or to conflict in title with any Invariant Section.@*
4007 If the Modified Version includes new front-matter sections or
4008 appendices that qualify as Secondary Sections and contain no material
4009 copied from the Document, you may at your option designate some or all
4010 of these sections as invariant. To do this, add their titles to the
4011 list of Invariant Sections in the Modified Version's license notice.
4012 These titles must be distinct from any other section titles.
4014 You may add a section entitled ``Endorsements'', provided it contains
4015 nothing but endorsements of your Modified Version by various
4016 parties--for example, statements of peer review or that the text has
4017 been approved by an organization as the authoritative definition of a
4020 You may add a passage of up to five words as a Front-Cover Text, and a
4021 passage of up to 25 words as a Back-Cover Text, to the end of the list
4022 of Cover Texts in the Modified Version. Only one passage of
4023 Front-Cover Text and one of Back-Cover Text may be added by (or
4024 through arrangements made by) any one entity. If the Document already
4025 includes a cover text for the same cover, previously added by you or
4026 by arrangement made by the same entity you are acting on behalf of,
4027 you may not add another; but you may replace the old one, on explicit
4028 permission from the previous publisher that added the old one.
4030 The author(s) and publisher(s) of the Document do not by this License
4031 give permission to use their names for publicity for or to assert or
4032 imply endorsement of any Modified Version.
4037 You may combine the Document with other documents released under this
4038 License, under the terms defined in section 4 above for modified
4039 versions, provided that you include in the combination all of the
4040 Invariant Sections of all of the original documents, unmodified, and
4041 list them all as Invariant Sections of your combined work in its
4044 The combined work need only contain one copy of this License, and
4045 multiple identical Invariant Sections may be replaced with a single
4046 copy. If there are multiple Invariant Sections with the same name but
4047 different contents, make the title of each such section unique by
4048 adding at the end of it, in parentheses, the name of the original
4049 author or publisher of that section if known, or else a unique number.
4050 Make the same adjustment to the section titles in the list of
4051 Invariant Sections in the license notice of the combined work.
4053 In the combination, you must combine any sections entitled ``History''
4054 in the various original documents, forming one section entitled
4055 ``History''; likewise combine any sections entitled ``Acknowledgements'',
4056 and any sections entitled ``Dedications''. You must delete all sections
4057 entitled ``Endorsements.''
4060 COLLECTIONS OF DOCUMENTS
4062 You may make a collection consisting of the Document and other documents
4063 released under this License, and replace the individual copies of this
4064 License in the various documents with a single copy that is included in
4065 the collection, provided that you follow the rules of this License for
4066 verbatim copying of each of the documents in all other respects.
4068 You may extract a single document from such a collection, and distribute
4069 it individually under this License, provided you insert a copy of this
4070 License into the extracted document, and follow this License in all
4071 other respects regarding verbatim copying of that document.
4074 AGGREGATION WITH INDEPENDENT WORKS
4076 A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other separate
4077 and independent documents or works, in or on a volume of a storage or
4078 distribution medium, does not as a whole count as a Modified Version
4079 of the Document, provided no compilation copyright is claimed for the
4080 compilation. Such a compilation is called an ``aggregate'', and this
4081 License does not apply to the other self-contained works thus compiled
4082 with the Document, on account of their being thus compiled, if they
4083 are not themselves derivative works of the Document.
4085 If the Cover Text requirement of section 3 is applicable to these
4086 copies of the Document, then if the Document is less than one quarter
4087 of the entire aggregate, the Document's Cover Texts may be placed on
4088 covers that surround only the Document within the aggregate.
4089 Otherwise they must appear on covers around the whole aggregate.
4094 Translation is considered a kind of modification, so you may
4095 distribute translations of the Document under the terms of section 4.
4096 Replacing Invariant Sections with translations requires special
4097 permission from their copyright holders, but you may include
4098 translations of some or all Invariant Sections in addition to the
4099 original versions of these Invariant Sections. You may include a
4100 translation of this License provided that you also include the
4101 original English version of this License. In case of a disagreement
4102 between the translation and the original English version of this
4103 License, the original English version will prevail.
4108 You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Document except
4109 as expressly provided for under this License. Any other attempt to
4110 copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Document is void, and will
4111 automatically terminate your rights under this License. However,
4112 parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this
4113 License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such
4114 parties remain in full compliance.
4117 FUTURE REVISIONS OF THIS LICENSE
4119 The Free Software Foundation may publish new, revised versions
4120 of the GNU Free Documentation License from time to time. Such new
4121 versions will be similar in spirit to the present version, but may
4122 differ in detail to address new problems or concerns. See
4123 http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/.
4125 Each version of the License is given a distinguishing version number.
4126 If the Document specifies that a particular numbered version of this
4127 License ``or any later version'' applies to it, you have the option of
4128 following the terms and conditions either of that specified version or
4129 of any later version that has been published (not as a draft) by the
4130 Free Software Foundation. If the Document does not specify a version
4131 number of this License, you may choose any version ever published (not
4132 as a draft) by the Free Software Foundation.
4136 @unnumberedsec ADDENDUM: How to use this License for your documents
4138 To use this License in a document you have written, include a copy of
4139 the License in the document and put the following copyright and
4140 license notices just after the title page:
4145 Copyright (C) @var{year} @var{your name}.
4146 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
4147 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1
4148 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation;
4149 with the Invariant Sections being @var{list their titles}, with the
4150 Front-Cover Texts being @var{list}, and with the Back-Cover Texts being @var{list}.
4151 A copy of the license is included in the section entitled ``GNU
4152 Free Documentation License''.
4155 If you have no Invariant Sections, write ``with no Invariant Sections''
4156 instead of saying which ones are invariant. If you have no
4157 Front-Cover Texts, write ``no Front-Cover Texts'' instead of
4158 ``Front-Cover Texts being @var{list}''; likewise for Back-Cover Texts.
4160 If your document contains nontrivial examples of program code, we
4161 recommend releasing these examples in parallel under your choice of
4162 free software license, such as the GNU General Public License,
4163 to permit their use in free software.
4166 @node Concept Index, , Copying, Top
4167 @unnumbered Concept Index