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@xemacs.org>.
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 1.2 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''.
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 Download:: Downloading interlinked pages.
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.
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
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::
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}.
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
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
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
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 @samp{.htm} will be loaded from the local disk and
559 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
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 @item --protocol-directories
895 Use the protocol name as a directory component of local file names. For
896 example, with this option, @samp{wget -r http://@var{host}} will save to
897 @samp{http/@var{host}/...} rather than just to @samp{@var{host}/...}.
899 Disable generation of host-prefixed directories. By default, invoking
900 Wget with @samp{-r http://fly.srk.fer.hr/} will create a structure of
901 directories beginning with @file{fly.srk.fer.hr/}. This option disables
904 @cindex cut directories
905 @item --cut-dirs=@var{number}
906 Ignore @var{number} directory components. This is useful for getting a
907 fine-grained control over the directory where recursive retrieval will
910 Take, for example, the directory at
911 @samp{ftp://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/}. If you retrieve it with
912 @samp{-r}, it will be saved locally under
913 @file{ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/}. While the @samp{-nH} option can
914 remove the @file{ftp.xemacs.org/} part, you are still stuck with
915 @file{pub/xemacs}. This is where @samp{--cut-dirs} comes in handy; it
916 makes Wget not ``see'' @var{number} remote directory components. Here
917 are several examples of how @samp{--cut-dirs} option works.
921 No options -> ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/
923 -nH --cut-dirs=1 -> xemacs/
924 -nH --cut-dirs=2 -> .
926 --cut-dirs=1 -> ftp.xemacs.org/xemacs/
931 If you just want to get rid of the directory structure, this option is
932 similar to a combination of @samp{-nd} and @samp{-P}. However, unlike
933 @samp{-nd}, @samp{--cut-dirs} does not lose with subdirectories---for
934 instance, with @samp{-nH --cut-dirs=1}, a @file{beta/} subdirectory will
935 be placed to @file{xemacs/beta}, as one would expect.
937 @cindex directory prefix
938 @item -P @var{prefix}
939 @itemx --directory-prefix=@var{prefix}
940 Set directory prefix to @var{prefix}. The @dfn{directory prefix} is the
941 directory where all other files and subdirectories will be saved to,
942 i.e. the top of the retrieval tree. The default is @samp{.} (the
947 @section HTTP Options
950 @cindex .html extension
952 @itemx --html-extension
953 If a file of type @samp{application/xhtml+xml} or @samp{text/html} is
954 downloaded and the URL does not end with the regexp
955 @samp{\.[Hh][Tt][Mm][Ll]?}, this option will cause the suffix @samp{.html}
956 to be appended to the local filename. This is useful, for instance, when
957 you're mirroring a remote site that uses @samp{.asp} pages, but you want
958 the mirrored pages to be viewable on your stock Apache server. Another
959 good use for this is when you're downloading CGI-generated materials. A URL
960 like @samp{http://site.com/article.cgi?25} will be saved as
961 @file{article.cgi?25.html}.
963 Note that filenames changed in this way will be re-downloaded every time
964 you re-mirror a site, because Wget can't tell that the local
965 @file{@var{X}.html} file corresponds to remote URL @samp{@var{X}} (since
966 it doesn't yet know that the URL produces output of type
967 @samp{text/html} or @samp{application/xhtml+xml}. To prevent this
968 re-downloading, you must use @samp{-k} and @samp{-K} so that the original
969 version of the file will be saved as @file{@var{X}.orig} (@pxref{Recursive
973 @cindex http password
974 @cindex authentication
975 @item --http-user=@var{user}
976 @itemx --http-passwd=@var{password}
977 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} on an
978 @sc{http} server. According to the type of the challenge, Wget will
979 encode them using either the @code{basic} (insecure) or the
980 @code{digest} authentication scheme.
982 Another way to specify username and password is in the @sc{url} itself
983 (@pxref{URL Format}). Either method reveals your password to anyone who
984 bothers to run @code{ps}. To prevent the passwords from being seen,
985 store them in @file{.wgetrc} or @file{.netrc}, and make sure to protect
986 those files from other users with @code{chmod}. If the passwords are
987 really important, do not leave them lying in those files either---edit
988 the files and delete them after Wget has started the download.
990 For more information about security issues with Wget, @xref{Security
996 Disable server-side cache. In this case, Wget will send the remote
997 server an appropriate directive (@samp{Pragma: no-cache}) to get the
998 file from the remote service, rather than returning the cached version.
999 This is especially useful for retrieving and flushing out-of-date
1000 documents on proxy servers.
1002 Caching is allowed by default.
1006 Disable the use of cookies. Cookies are a mechanism for maintaining
1007 server-side state. The server sends the client a cookie using the
1008 @code{Set-Cookie} header, and the client responds with the same cookie
1009 upon further requests. Since cookies allow the server owners to keep
1010 track of visitors and for sites to exchange this information, some
1011 consider them a breach of privacy. The default is to use cookies;
1012 however, @emph{storing} cookies is not on by default.
1014 @cindex loading cookies
1015 @cindex cookies, loading
1016 @item --load-cookies @var{file}
1017 Load cookies from @var{file} before the first HTTP retrieval.
1018 @var{file} is a textual file in the format originally used by Netscape's
1019 @file{cookies.txt} file.
1021 You will typically use this option when mirroring sites that require
1022 that you be logged in to access some or all of their content. The login
1023 process typically works by the web server issuing an @sc{http} cookie
1024 upon receiving and verifying your credentials. The cookie is then
1025 resent by the browser when accessing that part of the site, and so
1026 proves your identity.
1028 Mirroring such a site requires Wget to send the same cookies your
1029 browser sends when communicating with the site. This is achieved by
1030 @samp{--load-cookies}---simply point Wget to the location of the
1031 @file{cookies.txt} file, and it will send the same cookies your browser
1032 would send in the same situation. Different browsers keep textual
1033 cookie files in different locations:
1037 The cookies are in @file{~/.netscape/cookies.txt}.
1039 @item Mozilla and Netscape 6.x.
1040 Mozilla's cookie file is also named @file{cookies.txt}, located
1041 somewhere under @file{~/.mozilla}, in the directory of your profile.
1042 The full path usually ends up looking somewhat like
1043 @file{~/.mozilla/default/@var{some-weird-string}/cookies.txt}.
1045 @item Internet Explorer.
1046 You can produce a cookie file Wget can use by using the File menu,
1047 Import and Export, Export Cookies. This has been tested with Internet
1048 Explorer 5; it is not guaranteed to work with earlier versions.
1050 @item Other browsers.
1051 If you are using a different browser to create your cookies,
1052 @samp{--load-cookies} will only work if you can locate or produce a
1053 cookie file in the Netscape format that Wget expects.
1056 If you cannot use @samp{--load-cookies}, there might still be an
1057 alternative. If your browser supports a ``cookie manager'', you can use
1058 it to view the cookies used when accessing the site you're mirroring.
1059 Write down the name and value of the cookie, and manually instruct Wget
1060 to send those cookies, bypassing the ``official'' cookie support:
1063 wget --cookies=off --header "Cookie: @var{name}=@var{value}"
1066 @cindex saving cookies
1067 @cindex cookies, saving
1068 @item --save-cookies @var{file}
1069 Save cookies to @var{file} before exiting. This will not save cookies
1070 that have expired or that have no expiry time (so-called ``session
1071 cookies''), but also see @samp{--keep-session-cookies}.
1073 @cindex cookies, session
1074 @cindex session cookies
1075 @item --keep-session-cookies
1077 When specified, causes @samp{--save-cookies} to also save session
1078 cookies. Session cookies are normally not save because they are
1079 supposed to be forgotten when you exit the browser. Saving them is
1080 useful on sites that require you to log in or to visit the home page
1081 before you can access some pages. With this option, multiple Wget runs
1082 are considered a single browser session as far as the site is concerned.
1084 Since the cookie file format does not normally carry session cookies,
1085 Wget marks them with an expiry timestamp of 0. Wget's
1086 @samp{--load-cookies} recognizes those as session cookies, but it might
1087 confuse other browsers. Also note that cookies so loaded will be
1088 treated as other session cookies, which means that if you want
1089 @samp{--save-cookies} to preserve them again, you must use
1090 @samp{--keep-session-cookies} again.
1092 @cindex Content-Length, ignore
1093 @cindex ignore length
1094 @item --ignore-length
1095 Unfortunately, some @sc{http} servers (@sc{cgi} programs, to be more
1096 precise) send out bogus @code{Content-Length} headers, which makes Wget
1097 go wild, as it thinks not all the document was retrieved. You can spot
1098 this syndrome if Wget retries getting the same document again and again,
1099 each time claiming that the (otherwise normal) connection has closed on
1102 With this option, Wget will ignore the @code{Content-Length} header---as
1103 if it never existed.
1106 @item --header=@var{additional-header}
1107 Define an @var{additional-header} to be passed to the @sc{http} servers.
1108 Headers must contain a @samp{:} preceded by one or more non-blank
1109 characters, and must not contain newlines.
1111 You may define more than one additional header by specifying
1112 @samp{--header} more than once.
1116 wget --header='Accept-Charset: iso-8859-2' \
1117 --header='Accept-Language: hr' \
1118 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/
1122 Specification of an empty string as the header value will clear all
1123 previous user-defined headers.
1126 @cindex proxy password
1127 @cindex proxy authentication
1128 @item --proxy-user=@var{user}
1129 @itemx --proxy-passwd=@var{password}
1130 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} for
1131 authentication on a proxy server. Wget will encode them using the
1132 @code{basic} authentication scheme.
1134 Security considerations similar to those with @samp{--http-passwd}
1135 pertain here as well.
1137 @cindex http referer
1138 @cindex referer, http
1139 @item --referer=@var{url}
1140 Include `Referer: @var{url}' header in HTTP request. Useful for
1141 retrieving documents with server-side processing that assume they are
1142 always being retrieved by interactive web browsers and only come out
1143 properly when Referer is set to one of the pages that point to them.
1145 @cindex server response, save
1146 @item --save-headers
1147 Save the headers sent by the @sc{http} server to the file, preceding the
1148 actual contents, with an empty line as the separator.
1151 @item -U @var{agent-string}
1152 @itemx --user-agent=@var{agent-string}
1153 Identify as @var{agent-string} to the @sc{http} server.
1155 The @sc{http} protocol allows the clients to identify themselves using a
1156 @code{User-Agent} header field. This enables distinguishing the
1157 @sc{www} software, usually for statistical purposes or for tracing of
1158 protocol violations. Wget normally identifies as
1159 @samp{Wget/@var{version}}, @var{version} being the current version
1162 However, some sites have been known to impose the policy of tailoring
1163 the output according to the @code{User-Agent}-supplied information.
1164 While conceptually this is not such a bad idea, it has been abused by
1165 servers denying information to clients other than @code{Mozilla} or
1166 Microsoft @code{Internet Explorer}. This option allows you to change
1167 the @code{User-Agent} line issued by Wget. Use of this option is
1168 discouraged, unless you really know what you are doing.
1171 @item --post-data=@var{string}
1172 @itemx --post-file=@var{file}
1173 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send the specified data
1174 in the request body. @code{--post-data} sends @var{string} as data,
1175 whereas @code{--post-file} sends the contents of @var{file}. Other than
1176 that, they work in exactly the same way.
1178 Please be aware that Wget needs to know the size of the POST data in
1179 advance. Therefore the argument to @code{--post-file} must be a regular
1180 file; specifying a FIFO or something like @file{/dev/stdin} won't work.
1181 It's not quite clear how to work around this limitation inherent in
1182 HTTP/1.0. Although HTTP/1.1 introduces @dfn{chunked} transfer that
1183 doesn't require knowing the request length in advance, a client can't
1184 use chunked unless it knows it's talking to an HTTP/1.1 server. And it
1185 can't know that until it receives a response, which in turn requires the
1186 request to have been completed -- a chicken-and-egg problem.
1188 Note: if Wget is redirected after the POST request is completed, it will
1189 not send the POST data to the redirected URL. This is because URLs that
1190 process POST often respond with a redirection to a regular page
1191 (although that's technically disallowed), which does not desire or
1192 accept POST. It is not yet clear that this behavior is optimal; if it
1193 doesn't work out, it will be changed.
1195 This example shows how to log to a server using POST and then proceed to
1196 download the desired pages, presumably only accessible to authorized
1201 # @r{Log in to the server. This can be done only once.}
1202 wget --save-cookies cookies.txt \
1203 --post-data 'user=foo&password=bar' \
1204 http://server.com/auth.php
1206 # @r{Now grab the page or pages we care about.}
1207 wget --load-cookies cookies.txt \
1208 -p http://server.com/interesting/article.php
1214 @section FTP Options
1217 @cindex .listing files, removing
1218 @item --no-remove-listing
1219 Don't remove the temporary @file{.listing} files generated by @sc{ftp}
1220 retrievals. Normally, these files contain the raw directory listings
1221 received from @sc{ftp} servers. Not removing them can be useful for
1222 debugging purposes, or when you want to be able to easily check on the
1223 contents of remote server directories (e.g. to verify that a mirror
1224 you're running is complete).
1226 Note that even though Wget writes to a known filename for this file,
1227 this is not a security hole in the scenario of a user making
1228 @file{.listing} a symbolic link to @file{/etc/passwd} or something and
1229 asking @code{root} to run Wget in his or her directory. Depending on
1230 the options used, either Wget will refuse to write to @file{.listing},
1231 making the globbing/recursion/time-stamping operation fail, or the
1232 symbolic link will be deleted and replaced with the actual
1233 @file{.listing} file, or the listing will be written to a
1234 @file{.listing.@var{number}} file.
1236 Even though this situation isn't a problem, though, @code{root} should
1237 never run Wget in a non-trusted user's directory. A user could do
1238 something as simple as linking @file{index.html} to @file{/etc/passwd}
1239 and asking @code{root} to run Wget with @samp{-N} or @samp{-r} so the file
1240 will be overwritten.
1242 @cindex globbing, toggle
1244 Turn off @sc{ftp} globbing. Globbing refers to the use of shell-like
1245 special characters (@dfn{wildcards}), like @samp{*}, @samp{?}, @samp{[}
1246 and @samp{]} to retrieve more than one file from the same directory at
1250 wget ftp://gnjilux.srk.fer.hr/*.msg
1253 By default, globbing will be turned on if the @sc{url} contains a
1254 globbing character. This option may be used to turn globbing on or off
1257 You may have to quote the @sc{url} to protect it from being expanded by
1258 your shell. Globbing makes Wget look for a directory listing, which is
1259 system-specific. This is why it currently works only with Unix @sc{ftp}
1260 servers (and the ones emulating Unix @code{ls} output).
1264 Use the @dfn{passive} @sc{ftp} retrieval scheme, in which the client
1265 initiates the data connection. This is sometimes required for @sc{ftp}
1266 to work behind firewalls.
1268 @cindex symbolic links, retrieving
1269 @item --retr-symlinks
1270 Usually, when retrieving @sc{ftp} directories recursively and a symbolic
1271 link is encountered, the linked-to file is not downloaded. Instead, a
1272 matching symbolic link is created on the local filesystem. The
1273 pointed-to file will not be downloaded unless this recursive retrieval
1274 would have encountered it separately and downloaded it anyway.
1276 When @samp{--retr-symlinks} is specified, however, symbolic links are
1277 traversed and the pointed-to files are retrieved. At this time, this
1278 option does not cause Wget to traverse symlinks to directories and
1279 recurse through them, but in the future it should be enhanced to do
1282 Note that when retrieving a file (not a directory) because it was
1283 specified on the command-line, rather than because it was recursed to,
1284 this option has no effect. Symbolic links are always traversed in this
1288 @node Recursive Retrieval Options
1289 @section Recursive Retrieval Options
1294 Turn on recursive retrieving. @xref{Recursive Download}, for more
1297 @item -l @var{depth}
1298 @itemx --level=@var{depth}
1299 Specify recursion maximum depth level @var{depth} (@pxref{Recursive
1300 Download}). The default maximum depth is 5.
1302 @cindex proxy filling
1303 @cindex delete after retrieval
1304 @cindex filling proxy cache
1305 @item --delete-after
1306 This option tells Wget to delete every single file it downloads,
1307 @emph{after} having done so. It is useful for pre-fetching popular
1308 pages through a proxy, e.g.:
1311 wget -r -nd --delete-after http://whatever.com/~popular/page/
1314 The @samp{-r} option is to retrieve recursively, and @samp{-nd} to not
1317 Note that @samp{--delete-after} deletes files on the local machine. It
1318 does not issue the @samp{DELE} command to remote FTP sites, for
1319 instance. Also note that when @samp{--delete-after} is specified,
1320 @samp{--convert-links} is ignored, so @samp{.orig} files are simply not
1321 created in the first place.
1323 @cindex conversion of links
1324 @cindex link conversion
1326 @itemx --convert-links
1327 After the download is complete, convert the links in the document to
1328 make them suitable for local viewing. This affects not only the visible
1329 hyperlinks, but any part of the document that links to external content,
1330 such as embedded images, links to style sheets, hyperlinks to non-@sc{html}
1333 Each link will be changed in one of the two ways:
1337 The links to files that have been downloaded by Wget will be changed to
1338 refer to the file they point to as a relative link.
1340 Example: if the downloaded file @file{/foo/doc.html} links to
1341 @file{/bar/img.gif}, also downloaded, then the link in @file{doc.html}
1342 will be modified to point to @samp{../bar/img.gif}. This kind of
1343 transformation works reliably for arbitrary combinations of directories.
1346 The links to files that have not been downloaded by Wget will be changed
1347 to include host name and absolute path of the location they point to.
1349 Example: if the downloaded file @file{/foo/doc.html} links to
1350 @file{/bar/img.gif} (or to @file{../bar/img.gif}), then the link in
1351 @file{doc.html} will be modified to point to
1352 @file{http://@var{hostname}/bar/img.gif}.
1355 Because of this, local browsing works reliably: if a linked file was
1356 downloaded, the link will refer to its local name; if it was not
1357 downloaded, the link will refer to its full Internet address rather than
1358 presenting a broken link. The fact that the former links are converted
1359 to relative links ensures that you can move the downloaded hierarchy to
1362 Note that only at the end of the download can Wget know which links have
1363 been downloaded. Because of that, the work done by @samp{-k} will be
1364 performed at the end of all the downloads.
1366 @cindex backing up converted files
1368 @itemx --backup-converted
1369 When converting a file, back up the original version with a @samp{.orig}
1370 suffix. Affects the behavior of @samp{-N} (@pxref{HTTP Time-Stamping
1375 Turn on options suitable for mirroring. This option turns on recursion
1376 and time-stamping, sets infinite recursion depth and keeps @sc{ftp}
1377 directory listings. It is currently equivalent to
1378 @samp{-r -N -l inf --no-remove-listing}.
1380 @cindex page requisites
1381 @cindex required images, downloading
1383 @itemx --page-requisites
1384 This option causes Wget to download all the files that are necessary to
1385 properly display a given @sc{html} page. This includes such things as
1386 inlined images, sounds, and referenced stylesheets.
1388 Ordinarily, when downloading a single @sc{html} page, any requisite documents
1389 that may be needed to display it properly are not downloaded. Using
1390 @samp{-r} together with @samp{-l} can help, but since Wget does not
1391 ordinarily distinguish between external and inlined documents, one is
1392 generally left with ``leaf documents'' that are missing their
1395 For instance, say document @file{1.html} contains an @code{<IMG>} tag
1396 referencing @file{1.gif} and an @code{<A>} tag pointing to external
1397 document @file{2.html}. Say that @file{2.html} is similar but that its
1398 image is @file{2.gif} and it links to @file{3.html}. Say this
1399 continues up to some arbitrarily high number.
1401 If one executes the command:
1404 wget -r -l 2 http://@var{site}/1.html
1407 then @file{1.html}, @file{1.gif}, @file{2.html}, @file{2.gif}, and
1408 @file{3.html} will be downloaded. As you can see, @file{3.html} is
1409 without its requisite @file{3.gif} because Wget is simply counting the
1410 number of hops (up to 2) away from @file{1.html} in order to determine
1411 where to stop the recursion. However, with this command:
1414 wget -r -l 2 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1417 all the above files @emph{and} @file{3.html}'s requisite @file{3.gif}
1418 will be downloaded. Similarly,
1421 wget -r -l 1 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1424 will cause @file{1.html}, @file{1.gif}, @file{2.html}, and @file{2.gif}
1425 to be downloaded. One might think that:
1428 wget -r -l 0 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1431 would download just @file{1.html} and @file{1.gif}, but unfortunately
1432 this is not the case, because @samp{-l 0} is equivalent to
1433 @samp{-l inf}---that is, infinite recursion. To download a single @sc{html}
1434 page (or a handful of them, all specified on the command-line or in a
1435 @samp{-i} @sc{url} input file) and its (or their) requisites, simply leave off
1436 @samp{-r} and @samp{-l}:
1439 wget -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1442 Note that Wget will behave as if @samp{-r} had been specified, but only
1443 that single page and its requisites will be downloaded. Links from that
1444 page to external documents will not be followed. Actually, to download
1445 a single page and all its requisites (even if they exist on separate
1446 websites), and make sure the lot displays properly locally, this author
1447 likes to use a few options in addition to @samp{-p}:
1450 wget -E -H -k -K -p http://@var{site}/@var{document}
1453 To finish off this topic, it's worth knowing that Wget's idea of an
1454 external document link is any URL specified in an @code{<A>} tag, an
1455 @code{<AREA>} tag, or a @code{<LINK>} tag other than @code{<LINK
1458 @cindex @sc{html} comments
1459 @cindex comments, @sc{html}
1460 @item --strict-comments
1461 Turn on strict parsing of @sc{html} comments. The default is to terminate
1462 comments at the first occurrence of @samp{-->}.
1464 According to specifications, @sc{html} comments are expressed as @sc{sgml}
1465 @dfn{declarations}. Declaration is special markup that begins with
1466 @samp{<!} and ends with @samp{>}, such as @samp{<!DOCTYPE ...>}, that
1467 may contain comments between a pair of @samp{--} delimiters. @sc{html}
1468 comments are ``empty declarations'', @sc{sgml} declarations without any
1469 non-comment text. Therefore, @samp{<!--foo-->} is a valid comment, and
1470 so is @samp{<!--one-- --two-->}, but @samp{<!--1--2-->} is not.
1472 On the other hand, most @sc{html} writers don't perceive comments as anything
1473 other than text delimited with @samp{<!--} and @samp{-->}, which is not
1474 quite the same. For example, something like @samp{<!------------>}
1475 works as a valid comment as long as the number of dashes is a multiple
1476 of four (!). If not, the comment technically lasts until the next
1477 @samp{--}, which may be at the other end of the document. Because of
1478 this, many popular browsers completely ignore the specification and
1479 implement what users have come to expect: comments delimited with
1480 @samp{<!--} and @samp{-->}.
1482 Until version 1.9, Wget interpreted comments strictly, which resulted in
1483 missing links in many web pages that displayed fine in browsers, but had
1484 the misfortune of containing non-compliant comments. Beginning with
1485 version 1.9, Wget has joined the ranks of clients that implements
1486 ``naive'' comments, terminating each comment at the first occurrence of
1489 If, for whatever reason, you want strict comment parsing, use this
1490 option to turn it on.
1493 @node Recursive Accept/Reject Options
1494 @section Recursive Accept/Reject Options
1497 @item -A @var{acclist} --accept @var{acclist}
1498 @itemx -R @var{rejlist} --reject @var{rejlist}
1499 Specify comma-separated lists of file name suffixes or patterns to
1500 accept or reject (@pxref{Types of Files} for more details).
1502 @item -D @var{domain-list}
1503 @itemx --domains=@var{domain-list}
1504 Set domains to be followed. @var{domain-list} is a comma-separated list
1505 of domains. Note that it does @emph{not} turn on @samp{-H}.
1507 @item --exclude-domains @var{domain-list}
1508 Specify the domains that are @emph{not} to be followed.
1509 (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
1511 @cindex follow FTP links
1513 Follow @sc{ftp} links from @sc{html} documents. Without this option,
1514 Wget will ignore all the @sc{ftp} links.
1516 @cindex tag-based recursive pruning
1517 @item --follow-tags=@var{list}
1518 Wget has an internal table of @sc{html} tag / attribute pairs that it
1519 considers when looking for linked documents during a recursive
1520 retrieval. If a user wants only a subset of those tags to be
1521 considered, however, he or she should be specify such tags in a
1522 comma-separated @var{list} with this option.
1524 @item --ignore-tags=@var{list}
1525 This is the opposite of the @samp{--follow-tags} option. To skip
1526 certain @sc{html} tags when recursively looking for documents to download,
1527 specify them in a comma-separated @var{list}.
1529 In the past, this option was the best bet for downloading a single page
1530 and its requisites, using a command-line like:
1533 wget --ignore-tags=a,area -H -k -K -r http://@var{site}/@var{document}
1536 However, the author of this option came across a page with tags like
1537 @code{<LINK REL="home" HREF="/">} and came to the realization that
1538 specifying tags to ignore was not enough. One can't just tell Wget to
1539 ignore @code{<LINK>}, because then stylesheets will not be downloaded.
1540 Now the best bet for downloading a single page and its requisites is the
1541 dedicated @samp{--page-requisites} option.
1545 Enable spanning across hosts when doing recursive retrieving
1546 (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
1550 Follow relative links only. Useful for retrieving a specific home page
1551 without any distractions, not even those from the same hosts
1552 (@pxref{Relative Links}).
1555 @itemx --include-directories=@var{list}
1556 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to follow when
1557 downloading (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits} for more details.) Elements
1558 of @var{list} may contain wildcards.
1561 @itemx --exclude-directories=@var{list}
1562 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to exclude from
1563 download (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits} for more details.) Elements of
1564 @var{list} may contain wildcards.
1568 Do not ever ascend to the parent directory when retrieving recursively.
1569 This is a useful option, since it guarantees that only the files
1570 @emph{below} a certain hierarchy will be downloaded.
1571 @xref{Directory-Based Limits}, for more details.
1576 @node Recursive Download
1577 @chapter Recursive Download
1580 @cindex recursive download
1582 GNU Wget is capable of traversing parts of the Web (or a single
1583 @sc{http} or @sc{ftp} server), following links and directory structure.
1584 We refer to this as to @dfn{recursive retrieval}, or @dfn{recursion}.
1586 With @sc{http} @sc{url}s, Wget retrieves and parses the @sc{html} from
1587 the given @sc{url}, documents, retrieving the files the @sc{html}
1588 document was referring to, through markup like @code{href}, or
1589 @code{src}. If the freshly downloaded file is also of type
1590 @code{text/html} or @code{application/xhtml+xml}, it will be parsed and
1593 Recursive retrieval of @sc{http} and @sc{html} content is
1594 @dfn{breadth-first}. This means that Wget first downloads the requested
1595 @sc{html} document, then the documents linked from that document, then the
1596 documents linked by them, and so on. In other words, Wget first
1597 downloads the documents at depth 1, then those at depth 2, and so on
1598 until the specified maximum depth.
1600 The maximum @dfn{depth} to which the retrieval may descend is specified
1601 with the @samp{-l} option. The default maximum depth is five layers.
1603 When retrieving an @sc{ftp} @sc{url} recursively, Wget will retrieve all
1604 the data from the given directory tree (including the subdirectories up
1605 to the specified depth) on the remote server, creating its mirror image
1606 locally. @sc{ftp} retrieval is also limited by the @code{depth}
1607 parameter. Unlike @sc{http} recursion, @sc{ftp} recursion is performed
1610 By default, Wget will create a local directory tree, corresponding to
1611 the one found on the remote server.
1613 Recursive retrieving can find a number of applications, the most
1614 important of which is mirroring. It is also useful for @sc{www}
1615 presentations, and any other opportunities where slow network
1616 connections should be bypassed by storing the files locally.
1618 You should be warned that recursive downloads can overload the remote
1619 servers. Because of that, many administrators frown upon them and may
1620 ban access from your site if they detect very fast downloads of big
1621 amounts of content. When downloading from Internet servers, consider
1622 using the @samp{-w} option to introduce a delay between accesses to the
1623 server. The download will take a while longer, but the server
1624 administrator will not be alarmed by your rudeness.
1626 Of course, recursive download may cause problems on your machine. If
1627 left to run unchecked, it can easily fill up the disk. If downloading
1628 from local network, it can also take bandwidth on the system, as well as
1629 consume memory and CPU.
1631 Try to specify the criteria that match the kind of download you are
1632 trying to achieve. If you want to download only one page, use
1633 @samp{--page-requisites} without any additional recursion. If you want
1634 to download things under one directory, use @samp{-np} to avoid
1635 downloading things from other directories. If you want to download all
1636 the files from one directory, use @samp{-l 1} to make sure the recursion
1637 depth never exceeds one. @xref{Following Links}, for more information
1640 Recursive retrieval should be used with care. Don't say you were not
1643 @node Following Links
1644 @chapter Following Links
1646 @cindex following links
1648 When retrieving recursively, one does not wish to retrieve loads of
1649 unnecessary data. Most of the time the users bear in mind exactly what
1650 they want to download, and want Wget to follow only specific links.
1652 For example, if you wish to download the music archive from
1653 @samp{fly.srk.fer.hr}, you will not want to download all the home pages
1654 that happen to be referenced by an obscure part of the archive.
1656 Wget possesses several mechanisms that allows you to fine-tune which
1657 links it will follow.
1660 * Spanning Hosts:: (Un)limiting retrieval based on host name.
1661 * Types of Files:: Getting only certain files.
1662 * Directory-Based Limits:: Getting only certain directories.
1663 * Relative Links:: Follow relative links only.
1664 * FTP Links:: Following FTP links.
1667 @node Spanning Hosts
1668 @section Spanning Hosts
1669 @cindex spanning hosts
1670 @cindex hosts, spanning
1672 Wget's recursive retrieval normally refuses to visit hosts different
1673 than the one you specified on the command line. This is a reasonable
1674 default; without it, every retrieval would have the potential to turn
1675 your Wget into a small version of google.
1677 However, visiting different hosts, or @dfn{host spanning,} is sometimes
1678 a useful option. Maybe the images are served from a different server.
1679 Maybe you're mirroring a site that consists of pages interlinked between
1680 three servers. Maybe the server has two equivalent names, and the @sc{html}
1681 pages refer to both interchangeably.
1684 @item Span to any host---@samp{-H}
1686 The @samp{-H} option turns on host spanning, thus allowing Wget's
1687 recursive run to visit any host referenced by a link. Unless sufficient
1688 recursion-limiting criteria are applied depth, these foreign hosts will
1689 typically link to yet more hosts, and so on until Wget ends up sucking
1690 up much more data than you have intended.
1692 @item Limit spanning to certain domains---@samp{-D}
1694 The @samp{-D} option allows you to specify the domains that will be
1695 followed, thus limiting the recursion only to the hosts that belong to
1696 these domains. Obviously, this makes sense only in conjunction with
1697 @samp{-H}. A typical example would be downloading the contents of
1698 @samp{www.server.com}, but allowing downloads from
1699 @samp{images.server.com}, etc.:
1702 wget -rH -Dserver.com http://www.server.com/
1705 You can specify more than one address by separating them with a comma,
1706 e.g. @samp{-Ddomain1.com,domain2.com}.
1708 @item Keep download off certain domains---@samp{--exclude-domains}
1710 If there are domains you want to exclude specifically, you can do it
1711 with @samp{--exclude-domains}, which accepts the same type of arguments
1712 of @samp{-D}, but will @emph{exclude} all the listed domains. For
1713 example, if you want to download all the hosts from @samp{foo.edu}
1714 domain, with the exception of @samp{sunsite.foo.edu}, you can do it like
1718 wget -rH -Dfoo.edu --exclude-domains sunsite.foo.edu \
1724 @node Types of Files
1725 @section Types of Files
1726 @cindex types of files
1728 When downloading material from the web, you will often want to restrict
1729 the retrieval to only certain file types. For example, if you are
1730 interested in downloading @sc{gif}s, you will not be overjoyed to get
1731 loads of PostScript documents, and vice versa.
1733 Wget offers two options to deal with this problem. Each option
1734 description lists a short name, a long name, and the equivalent command
1737 @cindex accept wildcards
1738 @cindex accept suffixes
1739 @cindex wildcards, accept
1740 @cindex suffixes, accept
1742 @item -A @var{acclist}
1743 @itemx --accept @var{acclist}
1744 @itemx accept = @var{acclist}
1745 The argument to @samp{--accept} option is a list of file suffixes or
1746 patterns that Wget will download during recursive retrieval. A suffix
1747 is the ending part of a file, and consists of ``normal'' letters,
1748 e.g. @samp{gif} or @samp{.jpg}. A matching pattern contains shell-like
1749 wildcards, e.g. @samp{books*} or @samp{zelazny*196[0-9]*}.
1751 So, specifying @samp{wget -A gif,jpg} will make Wget download only the
1752 files ending with @samp{gif} or @samp{jpg}, i.e. @sc{gif}s and
1753 @sc{jpeg}s. On the other hand, @samp{wget -A "zelazny*196[0-9]*"} will
1754 download only files beginning with @samp{zelazny} and containing numbers
1755 from 1960 to 1969 anywhere within. Look up the manual of your shell for
1756 a description of how pattern matching works.
1758 Of course, any number of suffixes and patterns can be combined into a
1759 comma-separated list, and given as an argument to @samp{-A}.
1761 @cindex reject wildcards
1762 @cindex reject suffixes
1763 @cindex wildcards, reject
1764 @cindex suffixes, reject
1765 @item -R @var{rejlist}
1766 @itemx --reject @var{rejlist}
1767 @itemx reject = @var{rejlist}
1768 The @samp{--reject} option works the same way as @samp{--accept}, only
1769 its logic is the reverse; Wget will download all files @emph{except} the
1770 ones matching the suffixes (or patterns) in the list.
1772 So, if you want to download a whole page except for the cumbersome
1773 @sc{mpeg}s and @sc{.au} files, you can use @samp{wget -R mpg,mpeg,au}.
1774 Analogously, to download all files except the ones beginning with
1775 @samp{bjork}, use @samp{wget -R "bjork*"}. The quotes are to prevent
1776 expansion by the shell.
1779 The @samp{-A} and @samp{-R} options may be combined to achieve even
1780 better fine-tuning of which files to retrieve. E.g. @samp{wget -A
1781 "*zelazny*" -R .ps} will download all the files having @samp{zelazny} as
1782 a part of their name, but @emph{not} the PostScript files.
1784 Note that these two options do not affect the downloading of @sc{html}
1785 files; Wget must load all the @sc{html}s to know where to go at
1786 all---recursive retrieval would make no sense otherwise.
1788 @node Directory-Based Limits
1789 @section Directory-Based Limits
1791 @cindex directory limits
1793 Regardless of other link-following facilities, it is often useful to
1794 place the restriction of what files to retrieve based on the directories
1795 those files are placed in. There can be many reasons for this---the
1796 home pages may be organized in a reasonable directory structure; or some
1797 directories may contain useless information, e.g. @file{/cgi-bin} or
1798 @file{/dev} directories.
1800 Wget offers three different options to deal with this requirement. Each
1801 option description lists a short name, a long name, and the equivalent
1802 command in @file{.wgetrc}.
1804 @cindex directories, include
1805 @cindex include directories
1806 @cindex accept directories
1809 @itemx --include @var{list}
1810 @itemx include_directories = @var{list}
1811 @samp{-I} option accepts a comma-separated list of directories included
1812 in the retrieval. Any other directories will simply be ignored. The
1813 directories are absolute paths.
1815 So, if you wish to download from @samp{http://host/people/bozo/}
1816 following only links to bozo's colleagues in the @file{/people}
1817 directory and the bogus scripts in @file{/cgi-bin}, you can specify:
1820 wget -I /people,/cgi-bin http://host/people/bozo/
1823 @cindex directories, exclude
1824 @cindex exclude directories
1825 @cindex reject directories
1827 @itemx --exclude @var{list}
1828 @itemx exclude_directories = @var{list}
1829 @samp{-X} option is exactly the reverse of @samp{-I}---this is a list of
1830 directories @emph{excluded} from the download. E.g. if you do not want
1831 Wget to download things from @file{/cgi-bin} directory, specify @samp{-X
1832 /cgi-bin} on the command line.
1834 The same as with @samp{-A}/@samp{-R}, these two options can be combined
1835 to get a better fine-tuning of downloading subdirectories. E.g. if you
1836 want to load all the files from @file{/pub} hierarchy except for
1837 @file{/pub/worthless}, specify @samp{-I/pub -X/pub/worthless}.
1842 @itemx no_parent = on
1843 The simplest, and often very useful way of limiting directories is
1844 disallowing retrieval of the links that refer to the hierarchy
1845 @dfn{above} than the beginning directory, i.e. disallowing ascent to the
1846 parent directory/directories.
1848 The @samp{--no-parent} option (short @samp{-np}) is useful in this case.
1849 Using it guarantees that you will never leave the existing hierarchy.
1850 Supposing you issue Wget with:
1853 wget -r --no-parent http://somehost/~luzer/my-archive/
1856 You may rest assured that none of the references to
1857 @file{/~his-girls-homepage/} or @file{/~luzer/all-my-mpegs/} will be
1858 followed. Only the archive you are interested in will be downloaded.
1859 Essentially, @samp{--no-parent} is similar to
1860 @samp{-I/~luzer/my-archive}, only it handles redirections in a more
1861 intelligent fashion.
1864 @node Relative Links
1865 @section Relative Links
1866 @cindex relative links
1868 When @samp{-L} is turned on, only the relative links are ever followed.
1869 Relative links are here defined those that do not refer to the web
1870 server root. For example, these links are relative:
1874 <a href="foo/bar.gif">
1875 <a href="../foo/bar.gif">
1878 These links are not relative:
1882 <a href="/foo/bar.gif">
1883 <a href="http://www.server.com/foo/bar.gif">
1886 Using this option guarantees that recursive retrieval will not span
1887 hosts, even without @samp{-H}. In simple cases it also allows downloads
1888 to ``just work'' without having to convert links.
1890 This option is probably not very useful and might be removed in a future
1894 @section Following FTP Links
1895 @cindex following ftp links
1897 The rules for @sc{ftp} are somewhat specific, as it is necessary for
1898 them to be. @sc{ftp} links in @sc{html} documents are often included
1899 for purposes of reference, and it is often inconvenient to download them
1902 To have @sc{ftp} links followed from @sc{html} documents, you need to
1903 specify the @samp{--follow-ftp} option. Having done that, @sc{ftp}
1904 links will span hosts regardless of @samp{-H} setting. This is logical,
1905 as @sc{ftp} links rarely point to the same host where the @sc{http}
1906 server resides. For similar reasons, the @samp{-L} options has no
1907 effect on such downloads. On the other hand, domain acceptance
1908 (@samp{-D}) and suffix rules (@samp{-A} and @samp{-R}) apply normally.
1910 Also note that followed links to @sc{ftp} directories will not be
1911 retrieved recursively further.
1914 @chapter Time-Stamping
1915 @cindex time-stamping
1916 @cindex timestamping
1917 @cindex updating the archives
1918 @cindex incremental updating
1920 One of the most important aspects of mirroring information from the
1921 Internet is updating your archives.
1923 Downloading the whole archive again and again, just to replace a few
1924 changed files is expensive, both in terms of wasted bandwidth and money,
1925 and the time to do the update. This is why all the mirroring tools
1926 offer the option of incremental updating.
1928 Such an updating mechanism means that the remote server is scanned in
1929 search of @dfn{new} files. Only those new files will be downloaded in
1930 the place of the old ones.
1932 A file is considered new if one of these two conditions are met:
1936 A file of that name does not already exist locally.
1939 A file of that name does exist, but the remote file was modified more
1940 recently than the local file.
1943 To implement this, the program needs to be aware of the time of last
1944 modification of both local and remote files. We call this information the
1945 @dfn{time-stamp} of a file.
1947 The time-stamping in GNU Wget is turned on using @samp{--timestamping}
1948 (@samp{-N}) option, or through @code{timestamping = on} directive in
1949 @file{.wgetrc}. With this option, for each file it intends to download,
1950 Wget will check whether a local file of the same name exists. If it
1951 does, and the remote file is older, Wget will not download it.
1953 If the local file does not exist, or the sizes of the files do not
1954 match, Wget will download the remote file no matter what the time-stamps
1958 * Time-Stamping Usage::
1959 * HTTP Time-Stamping Internals::
1960 * FTP Time-Stamping Internals::
1963 @node Time-Stamping Usage
1964 @section Time-Stamping Usage
1965 @cindex time-stamping usage
1966 @cindex usage, time-stamping
1968 The usage of time-stamping is simple. Say you would like to download a
1969 file so that it keeps its date of modification.
1972 wget -S http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/
1975 A simple @code{ls -l} shows that the time stamp on the local file equals
1976 the state of the @code{Last-Modified} header, as returned by the server.
1977 As you can see, the time-stamping info is preserved locally, even
1978 without @samp{-N} (at least for @sc{http}).
1980 Several days later, you would like Wget to check if the remote file has
1981 changed, and download it if it has.
1984 wget -N http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/
1987 Wget will ask the server for the last-modified date. If the local file
1988 has the same timestamp as the server, or a newer one, the remote file
1989 will not be re-fetched. However, if the remote file is more recent,
1990 Wget will proceed to fetch it.
1992 The same goes for @sc{ftp}. For example:
1995 wget "ftp://ftp.ifi.uio.no/pub/emacs/gnus/*"
1998 (The quotes around that URL are to prevent the shell from trying to
1999 interpret the @samp{*}.)
2001 After download, a local directory listing will show that the timestamps
2002 match those on the remote server. Reissuing the command with @samp{-N}
2003 will make Wget re-fetch @emph{only} the files that have been modified
2004 since the last download.
2006 If you wished to mirror the GNU archive every week, you would use a
2007 command like the following, weekly:
2010 wget --timestamping -r ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/
2013 Note that time-stamping will only work for files for which the server
2014 gives a timestamp. For @sc{http}, this depends on getting a
2015 @code{Last-Modified} header. For @sc{ftp}, this depends on getting a
2016 directory listing with dates in a format that Wget can parse
2017 (@pxref{FTP Time-Stamping Internals}).
2019 @node HTTP Time-Stamping Internals
2020 @section HTTP Time-Stamping Internals
2021 @cindex http time-stamping
2023 Time-stamping in @sc{http} is implemented by checking of the
2024 @code{Last-Modified} header. If you wish to retrieve the file
2025 @file{foo.html} through @sc{http}, Wget will check whether
2026 @file{foo.html} exists locally. If it doesn't, @file{foo.html} will be
2027 retrieved unconditionally.
2029 If the file does exist locally, Wget will first check its local
2030 time-stamp (similar to the way @code{ls -l} checks it), and then send a
2031 @code{HEAD} request to the remote server, demanding the information on
2034 The @code{Last-Modified} header is examined to find which file was
2035 modified more recently (which makes it ``newer''). If the remote file
2036 is newer, it will be downloaded; if it is older, Wget will give
2037 up.@footnote{As an additional check, Wget will look at the
2038 @code{Content-Length} header, and compare the sizes; if they are not the
2039 same, the remote file will be downloaded no matter what the time-stamp
2042 When @samp{--backup-converted} (@samp{-K}) is specified in conjunction
2043 with @samp{-N}, server file @samp{@var{X}} is compared to local file
2044 @samp{@var{X}.orig}, if extant, rather than being compared to local file
2045 @samp{@var{X}}, which will always differ if it's been converted by
2046 @samp{--convert-links} (@samp{-k}).
2048 Arguably, @sc{http} time-stamping should be implemented using the
2049 @code{If-Modified-Since} request.
2051 @node FTP Time-Stamping Internals
2052 @section FTP Time-Stamping Internals
2053 @cindex ftp time-stamping
2055 In theory, @sc{ftp} time-stamping works much the same as @sc{http}, only
2056 @sc{ftp} has no headers---time-stamps must be ferreted out of directory
2059 If an @sc{ftp} download is recursive or uses globbing, Wget will use the
2060 @sc{ftp} @code{LIST} command to get a file listing for the directory
2061 containing the desired file(s). It will try to analyze the listing,
2062 treating it like Unix @code{ls -l} output, extracting the time-stamps.
2063 The rest is exactly the same as for @sc{http}. Note that when
2064 retrieving individual files from an @sc{ftp} server without using
2065 globbing or recursion, listing files will not be downloaded (and thus
2066 files will not be time-stamped) unless @samp{-N} is specified.
2068 Assumption that every directory listing is a Unix-style listing may
2069 sound extremely constraining, but in practice it is not, as many
2070 non-Unix @sc{ftp} servers use the Unixoid listing format because most
2071 (all?) of the clients understand it. Bear in mind that @sc{rfc959}
2072 defines no standard way to get a file list, let alone the time-stamps.
2073 We can only hope that a future standard will define this.
2075 Another non-standard solution includes the use of @code{MDTM} command
2076 that is supported by some @sc{ftp} servers (including the popular
2077 @code{wu-ftpd}), which returns the exact time of the specified file.
2078 Wget may support this command in the future.
2081 @chapter Startup File
2082 @cindex startup file
2088 Once you know how to change default settings of Wget through command
2089 line arguments, you may wish to make some of those settings permanent.
2090 You can do that in a convenient way by creating the Wget startup
2091 file---@file{.wgetrc}.
2093 Besides @file{.wgetrc} is the ``main'' initialization file, it is
2094 convenient to have a special facility for storing passwords. Thus Wget
2095 reads and interprets the contents of @file{$HOME/.netrc}, if it finds
2096 it. You can find @file{.netrc} format in your system manuals.
2098 Wget reads @file{.wgetrc} upon startup, recognizing a limited set of
2102 * Wgetrc Location:: Location of various wgetrc files.
2103 * Wgetrc Syntax:: Syntax of wgetrc.
2104 * Wgetrc Commands:: List of available commands.
2105 * Sample Wgetrc:: A wgetrc example.
2108 @node Wgetrc Location
2109 @section Wgetrc Location
2110 @cindex wgetrc location
2111 @cindex location of wgetrc
2113 When initializing, Wget will look for a @dfn{global} startup file,
2114 @file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default (or some prefix other than
2115 @file{/usr/local}, if Wget was not installed there) and read commands
2116 from there, if it exists.
2118 Then it will look for the user's file. If the environmental variable
2119 @code{WGETRC} is set, Wget will try to load that file. Failing that, no
2120 further attempts will be made.
2122 If @code{WGETRC} is not set, Wget will try to load @file{$HOME/.wgetrc}.
2124 The fact that user's settings are loaded after the system-wide ones
2125 means that in case of collision user's wgetrc @emph{overrides} the
2126 system-wide wgetrc (in @file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default).
2127 Fascist admins, away!
2130 @section Wgetrc Syntax
2131 @cindex wgetrc syntax
2132 @cindex syntax of wgetrc
2134 The syntax of a wgetrc command is simple:
2140 The @dfn{variable} will also be called @dfn{command}. Valid
2141 @dfn{values} are different for different commands.
2143 The commands are case-insensitive and underscore-insensitive. Thus
2144 @samp{DIr__PrefiX} is the same as @samp{dirprefix}. Empty lines, lines
2145 beginning with @samp{#} and lines containing white-space only are
2148 Commands that expect a comma-separated list will clear the list on an
2149 empty command. So, if you wish to reset the rejection list specified in
2150 global @file{wgetrc}, you can do it with:
2156 @node Wgetrc Commands
2157 @section Wgetrc Commands
2158 @cindex wgetrc commands
2160 The complete set of commands is listed below. Legal values are listed
2161 after the @samp{=}. Simple Boolean values can be set or unset using
2162 @samp{on} and @samp{off} or @samp{1} and @samp{0}. A fancier kind of
2163 Boolean allowed in some cases is the @dfn{lockable Boolean}, which may
2164 be set to @samp{on}, @samp{off}, @samp{always}, or @samp{never}. If an
2165 option is set to @samp{always} or @samp{never}, that value will be
2166 locked in for the duration of the Wget invocation---command-line options
2169 Some commands take pseudo-arbitrary values. @var{address} values can be
2170 hostnames or dotted-quad IP addresses. @var{n} can be any positive
2171 integer, or @samp{inf} for infinity, where appropriate. @var{string}
2172 values can be any non-empty string.
2174 Most of these commands have command-line equivalents (@pxref{Invoking}),
2175 though some of the more obscure or rarely used ones do not.
2178 @item accept/reject = @var{string}
2179 Same as @samp{-A}/@samp{-R} (@pxref{Types of Files}).
2181 @item add_hostdir = on/off
2182 Enable/disable host-prefixed file names. @samp{-nH} disables it.
2184 @item continue = on/off
2185 If set to on, force continuation of preexistent partially retrieved
2186 files. See @samp{-c} before setting it.
2188 @item background = on/off
2189 Enable/disable going to background---the same as @samp{-b} (which
2192 @item backup_converted = on/off
2193 Enable/disable saving pre-converted files with the suffix
2194 @samp{.orig}---the same as @samp{-K} (which enables it).
2196 @c @item backups = @var{number}
2197 @c #### Document me!
2199 @item base = @var{string}
2200 Consider relative @sc{url}s in @sc{url} input files forced to be
2201 interpreted as @sc{html} as being relative to @var{string}---the same as
2204 @item bind_address = @var{address}
2205 Bind to @var{address}, like the @samp{--bind-address} option.
2207 @item cache = on/off
2208 When set to off, disallow server-caching. See the @samp{--no-cache}
2211 @item convert_links = on/off
2212 Convert non-relative links locally. The same as @samp{-k}.
2214 @item cookies = on/off
2215 When set to off, disallow cookies. See the @samp{--cookies} option.
2217 @item load_cookies = @var{file}
2218 Load cookies from @var{file}. See @samp{--load-cookies}.
2220 @item save_cookies = @var{file}
2221 Save cookies to @var{file}. See @samp{--save-cookies}.
2223 @item connect_timeout = @var{n}
2224 Set the connect timeout---the same as @samp{--connect-timeout}.
2226 @item cut_dirs = @var{n}
2227 Ignore @var{n} remote directory components.
2229 @item debug = on/off
2230 Debug mode, same as @samp{-d}.
2232 @item delete_after = on/off
2233 Delete after download---the same as @samp{--delete-after}.
2235 @item dir_prefix = @var{string}
2236 Top of directory tree---the same as @samp{-P}.
2238 @item dirstruct = on/off
2239 Turning dirstruct on or off---the same as @samp{-x} or @samp{-nd},
2242 @item dns_cache = on/off
2243 Turn DNS caching on/off. Since DNS caching is on by default, this
2244 option is normally used to turn it off. Same as @samp{--dns-cache}.
2246 @item dns_timeout = @var{n}
2247 Set the DNS timeout---the same as @samp{--dns-timeout}.
2249 @item domains = @var{string}
2250 Same as @samp{-D} (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
2252 @item dot_bytes = @var{n}
2253 Specify the number of bytes ``contained'' in a dot, as seen throughout
2254 the retrieval (1024 by default). You can postfix the value with
2255 @samp{k} or @samp{m}, representing kilobytes and megabytes,
2256 respectively. With dot settings you can tailor the dot retrieval to
2257 suit your needs, or you can use the predefined @dfn{styles}
2258 (@pxref{Download Options}).
2260 @item dots_in_line = @var{n}
2261 Specify the number of dots that will be printed in each line throughout
2262 the retrieval (50 by default).
2264 @item dot_spacing = @var{n}
2265 Specify the number of dots in a single cluster (10 by default).
2267 @item exclude_directories = @var{string}
2268 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to exclude from
2269 download---the same as @samp{-X} (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}).
2271 @item exclude_domains = @var{string}
2272 Same as @samp{--exclude-domains} (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
2274 @item follow_ftp = on/off
2275 Follow @sc{ftp} links from @sc{html} documents---the same as
2276 @samp{--follow-ftp}.
2278 @item follow_tags = @var{string}
2279 Only follow certain @sc{html} tags when doing a recursive retrieval, just like
2280 @samp{--follow-tags}.
2282 @item force_html = on/off
2283 If set to on, force the input filename to be regarded as an @sc{html}
2284 document---the same as @samp{-F}.
2286 @item ftp_proxy = @var{string}
2287 Use @var{string} as @sc{ftp} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2291 Turn globbing on/off---the same as @samp{--glob} and @samp{--no-glob}.
2293 @item header = @var{string}
2294 Define an additional header, like @samp{--header}.
2296 @item html_extension = on/off
2297 Add a @samp{.html} extension to @samp{text/html} or
2298 @samp{application/xhtml+xml} files without it, like
2301 @item http_passwd = @var{string}
2302 Set @sc{http} password.
2304 @item http_proxy = @var{string}
2305 Use @var{string} as @sc{http} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2308 @item http_user = @var{string}
2309 Set @sc{http} user to @var{string}.
2311 @item ignore_length = on/off
2312 When set to on, ignore @code{Content-Length} header; the same as
2313 @samp{--ignore-length}.
2315 @item ignore_tags = @var{string}
2316 Ignore certain @sc{html} tags when doing a recursive retrieval, just like
2317 @samp{--ignore-tags}.
2319 @item include_directories = @var{string}
2320 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to follow when
2321 downloading---the same as @samp{-I}.
2323 @item input = @var{string}
2324 Read the @sc{url}s from @var{string}, like @samp{-i}.
2326 @item kill_longer = on/off
2327 Consider data longer than specified in content-length header as invalid
2328 (and retry getting it). The default behavior is to save as much data
2329 as there is, provided there is more than or equal to the value in
2330 @code{Content-Length}.
2332 @item limit_rate = @var{rate}
2333 Limit the download speed to no more than @var{rate} bytes per second.
2334 The same as @samp{--limit-rate}.
2336 @item logfile = @var{string}
2337 Set logfile---the same as @samp{-o}.
2339 @item login = @var{string}
2340 Your user name on the remote machine, for @sc{ftp}. Defaults to
2343 @item mirror = on/off
2344 Turn mirroring on/off. The same as @samp{-m}.
2346 @item netrc = on/off
2347 Turn reading netrc on or off.
2349 @item noclobber = on/off
2352 @item no_parent = on/off
2353 Disallow retrieving outside the directory hierarchy, like
2354 @samp{--no-parent} (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}).
2356 @item no_proxy = @var{string}
2357 Use @var{string} as the comma-separated list of domains to avoid in
2358 proxy loading, instead of the one specified in environment.
2360 @item output_document = @var{string}
2361 Set the output filename---the same as @samp{-O}.
2363 @item page_requisites = on/off
2364 Download all ancillary documents necessary for a single @sc{html} page to
2365 display properly---the same as @samp{-p}.
2367 @item passive_ftp = on/off/always/never
2368 Set passive @sc{ftp}---the same as @samp{--passive-ftp}. Some scripts
2369 and @samp{.pm} (Perl module) files download files using @samp{wget
2370 --passive-ftp}. If your firewall does not allow this, you can set
2371 @samp{passive_ftp = never} to override the command-line.
2373 @item passwd = @var{string}
2374 Set your @sc{ftp} password to @var{password}. Without this setting, the
2375 password defaults to @samp{username@@hostname.domainname}.
2377 @item post_data = @var{string}
2378 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send @var{string} in
2379 the request body. The same as @samp{--post-data}.
2381 @item post_file = @var{file}
2382 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send the contents of
2383 @var{file} in the request body. The same as @samp{--post-file}.
2385 @item progress = @var{string}
2386 Set the type of the progress indicator. Legal types are ``dot'' and
2389 @item protocol_directories = on/off
2390 When set, use the protocol name as a directory component of local file
2391 names. The same as @samp{--protocol-directories}.
2393 @item proxy_user = @var{string}
2394 Set proxy authentication user name to @var{string}, like @samp{--proxy-user}.
2396 @item proxy_passwd = @var{string}
2397 Set proxy authentication password to @var{string}, like @samp{--proxy-passwd}.
2399 @item referer = @var{string}
2400 Set HTTP @samp{Referer:} header just like @samp{--referer}. (Note it
2401 was the folks who wrote the @sc{http} spec who got the spelling of
2402 ``referrer'' wrong.)
2404 @item quiet = on/off
2405 Quiet mode---the same as @samp{-q}.
2407 @item quota = @var{quota}
2408 Specify the download quota, which is useful to put in the global
2409 @file{wgetrc}. When download quota is specified, Wget will stop
2410 retrieving after the download sum has become greater than quota. The
2411 quota can be specified in bytes (default), kbytes @samp{k} appended) or
2412 mbytes (@samp{m} appended). Thus @samp{quota = 5m} will set the quota
2413 to 5 mbytes. Note that the user's startup file overrides system
2416 @item read_timeout = @var{n}
2417 Set the read (and write) timeout---the same as @samp{--read-timeout}.
2419 @item reclevel = @var{n}
2420 Recursion level---the same as @samp{-l}.
2422 @item recursive = on/off
2423 Recursive on/off---the same as @samp{-r}.
2425 @item relative_only = on/off
2426 Follow only relative links---the same as @samp{-L} (@pxref{Relative
2429 @item remove_listing = on/off
2430 If set to on, remove @sc{ftp} listings downloaded by Wget. Setting it
2431 to off is the same as @samp{--no-remove-listing}.
2433 @item restrict_file_names = unix/windows
2434 Restrict the file names generated by Wget from URLs. See
2435 @samp{--restrict-file-names} for a more detailed description.
2437 @item retr_symlinks = on/off
2438 When set to on, retrieve symbolic links as if they were plain files; the
2439 same as @samp{--retr-symlinks}.
2441 @item robots = on/off
2442 Specify whether the norobots convention is respected by Wget, ``on'' by
2443 default. This switch controls both the @file{/robots.txt} and the
2444 @samp{nofollow} aspect of the spec. @xref{Robot Exclusion}, for more
2445 details about this. Be sure you know what you are doing before turning
2448 @item server_response = on/off
2449 Choose whether or not to print the @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} server
2450 responses---the same as @samp{-S}.
2452 @item span_hosts = on/off
2455 @item strict_comments = on/off
2456 Same as @samp{--strict-comments}.
2458 @item timeout = @var{n}
2459 Set timeout value---the same as @samp{-T}.
2461 @item timestamping = on/off
2462 Turn timestamping on/off. The same as @samp{-N} (@pxref{Time-Stamping}).
2464 @item tries = @var{n}
2465 Set number of retries per @sc{url}---the same as @samp{-t}.
2467 @item use_proxy = on/off
2468 Turn proxy support on/off. The same as @samp{-Y}.
2470 @item verbose = on/off
2471 Turn verbose on/off---the same as @samp{-v}/@samp{-nv}.
2473 @item wait = @var{n}
2474 Wait @var{n} seconds between retrievals---the same as @samp{-w}.
2476 @item waitretry = @var{n}
2477 Wait up to @var{n} seconds between retries of failed retrievals
2478 only---the same as @samp{--waitretry}. Note that this is turned on by
2479 default in the global @file{wgetrc}.
2481 @item randomwait = on/off
2482 Turn random between-request wait times on or off. The same as
2483 @samp{--random-wait}.
2487 @section Sample Wgetrc
2488 @cindex sample wgetrc
2490 This is the sample initialization file, as given in the distribution.
2491 It is divided in two section---one for global usage (suitable for global
2492 startup file), and one for local usage (suitable for
2493 @file{$HOME/.wgetrc}). Be careful about the things you change.
2495 Note that almost all the lines are commented out. For a command to have
2496 any effect, you must remove the @samp{#} character at the beginning of
2500 @include sample.wgetrc.munged_for_texi_inclusion
2507 @c man begin EXAMPLES
2508 The examples are divided into three sections loosely based on their
2512 * Simple Usage:: Simple, basic usage of the program.
2513 * Advanced Usage:: Advanced tips.
2514 * Very Advanced Usage:: The hairy stuff.
2518 @section Simple Usage
2522 Say you want to download a @sc{url}. Just type:
2525 wget http://fly.srk.fer.hr/
2529 But what will happen if the connection is slow, and the file is lengthy?
2530 The connection will probably fail before the whole file is retrieved,
2531 more than once. In this case, Wget will try getting the file until it
2532 either gets the whole of it, or exceeds the default number of retries
2533 (this being 20). It is easy to change the number of tries to 45, to
2534 insure that the whole file will arrive safely:
2537 wget --tries=45 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/jpg/flyweb.jpg
2541 Now let's leave Wget to work in the background, and write its progress
2542 to log file @file{log}. It is tiring to type @samp{--tries}, so we
2543 shall use @samp{-t}.
2546 wget -t 45 -o log http://fly.srk.fer.hr/jpg/flyweb.jpg &
2549 The ampersand at the end of the line makes sure that Wget works in the
2550 background. To unlimit the number of retries, use @samp{-t inf}.
2553 The usage of @sc{ftp} is as simple. Wget will take care of login and
2557 wget ftp://gnjilux.srk.fer.hr/welcome.msg
2561 If you specify a directory, Wget will retrieve the directory listing,
2562 parse it and convert it to @sc{html}. Try:
2565 wget ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/
2570 @node Advanced Usage
2571 @section Advanced Usage
2575 You have a file that contains the URLs you want to download? Use the
2582 If you specify @samp{-} as file name, the @sc{url}s will be read from
2586 Create a five levels deep mirror image of the GNU web site, with the
2587 same directory structure the original has, with only one try per
2588 document, saving the log of the activities to @file{gnulog}:
2591 wget -r http://www.gnu.org/ -o gnulog
2595 The same as the above, but convert the links in the @sc{html} files to
2596 point to local files, so you can view the documents off-line:
2599 wget --convert-links -r http://www.gnu.org/ -o gnulog
2603 Retrieve only one @sc{html} page, but make sure that all the elements needed
2604 for the page to be displayed, such as inline images and external style
2605 sheets, are also downloaded. Also make sure the downloaded page
2606 references the downloaded links.
2609 wget -p --convert-links http://www.server.com/dir/page.html
2612 The @sc{html} page will be saved to @file{www.server.com/dir/page.html}, and
2613 the images, stylesheets, etc., somewhere under @file{www.server.com/},
2614 depending on where they were on the remote server.
2617 The same as the above, but without the @file{www.server.com/} directory.
2618 In fact, I don't want to have all those random server directories
2619 anyway---just save @emph{all} those files under a @file{download/}
2620 subdirectory of the current directory.
2623 wget -p --convert-links -nH -nd -Pdownload \
2624 http://www.server.com/dir/page.html
2628 Retrieve the index.html of @samp{www.lycos.com}, showing the original
2632 wget -S http://www.lycos.com/
2636 Save the server headers with the file, perhaps for post-processing.
2639 wget -s http://www.lycos.com/
2644 Retrieve the first two levels of @samp{wuarchive.wustl.edu}, saving them
2648 wget -r -l2 -P/tmp ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/
2652 You want to download all the @sc{gif}s from a directory on an @sc{http}
2653 server. You tried @samp{wget http://www.server.com/dir/*.gif}, but that
2654 didn't work because @sc{http} retrieval does not support globbing. In
2658 wget -r -l1 --no-parent -A.gif http://www.server.com/dir/
2661 More verbose, but the effect is the same. @samp{-r -l1} means to
2662 retrieve recursively (@pxref{Recursive Download}), with maximum depth
2663 of 1. @samp{--no-parent} means that references to the parent directory
2664 are ignored (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}), and @samp{-A.gif} means to
2665 download only the @sc{gif} files. @samp{-A "*.gif"} would have worked
2669 Suppose you were in the middle of downloading, when Wget was
2670 interrupted. Now you do not want to clobber the files already present.
2674 wget -nc -r http://www.gnu.org/
2678 If you want to encode your own username and password to @sc{http} or
2679 @sc{ftp}, use the appropriate @sc{url} syntax (@pxref{URL Format}).
2682 wget ftp://hniksic:mypassword@@unix.server.com/.emacs
2685 Note, however, that this usage is not advisable on multi-user systems
2686 because it reveals your password to anyone who looks at the output of
2689 @cindex redirecting output
2691 You would like the output documents to go to standard output instead of
2695 wget -O - http://jagor.srce.hr/ http://www.srce.hr/
2698 You can also combine the two options and make pipelines to retrieve the
2699 documents from remote hotlists:
2702 wget -O - http://cool.list.com/ | wget --force-html -i -
2706 @node Very Advanced Usage
2707 @section Very Advanced Usage
2712 If you wish Wget to keep a mirror of a page (or @sc{ftp}
2713 subdirectories), use @samp{--mirror} (@samp{-m}), which is the shorthand
2714 for @samp{-r -l inf -N}. You can put Wget in the crontab file asking it
2715 to recheck a site each Sunday:
2719 0 0 * * 0 wget --mirror http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2723 In addition to the above, you want the links to be converted for local
2724 viewing. But, after having read this manual, you know that link
2725 conversion doesn't play well with timestamping, so you also want Wget to
2726 back up the original @sc{html} files before the conversion. Wget invocation
2727 would look like this:
2730 wget --mirror --convert-links --backup-converted \
2731 http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2735 But you've also noticed that local viewing doesn't work all that well
2736 when @sc{html} files are saved under extensions other than @samp{.html},
2737 perhaps because they were served as @file{index.cgi}. So you'd like
2738 Wget to rename all the files served with content-type @samp{text/html}
2739 or @samp{application/xhtml+xml} to @file{@var{name}.html}.
2742 wget --mirror --convert-links --backup-converted \
2743 --html-extension -o /home/me/weeklog \
2747 Or, with less typing:
2750 wget -m -k -K -E http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2759 This chapter contains all the stuff that could not fit anywhere else.
2762 * Proxies:: Support for proxy servers
2763 * Distribution:: Getting the latest version.
2764 * Mailing List:: Wget mailing list for announcements and discussion.
2765 * Reporting Bugs:: How and where to report bugs.
2766 * Portability:: The systems Wget works on.
2767 * Signals:: Signal-handling performed by Wget.
2774 @dfn{Proxies} are special-purpose @sc{http} servers designed to transfer
2775 data from remote servers to local clients. One typical use of proxies
2776 is lightening network load for users behind a slow connection. This is
2777 achieved by channeling all @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} requests through the
2778 proxy which caches the transferred data. When a cached resource is
2779 requested again, proxy will return the data from cache. Another use for
2780 proxies is for companies that separate (for security reasons) their
2781 internal networks from the rest of Internet. In order to obtain
2782 information from the Web, their users connect and retrieve remote data
2783 using an authorized proxy.
2785 Wget supports proxies for both @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} retrievals. The
2786 standard way to specify proxy location, which Wget recognizes, is using
2787 the following environment variables:
2791 This variable should contain the @sc{url} of the proxy for @sc{http}
2795 This variable should contain the @sc{url} of the proxy for @sc{ftp}
2796 connections. It is quite common that @sc{http_proxy} and @sc{ftp_proxy}
2797 are set to the same @sc{url}.
2800 This variable should contain a comma-separated list of domain extensions
2801 proxy should @emph{not} be used for. For instance, if the value of
2802 @code{no_proxy} is @samp{.mit.edu}, proxy will not be used to retrieve
2806 In addition to the environment variables, proxy location and settings
2807 may be specified from within Wget itself.
2811 @itemx --proxy=on/off
2812 @itemx proxy = on/off
2813 This option may be used to turn the proxy support on or off. Proxy
2814 support is on by default, provided that the appropriate environment
2817 @item http_proxy = @var{URL}
2818 @itemx ftp_proxy = @var{URL}
2819 @itemx no_proxy = @var{string}
2820 These startup file variables allow you to override the proxy settings
2821 specified by the environment.
2824 Some proxy servers require authorization to enable you to use them. The
2825 authorization consists of @dfn{username} and @dfn{password}, which must
2826 be sent by Wget. As with @sc{http} authorization, several
2827 authentication schemes exist. For proxy authorization only the
2828 @code{Basic} authentication scheme is currently implemented.
2830 You may specify your username and password either through the proxy
2831 @sc{url} or through the command-line options. Assuming that the
2832 company's proxy is located at @samp{proxy.company.com} at port 8001, a
2833 proxy @sc{url} location containing authorization data might look like
2837 http://hniksic:mypassword@@proxy.company.com:8001/
2840 Alternatively, you may use the @samp{proxy-user} and
2841 @samp{proxy-password} options, and the equivalent @file{.wgetrc}
2842 settings @code{proxy_user} and @code{proxy_passwd} to set the proxy
2843 username and password.
2846 @section Distribution
2847 @cindex latest version
2849 Like all GNU utilities, the latest version of Wget can be found at the
2850 master GNU archive site ftp.gnu.org, and its mirrors. For example,
2851 Wget @value{VERSION} can be found at
2852 @url{ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/wget/wget-@value{VERSION}.tar.gz}
2855 @section Mailing List
2856 @cindex mailing list
2859 Wget has its own mailing list at @email{wget@@sunsite.dk}, thanks
2860 to Karsten Thygesen. The mailing list is for discussion of Wget
2861 features and web, reporting Wget bugs (those that you think may be of
2862 interest to the public) and mailing announcements. You are welcome to
2863 subscribe. The more people on the list, the better!
2865 To subscribe, simply send mail to @email{wget-subscribe@@sunsite.dk}.
2866 Unsubscribe by mailing to @email{wget-unsubscribe@@sunsite.dk}.
2868 The mailing list is archived at @url{http://fly.srk.fer.hr/archive/wget}.
2869 Alternative archive is available at
2870 @url{http://www.mail-archive.com/wget%40sunsite.auc.dk/}.
2872 @node Reporting Bugs
2873 @section Reporting Bugs
2875 @cindex reporting bugs
2879 You are welcome to send bug reports about GNU Wget to
2880 @email{bug-wget@@gnu.org}.
2882 Before actually submitting a bug report, please try to follow a few
2887 Please try to ascertain that the behavior you see really is a bug. If
2888 Wget crashes, it's a bug. If Wget does not behave as documented,
2889 it's a bug. If things work strange, but you are not sure about the way
2890 they are supposed to work, it might well be a bug.
2893 Try to repeat the bug in as simple circumstances as possible. E.g. if
2894 Wget crashes while downloading @samp{wget -rl0 -kKE -t5 -Y0
2895 http://yoyodyne.com -o /tmp/log}, you should try to see if the crash is
2896 repeatable, and if will occur with a simpler set of options. You might
2897 even try to start the download at the page where the crash occurred to
2898 see if that page somehow triggered the crash.
2900 Also, while I will probably be interested to know the contents of your
2901 @file{.wgetrc} file, just dumping it into the debug message is probably
2902 a bad idea. Instead, you should first try to see if the bug repeats
2903 with @file{.wgetrc} moved out of the way. Only if it turns out that
2904 @file{.wgetrc} settings affect the bug, mail me the relevant parts of
2908 Please start Wget with @samp{-d} option and send the log (or the
2909 relevant parts of it). If Wget was compiled without debug support,
2910 recompile it. It is @emph{much} easier to trace bugs with debug support
2914 If Wget has crashed, try to run it in a debugger, e.g. @code{gdb `which
2915 wget` core} and type @code{where} to get the backtrace.
2920 @section Portability
2922 @cindex operating systems
2924 Like all GNU software, Wget works on the GNU system. However, since it
2925 uses GNU Autoconf for building and configuring, and mostly avoids using
2926 ``special'' features of any particular Unix, it should compile (and
2927 work) on all common Unix flavors.
2929 Various Wget versions have been compiled and tested under many kinds of
2930 Unix systems, including Solaris, GNU/Linux, SunOS, OSF (aka Digital Unix
2931 or Tru64), Ultrix, *BSD, IRIX, AIX, and others; refer to the file
2932 @file{MACHINES} in the distribution directory for a comprehensive list.
2933 If you compile it on an architecture not listed there, please let me
2934 know so I can update it.
2936 Wget should also compile on the other Unix systems, not listed in
2937 @file{MACHINES}. If it doesn't, please let me know.
2939 Thanks to kind contributors, this version of Wget compiles and works on
2940 Microsoft Windows 95 and Windows NT platforms. It has been compiled
2941 successfully using MS Visual C++ 6.0, Watcom, and Borland C compilers,
2942 with Winsock as networking software. Naturally, it is crippled of some
2943 features available on Unix, but it should work as a substitute for
2944 people stuck with Windows. Note that the Windows port is
2945 @strong{neither tested nor maintained} by me---all questions and
2946 problems in Windows usage should be reported to Wget mailing list at
2947 @email{wget@@sunsite.dk} where the volunteers who maintain the
2948 Windows-related features might look at them.
2952 @cindex signal handling
2955 Since the purpose of Wget is background work, it catches the hangup
2956 signal (@code{SIGHUP}) and ignores it. If the output was on standard
2957 output, it will be redirected to a file named @file{wget-log}.
2958 Otherwise, @code{SIGHUP} is ignored. This is convenient when you wish
2959 to redirect the output of Wget after having started it.
2962 $ wget http://www.ifi.uio.no/~larsi/gnus.tar.gz &
2963 $ kill -HUP %% # Redirect the output to wget-log
2966 Other than that, Wget will not try to interfere with signals in any way.
2967 @kbd{C-c}, @code{kill -TERM} and @code{kill -KILL} should kill it alike.
2972 This chapter contains some references I consider useful.
2975 * Robot Exclusion:: Wget's support for RES.
2976 * Security Considerations:: Security with Wget.
2977 * Contributors:: People who helped.
2980 @node Robot Exclusion
2981 @section Robot Exclusion
2982 @cindex robot exclusion
2984 @cindex server maintenance
2986 It is extremely easy to make Wget wander aimlessly around a web site,
2987 sucking all the available data in progress. @samp{wget -r @var{site}},
2988 and you're set. Great? Not for the server admin.
2990 As long as Wget is only retrieving static pages, and doing it at a
2991 reasonable rate (see the @samp{--wait} option), there's not much of a
2992 problem. The trouble is that Wget can't tell the difference between the
2993 smallest static page and the most demanding CGI. A site I know has a
2994 section handled by a CGI Perl script that converts Info files to @sc{html} on
2995 the fly. The script is slow, but works well enough for human users
2996 viewing an occasional Info file. However, when someone's recursive Wget
2997 download stumbles upon the index page that links to all the Info files
2998 through the script, the system is brought to its knees without providing
2999 anything useful to the user (This task of converting Info files could be
3000 done locally and access to Info documentation for all installed GNU
3001 software on a system is available from the @code{info} command).
3003 To avoid this kind of accident, as well as to preserve privacy for
3004 documents that need to be protected from well-behaved robots, the
3005 concept of @dfn{robot exclusion} was invented. The idea is that
3006 the server administrators and document authors can specify which
3007 portions of the site they wish to protect from robots and those
3008 they will permit access.
3010 The most popular mechanism, and the @i{de facto} standard supported by
3011 all the major robots, is the ``Robots Exclusion Standard'' (RES) written
3012 by Martijn Koster et al. in 1994. It specifies the format of a text
3013 file containing directives that instruct the robots which URL paths to
3014 avoid. To be found by the robots, the specifications must be placed in
3015 @file{/robots.txt} in the server root, which the robots are expected to
3018 Although Wget is not a web robot in the strictest sense of the word, it
3019 can downloads large parts of the site without the user's intervention to
3020 download an individual page. Because of that, Wget honors RES when
3021 downloading recursively. For instance, when you issue:
3024 wget -r http://www.server.com/
3027 First the index of @samp{www.server.com} will be downloaded. If Wget
3028 finds that it wants to download more documents from that server, it will
3029 request @samp{http://www.server.com/robots.txt} and, if found, use it
3030 for further downloads. @file{robots.txt} is loaded only once per each
3033 Until version 1.8, Wget supported the first version of the standard,
3034 written by Martijn Koster in 1994 and available at
3035 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/norobots.html}. As of version 1.8,
3036 Wget has supported the additional directives specified in the internet
3037 draft @samp{<draft-koster-robots-00.txt>} titled ``A Method for Web
3038 Robots Control''. The draft, which has as far as I know never made to
3039 an @sc{rfc}, is available at
3040 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/norobots-rfc.txt}.
3042 This manual no longer includes the text of the Robot Exclusion Standard.
3044 The second, less known mechanism, enables the author of an individual
3045 document to specify whether they want the links from the file to be
3046 followed by a robot. This is achieved using the @code{META} tag, like
3050 <meta name="robots" content="nofollow">
3053 This is explained in some detail at
3054 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/meta-user.html}. Wget supports this
3055 method of robot exclusion in addition to the usual @file{/robots.txt}
3058 If you know what you are doing and really really wish to turn off the
3059 robot exclusion, set the @code{robots} variable to @samp{off} in your
3060 @file{.wgetrc}. You can achieve the same effect from the command line
3061 using the @code{-e} switch, e.g. @samp{wget -e robots=off @var{url}...}.
3063 @node Security Considerations
3064 @section Security Considerations
3067 When using Wget, you must be aware that it sends unencrypted passwords
3068 through the network, which may present a security problem. Here are the
3069 main issues, and some solutions.
3072 @item The passwords on the command line are visible using @code{ps}.
3073 The best way around it is to use @code{wget -i -} and feed the @sc{url}s
3074 to Wget's standard input, each on a separate line, terminated by
3075 @kbd{C-d}. Another workaround is to use @file{.netrc} to store
3076 passwords; however, storing unencrypted passwords is also considered a
3080 Using the insecure @dfn{basic} authentication scheme, unencrypted
3081 passwords are transmitted through the network routers and gateways.
3084 The @sc{ftp} passwords are also in no way encrypted. There is no good
3085 solution for this at the moment.
3088 Although the ``normal'' output of Wget tries to hide the passwords,
3089 debugging logs show them, in all forms. This problem is avoided by
3090 being careful when you send debug logs (yes, even when you send them to
3095 @section Contributors
3096 @cindex contributors
3099 GNU Wget was written by Hrvoje Nik@v{s}i@'{c} @email{hniksic@@xemacs.org}.
3102 GNU Wget was written by Hrvoje Niksic @email{hniksic@@xemacs.org}.
3104 However, its development could never have gone as far as it has, were it
3105 not for the help of many people, either with bug reports, feature
3106 proposals, patches, or letters saying ``Thanks!''.
3108 Special thanks goes to the following people (no particular order):
3112 Karsten Thygesen---donated system resources such as the mailing list,
3113 web space, and @sc{ftp} space, along with a lot of time to make these
3117 Shawn McHorse---bug reports and patches.
3120 Kaveh R. Ghazi---on-the-fly @code{ansi2knr}-ization. Lots of
3124 Gordon Matzigkeit---@file{.netrc} support.
3128 Zlatko @v{C}alu@v{s}i@'{c}, Tomislav Vujec and Dra@v{z}en
3129 Ka@v{c}ar---feature suggestions and ``philosophical'' discussions.
3132 Zlatko Calusic, Tomislav Vujec and Drazen Kacar---feature suggestions
3133 and ``philosophical'' discussions.
3137 Darko Budor---initial port to Windows.
3140 Antonio Rosella---help and suggestions, plus the Italian translation.
3144 Tomislav Petrovi@'{c}, Mario Miko@v{c}evi@'{c}---many bug reports and
3148 Tomislav Petrovic, Mario Mikocevic---many bug reports and suggestions.
3153 Fran@,{c}ois Pinard---many thorough bug reports and discussions.
3156 Francois Pinard---many thorough bug reports and discussions.
3160 Karl Eichwalder---lots of help with internationalization and other
3164 Junio Hamano---donated support for Opie and @sc{http} @code{Digest}
3168 The people who provided donations for development, including Brian
3172 The following people have provided patches, bug/build reports, useful
3173 suggestions, beta testing services, fan mail and all the other things
3174 that make maintenance so much fun:
3193 Kristijan @v{C}onka@v{s},
3212 Aleksandar Erkalovi@'{c},
3215 Aleksandar Erkalovic,
3232 Erik Magnus Hulthen,
3250 Goran Kezunovi@'{c},
3261 $\Sigma\acute{\iota}\mu o\varsigma\;
3262 \Xi\varepsilon\nu\iota\tau\acute{\epsilon}\lambda\lambda\eta\varsigma$
3263 (Simos KSenitellis),
3271 Nicol@'{a}s Lichtmeier,
3277 Alexander V. Lukyanov,
3305 @c Texinfo doesn't grok @'{@i}, so we have to use TeX itself.
3307 Juan Jos\'{e} Rodr\'{\i}gues,
3310 Juan Jose Rodrigues,
3323 Szakacsits Szabolcs,
3331 Douglas E. Wegscheid,
3341 Apologies to all who I accidentally left out, and many thanks to all the
3342 subscribers of the Wget mailing list.
3349 @cindex free software
3351 GNU Wget is licensed under the GNU General Public License (GNU GPL),
3352 which makes it @dfn{free software}. Please note that ``free'' in ``free
3353 software'' refers to liberty, not price. As some people like to point
3354 out, it's the ``free'' of ``free speech'', not the ``free'' of ``free
3357 The exact and legally binding distribution terms are spelled out below.
3358 The GPL guarantees that you have the right (freedom) to run and change
3359 GNU Wget and distribute it to others, and even---if you want---charge
3360 money for doing any of those things. With these rights comes the
3361 obligation to distribute the source code along with the software and to
3362 grant your recipients the same rights and impose the same restrictions.
3364 This licensing model is also known as @dfn{open source} because it,
3365 among other things, makes sure that all recipients will receive the
3366 source code along with the program, and be able to improve it. The GNU
3367 project prefers the term ``free software'' for reasons outlined at
3368 @url{http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html}.
3370 The exact license terms are defined by this paragraph and the GNU
3371 General Public License it refers to:
3374 GNU Wget is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
3375 under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the
3376 Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your
3377 option) any later version.
3379 GNU Wget is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
3380 ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or
3381 FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License
3384 A copy of the GNU General Public License is included as part of this
3385 manual; if you did not receive it, write to the Free Software
3386 Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
3389 In addition to this, this manual is free in the same sense:
3392 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
3393 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or
3394 any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with the
3395 Invariant Sections being ``GNU General Public License'' and ``GNU Free
3396 Documentation License'', with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no
3397 Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section
3398 entitled ``GNU Free Documentation License''.
3401 @c #### Maybe we should wrap these licenses in ifinfo? Stallman says
3402 @c that the GFDL needs to be present in the manual, and to me it would
3403 @c suck to include the license for the manual and not the license for
3406 The full texts of the GNU General Public License and of the GNU Free
3407 Documentation License are available below.
3410 * GNU General Public License::
3411 * GNU Free Documentation License::
3414 @node GNU General Public License
3415 @section GNU General Public License
3416 @center Version 2, June 1991
3419 Copyright @copyright{} 1989, 1991 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3420 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
3422 Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
3423 of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
3426 @unnumberedsec Preamble
3428 The licenses for most software are designed to take away your
3429 freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public
3430 License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free
3431 software---to make sure the software is free for all its users. This
3432 General Public License applies to most of the Free Software
3433 Foundation's software and to any other program whose authors commit to
3434 using it. (Some other Free Software Foundation software is covered by
3435 the GNU Library General Public License instead.) You can apply it to
3438 When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not
3439 price. Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you
3440 have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for
3441 this service if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it
3442 if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it
3443 in new free programs; and that you know you can do these things.
3445 To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid
3446 anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights.
3447 These restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you
3448 distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it.
3450 For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether
3451 gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that
3452 you have. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the
3453 source code. And you must show them these terms so they know their
3456 We protect your rights with two steps: (1) copyright the software, and
3457 (2) offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy,
3458 distribute and/or modify the software.
3460 Also, for each author's protection and ours, we want to make certain
3461 that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free
3462 software. If the software is modified by someone else and passed on, we
3463 want its recipients to know that what they have is not the original, so
3464 that any problems introduced by others will not reflect on the original
3465 authors' reputations.
3467 Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software
3468 patents. We wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free
3469 program will individually obtain patent licenses, in effect making the
3470 program proprietary. To prevent this, we have made it clear that any
3471 patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all.
3473 The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and
3474 modification follow.
3477 @unnumberedsec TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
3480 @center TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
3485 This License applies to any program or other work which contains
3486 a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed
3487 under the terms of this General Public License. The ``Program'', below,
3488 refers to any such program or work, and a ``work based on the Program''
3489 means either the Program or any derivative work under copyright law:
3490 that is to say, a work containing the Program or a portion of it,
3491 either verbatim or with modifications and/or translated into another
3492 language. (Hereinafter, translation is included without limitation in
3493 the term ``modification''.) Each licensee is addressed as ``you''.
3495 Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not
3496 covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of
3497 running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program
3498 is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the
3499 Program (independent of having been made by running the Program).
3500 Whether that is true depends on what the Program does.
3503 You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program's
3504 source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you
3505 conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate
3506 copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the
3507 notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty;
3508 and give any other recipients of the Program a copy of this License
3509 along with the Program.
3511 You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and
3512 you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.
3515 You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion
3516 of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and
3517 distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1
3518 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
3522 You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices
3523 stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
3526 You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
3527 whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
3528 part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
3529 parties under the terms of this License.
3532 If the modified program normally reads commands interactively
3533 when run, you must cause it, when started running for such
3534 interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an
3535 announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a
3536 notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide
3537 a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under
3538 these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this
3539 License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but
3540 does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on
3541 the Program is not required to print an announcement.)
3544 These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If
3545 identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program,
3546 and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in
3547 themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those
3548 sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you
3549 distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based
3550 on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of
3551 this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the
3552 entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.
3554 Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest
3555 your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to
3556 exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or
3557 collective works based on the Program.
3559 In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program
3560 with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of
3561 a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under
3562 the scope of this License.
3565 You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it,
3566 under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of
3567 Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:
3571 Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable
3572 source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections
3573 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
3576 Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three
3577 years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your
3578 cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete
3579 machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be
3580 distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium
3581 customarily used for software interchange; or,
3584 Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer
3585 to distribute corresponding source code. (This alternative is
3586 allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you
3587 received the program in object code or executable form with such
3588 an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)
3591 The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for
3592 making modifications to it. For an executable work, complete source
3593 code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any
3594 associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to
3595 control compilation and installation of the executable. However, as a
3596 special exception, the source code distributed need not include
3597 anything that is normally distributed (in either source or binary
3598 form) with the major components (compiler, kernel, and so on) of the
3599 operating system on which the executable runs, unless that component
3600 itself accompanies the executable.
3602 If distribution of executable or object code is made by offering
3603 access to copy from a designated place, then offering equivalent
3604 access to copy the source code from the same place counts as
3605 distribution of the source code, even though third parties are not
3606 compelled to copy the source along with the object code.
3609 You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program
3610 except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt
3611 otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is
3612 void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License.
3613 However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under
3614 this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such
3615 parties remain in full compliance.
3618 You are not required to accept this License, since you have not
3619 signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or
3620 distribute the Program or its derivative works. These actions are
3621 prohibited by law if you do not accept this License. Therefore, by
3622 modifying or distributing the Program (or any work based on the
3623 Program), you indicate your acceptance of this License to do so, and
3624 all its terms and conditions for copying, distributing or modifying
3625 the Program or works based on it.
3628 Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the
3629 Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the
3630 original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to
3631 these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further
3632 restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
3633 You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to
3637 If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent
3638 infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues),
3639 conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or
3640 otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not
3641 excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot
3642 distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this
3643 License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you
3644 may not distribute the Program at all. For example, if a patent
3645 license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Program by
3646 all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then
3647 the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to
3648 refrain entirely from distribution of the Program.
3650 If any portion of this section is held invalid or unenforceable under
3651 any particular circumstance, the balance of the section is intended to
3652 apply and the section as a whole is intended to apply in other
3655 It is not the purpose of this section to induce you to infringe any
3656 patents or other property right claims or to contest validity of any
3657 such claims; this section has the sole purpose of protecting the
3658 integrity of the free software distribution system, which is
3659 implemented by public license practices. Many people have made
3660 generous contributions to the wide range of software distributed
3661 through that system in reliance on consistent application of that
3662 system; it is up to the author/donor to decide if he or she is willing
3663 to distribute software through any other system and a licensee cannot
3666 This section is intended to make thoroughly clear what is believed to
3667 be a consequence of the rest of this License.
3670 If the distribution and/or use of the Program is restricted in
3671 certain countries either by patents or by copyrighted interfaces, the
3672 original copyright holder who places the Program under this License
3673 may add an explicit geographical distribution limitation excluding
3674 those countries, so that distribution is permitted only in or among
3675 countries not thus excluded. In such case, this License incorporates
3676 the limitation as if written in the body of this License.
3679 The Free Software Foundation may publish revised and/or new versions
3680 of the General Public License from time to time. Such new versions will
3681 be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to
3682 address new problems or concerns.
3684 Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program
3685 specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and ``any
3686 later version'', you have the option of following the terms and conditions
3687 either of that version or of any later version published by the Free
3688 Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of
3689 this License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software
3693 If you wish to incorporate parts of the Program into other free
3694 programs whose distribution conditions are different, write to the author
3695 to ask for permission. For software which is copyrighted by the Free
3696 Software Foundation, write to the Free Software Foundation; we sometimes
3697 make exceptions for this. Our decision will be guided by the two goals
3698 of preserving the free status of all derivatives of our free software and
3699 of promoting the sharing and reuse of software generally.
3702 @heading NO WARRANTY
3710 BECAUSE THE PROGRAM IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY
3711 FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. EXCEPT WHEN
3712 OTHERWISE STATED IN WRITING THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND/OR OTHER PARTIES
3713 PROVIDE THE PROGRAM ``AS IS'' WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED
3714 OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
3715 MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS
3716 TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM IS WITH YOU. SHOULD THE
3717 PROGRAM PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING,
3718 REPAIR OR CORRECTION.
3721 IN NO EVENT UNLESS REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW OR AGREED TO IN WRITING
3722 WILL ANY COPYRIGHT HOLDER, OR ANY OTHER PARTY WHO MAY MODIFY AND/OR
3723 REDISTRIBUTE THE PROGRAM AS PERMITTED ABOVE, BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR DAMAGES,
3724 INCLUDING ANY GENERAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING
3725 OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THE PROGRAM (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED
3726 TO LOSS OF DATA OR DATA BEING RENDERED INACCURATE OR LOSSES SUSTAINED BY
3727 YOU OR THIRD PARTIES OR A FAILURE OF THE PROGRAM TO OPERATE WITH ANY OTHER
3728 PROGRAMS), EVEN IF SUCH HOLDER OR OTHER PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE
3729 POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
3733 @heading END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
3736 @center END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
3740 @unnumberedsec How to Apply These Terms to Your New Programs
3742 If you develop a new program, and you want it to be of the greatest
3743 possible use to the public, the best way to achieve this is to make it
3744 free software which everyone can redistribute and change under these terms.
3746 To do so, attach the following notices to the program. It is safest
3747 to attach them to the start of each source file to most effectively
3748 convey the exclusion of warranty; and each file should have at least
3749 the ``copyright'' line and a pointer to where the full notice is found.
3752 @var{one line to give the program's name and an idea of what it does.}
3753 Copyright (C) 19@var{yy} @var{name of author}
3755 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
3756 modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License
3757 as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2
3758 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
3760 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
3761 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
3762 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
3763 GNU General Public License for more details.
3765 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
3766 along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
3767 Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
3770 Also add information on how to contact you by electronic and paper mail.
3772 If the program is interactive, make it output a short notice like this
3773 when it starts in an interactive mode:
3776 Gnomovision version 69, Copyright (C) 19@var{yy} @var{name of author}
3777 Gnomovision comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details
3778 type `show w'. This is free software, and you are welcome
3779 to redistribute it under certain conditions; type `show c'
3783 The hypothetical commands @samp{show w} and @samp{show c} should show
3784 the appropriate parts of the General Public License. Of course, the
3785 commands you use may be called something other than @samp{show w} and
3786 @samp{show c}; they could even be mouse-clicks or menu items---whatever
3789 You should also get your employer (if you work as a programmer) or your
3790 school, if any, to sign a ``copyright disclaimer'' for the program, if
3791 necessary. Here is a sample; alter the names:
3795 Yoyodyne, Inc., hereby disclaims all copyright
3796 interest in the program `Gnomovision'
3797 (which makes passes at compilers) written
3800 @var{signature of Ty Coon}, 1 April 1989
3801 Ty Coon, President of Vice
3805 This General Public License does not permit incorporating your program into
3806 proprietary programs. If your program is a subroutine library, you may
3807 consider it more useful to permit linking proprietary applications with the
3808 library. If this is what you want to do, use the GNU Library General
3809 Public License instead of this License.
3814 @unnumbered Concept Index