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--2005 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
36 Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of
37 this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice
38 are preserved on all copies.
41 Permission is granted to process this file through TeX and print the
42 results, provided the printed document carries a copying permission
43 notice identical to this one except for the removal of this paragraph
44 (this paragraph not being relevant to the printed manual).
46 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
47 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or
48 any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with the
49 Invariant Sections being ``GNU General Public License'' and ``GNU Free
50 Documentation License'', with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no
51 Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section
52 entitled ``GNU Free Documentation License''.
57 @title GNU Wget @value{VERSION}
58 @subtitle The non-interactive download utility
59 @subtitle Updated for Wget @value{VERSION}, @value{UPDATED}
60 @author by Hrvoje Nik@v{s}i@'{c} and the developers
64 Originally written by Hrvoje Niksic <hniksic@xemacs.org>.
67 GNU Info entry for @file{wget}.
72 @vskip 0pt plus 1filll
73 Copyright @copyright{} 1996--2005, Free Software Foundation, Inc.
75 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
76 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or
77 any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with the
78 Invariant Sections being ``GNU General Public License'' and ``GNU Free
79 Documentation License'', with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no
80 Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section
81 entitled ``GNU Free Documentation License''.
86 @top Wget @value{VERSION}
88 This manual documents version @value{VERSION} of GNU Wget, the freely
89 available utility for network downloads.
91 Copyright @copyright{} 1996--2005 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
94 * Overview:: Features of Wget.
95 * Invoking:: Wget command-line arguments.
96 * Recursive Download:: Downloading interlinked pages.
97 * Following Links:: The available methods of chasing links.
98 * Time-Stamping:: Mirroring according to time-stamps.
99 * Startup File:: Wget's initialization file.
100 * Examples:: Examples of usage.
101 * Various:: The stuff that doesn't fit anywhere else.
102 * Appendices:: Some useful references.
103 * Copying:: You may give out copies of Wget and of this manual.
104 * Concept Index:: Topics covered by this manual.
113 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
114 GNU Wget is a free utility for non-interactive download of files from
115 the Web. It supports @sc{http}, @sc{https}, and @sc{ftp} protocols, as
116 well as retrieval through @sc{http} proxies.
119 This chapter is a partial overview of Wget's features.
123 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
124 Wget is non-interactive, meaning that it can work in the background,
125 while the user is not logged on. This allows you to start a retrieval
126 and disconnect from the system, letting Wget finish the work. By
127 contrast, most of the Web browsers require constant user's presence,
128 which can be a great hindrance when transferring a lot of data.
134 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
138 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
139 Wget can follow links in @sc{html} and @sc{xhtml} pages and create local
140 versions of remote web sites, fully recreating the directory structure of
141 the original site. This is sometimes referred to as ``recursive
142 downloading.'' While doing that, Wget respects the Robot Exclusion
143 Standard (@file{/robots.txt}). Wget can be instructed to convert the
144 links in downloaded @sc{html} files to the local files for offline
150 File name wildcard matching and recursive mirroring of directories are
151 available when retrieving via @sc{ftp}. Wget can read the time-stamp
152 information given by both @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} servers, and store it
153 locally. Thus Wget can see if the remote file has changed since last
154 retrieval, and automatically retrieve the new version if it has. This
155 makes Wget suitable for mirroring of @sc{ftp} sites, as well as home
161 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
165 @c man begin DESCRIPTION
166 Wget has been designed for robustness over slow or unstable network
167 connections; if a download fails due to a network problem, it will
168 keep retrying until the whole file has been retrieved. If the server
169 supports regetting, it will instruct the server to continue the
170 download from where it left off.
175 Wget supports proxy servers, which can lighten the network load, speed
176 up retrieval and provide access behind firewalls. However, if you are
177 behind a firewall that requires that you use a socks style gateway,
178 you can get the socks library and build Wget with support for socks.
179 Wget uses the passive @sc{ftp} downloading by default, active @sc{ftp}
184 Wget supports IP version 6, the next generation of IP. IPv6 is
185 autodetected at compile-time, and can be disabled at either build or
186 run time. Binaries built with IPv6 support work well in both
187 IPv4-only and dual family environments.
191 Built-in features offer mechanisms to tune which links you wish to follow
192 (@pxref{Following Links}).
196 The progress of individual downloads is traced using a progress gauge.
197 Interactive downloads are tracked using a ``thermometer''-style gauge,
198 whereas non-interactive ones are traced with dots, each dot
199 representing a fixed amount of data received (1KB by default). Either
200 gauge can be customized to your preferences.
204 Most of the features are fully configurable, either through command line
205 options, or via the initialization file @file{.wgetrc} (@pxref{Startup
206 File}). Wget allows you to define @dfn{global} startup files
207 (@file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default) for site settings.
212 @item /usr/local/etc/wgetrc
213 Default location of the @dfn{global} startup file.
223 Finally, GNU Wget is free software. This means that everyone may use
224 it, redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General
225 Public License, as published by the Free Software Foundation
236 By default, Wget is very simple to invoke. The basic syntax is:
239 @c man begin SYNOPSIS
240 wget [@var{option}]@dots{} [@var{URL}]@dots{}
244 Wget will simply download all the @sc{url}s specified on the command
245 line. @var{URL} is a @dfn{Uniform Resource Locator}, as defined below.
247 However, you may wish to change some of the default parameters of
248 Wget. You can do it two ways: permanently, adding the appropriate
249 command to @file{.wgetrc} (@pxref{Startup File}), or specifying it on
255 * Basic Startup Options::
256 * Logging and Input File Options::
258 * Directory Options::
260 * HTTPS (SSL/TLS) Options::
262 * Recursive Retrieval Options::
263 * Recursive Accept/Reject Options::
271 @dfn{URL} is an acronym for Uniform Resource Locator. A uniform
272 resource locator is a compact string representation for a resource
273 available via the Internet. Wget recognizes the @sc{url} syntax as per
274 @sc{rfc1738}. This is the most widely used form (square brackets denote
278 http://host[:port]/directory/file
279 ftp://host[:port]/directory/file
282 You can also encode your username and password within a @sc{url}:
285 ftp://user:password@@host/path
286 http://user:password@@host/path
289 Either @var{user} or @var{password}, or both, may be left out. If you
290 leave out either the @sc{http} username or password, no authentication
291 will be sent. If you leave out the @sc{ftp} username, @samp{anonymous}
292 will be used. If you leave out the @sc{ftp} password, your email
293 address will be supplied as a default password.@footnote{If you have a
294 @file{.netrc} file in your home directory, password will also be
297 @strong{Important Note}: if you specify a password-containing @sc{url}
298 on the command line, the username and password will be plainly visible
299 to all users on the system, by way of @code{ps}. On multi-user systems,
300 this is a big security risk. To work around it, use @code{wget -i -}
301 and feed the @sc{url}s to Wget's standard input, each on a separate
302 line, terminated by @kbd{C-d}.
304 You can encode unsafe characters in a @sc{url} as @samp{%xy}, @code{xy}
305 being the hexadecimal representation of the character's @sc{ascii}
306 value. Some common unsafe characters include @samp{%} (quoted as
307 @samp{%25}), @samp{:} (quoted as @samp{%3A}), and @samp{@@} (quoted as
308 @samp{%40}). Refer to @sc{rfc1738} for a comprehensive list of unsafe
311 Wget also supports the @code{type} feature for @sc{ftp} @sc{url}s. By
312 default, @sc{ftp} documents are retrieved in the binary mode (type
313 @samp{i}), which means that they are downloaded unchanged. Another
314 useful mode is the @samp{a} (@dfn{ASCII}) mode, which converts the line
315 delimiters between the different operating systems, and is thus useful
316 for text files. Here is an example:
319 ftp://host/directory/file;type=a
322 Two alternative variants of @sc{url} specification are also supported,
323 because of historical (hysterical?) reasons and their widespreaded use.
325 @sc{ftp}-only syntax (supported by @code{NcFTP}):
330 @sc{http}-only syntax (introduced by @code{Netscape}):
335 These two alternative forms are deprecated, and may cease being
336 supported in the future.
338 If you do not understand the difference between these notations, or do
339 not know which one to use, just use the plain ordinary format you use
340 with your favorite browser, like @code{Lynx} or @code{Netscape}.
343 @section Option Syntax
344 @cindex option syntax
345 @cindex syntax of options
347 Since Wget uses GNU getopts to process its arguments, every option has a
348 short form and a long form. Long options are more convenient to
349 remember, but take time to type. You may freely mix different option
350 styles, or specify options after the command-line arguments. Thus you
354 wget -r --tries=10 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/ -o log
357 The space between the option accepting an argument and the argument may
358 be omitted. Instead @samp{-o log} you can write @samp{-olog}.
360 You may put several options that do not require arguments together,
367 This is a complete equivalent of:
370 wget -d -r -c @var{URL}
373 Since the options can be specified after the arguments, you may
374 terminate them with @samp{--}. So the following will try to download
375 @sc{url} @samp{-x}, reporting failure to @file{log}:
381 The options that accept comma-separated lists all respect the convention
382 that specifying an empty list clears its value. This can be useful to
383 clear the @file{.wgetrc} settings. For instance, if your @file{.wgetrc}
384 sets @code{exclude_directories} to @file{/cgi-bin}, the following
385 example will first reset it, and then set it to exclude @file{/~nobody}
386 and @file{/~somebody}. You can also clear the lists in @file{.wgetrc}
387 (@pxref{Wgetrc Syntax}).
390 wget -X '' -X /~nobody,/~somebody
395 @node Basic Startup Options
396 @section Basic Startup Options
401 Display the version of Wget.
405 Print a help message describing all of Wget's command-line options.
409 Go to background immediately after startup. If no output file is
410 specified via the @samp{-o}, output is redirected to @file{wget-log}.
412 @cindex execute wgetrc command
413 @item -e @var{command}
414 @itemx --execute @var{command}
415 Execute @var{command} as if it were a part of @file{.wgetrc}
416 (@pxref{Startup File}). A command thus invoked will be executed
417 @emph{after} the commands in @file{.wgetrc}, thus taking precedence over
418 them. If you need to specify more than one wgetrc command, use multiple
419 instances of @samp{-e}.
423 @node Logging and Input File Options
424 @section Logging and Input File Options
429 @item -o @var{logfile}
430 @itemx --output-file=@var{logfile}
431 Log all messages to @var{logfile}. The messages are normally reported
434 @cindex append to log
435 @item -a @var{logfile}
436 @itemx --append-output=@var{logfile}
437 Append to @var{logfile}. This is the same as @samp{-o}, only it appends
438 to @var{logfile} instead of overwriting the old log file. If
439 @var{logfile} does not exist, a new file is created.
444 Turn on debug output, meaning various information important to the
445 developers of Wget if it does not work properly. Your system
446 administrator may have chosen to compile Wget without debug support, in
447 which case @samp{-d} will not work. Please note that compiling with
448 debug support is always safe---Wget compiled with the debug support will
449 @emph{not} print any debug info unless requested with @samp{-d}.
450 @xref{Reporting Bugs}, for more information on how to use @samp{-d} for
456 Turn off Wget's output.
461 Turn on verbose output, with all the available data. The default output
466 Non-verbose output---turn off verbose without being completely quiet
467 (use @samp{-q} for that), which means that error messages and basic
468 information still get printed.
472 @itemx --input-file=@var{file}
473 Read @sc{url}s from @var{file}, in which case no @sc{url}s need to be on
474 the command line. If there are @sc{url}s both on the command line and
475 in an input file, those on the command lines will be the first ones to
476 be retrieved. The @var{file} need not be an @sc{html} document (but no
477 harm if it is)---it is enough if the @sc{url}s are just listed
480 However, if you specify @samp{--force-html}, the document will be
481 regarded as @samp{html}. In that case you may have problems with
482 relative links, which you can solve either by adding @code{<base
483 href="@var{url}">} to the documents or by specifying
484 @samp{--base=@var{url}} on the command line.
489 When input is read from a file, force it to be treated as an @sc{html}
490 file. This enables you to retrieve relative links from existing
491 @sc{html} files on your local disk, by adding @code{<base
492 href="@var{url}">} to @sc{html}, or using the @samp{--base} command-line
495 @cindex base for relative links in input file
497 @itemx --base=@var{URL}
498 When used in conjunction with @samp{-F}, prepends @var{URL} to relative
499 links in the file specified by @samp{-i}.
502 @node Download Options
503 @section Download Options
506 @cindex bind() address
507 @cindex client IP address
508 @cindex IP address, client
509 @item --bind-address=@var{ADDRESS}
510 When making client TCP/IP connections, @code{bind()} to @var{ADDRESS} on
511 the local machine. @var{ADDRESS} may be specified as a hostname or IP
512 address. This option can be useful if your machine is bound to multiple
517 @cindex number of retries
518 @item -t @var{number}
519 @itemx --tries=@var{number}
520 Set number of retries to @var{number}. Specify 0 or @samp{inf} for
521 infinite retrying. The default is to retry 20 times, with the exception
522 of fatal errors like ``connection refused'' or ``not found'' (404),
523 which are not retried.
526 @itemx --output-document=@var{file}
527 The documents will not be written to the appropriate files, but all will
528 be concatenated together and written to @var{file}. If @var{file}
529 already exists, it will be overwritten. If the @var{file} is @samp{-},
530 the documents will be written to standard output (disabling @samp{-k}).
532 Note that a combination with @samp{-k} is only well-defined for downloading
535 @cindex clobbering, file
536 @cindex downloading multiple times
540 If a file is downloaded more than once in the same directory, Wget's
541 behavior depends on a few options, including @samp{-nc}. In certain
542 cases, the local file will be @dfn{clobbered}, or overwritten, upon
543 repeated download. In other cases it will be preserved.
545 When running Wget without @samp{-N}, @samp{-nc}, or @samp{-r},
546 downloading the same file in the same directory will result in the
547 original copy of @var{file} being preserved and the second copy being
548 named @samp{@var{file}.1}. If that file is downloaded yet again, the
549 third copy will be named @samp{@var{file}.2}, and so on. When
550 @samp{-nc} is specified, this behavior is suppressed, and Wget will
551 refuse to download newer copies of @samp{@var{file}}. Therefore,
552 ``@code{no-clobber}'' is actually a misnomer in this mode---it's not
553 clobbering that's prevented (as the numeric suffixes were already
554 preventing clobbering), but rather the multiple version saving that's
557 When running Wget with @samp{-r}, but without @samp{-N} or @samp{-nc},
558 re-downloading a file will result in the new copy simply overwriting the
559 old. Adding @samp{-nc} will prevent this behavior, instead causing the
560 original version to be preserved and any newer copies on the server to
563 When running Wget with @samp{-N}, with or without @samp{-r}, the
564 decision as to whether or not to download a newer copy of a file depends
565 on the local and remote timestamp and size of the file
566 (@pxref{Time-Stamping}). @samp{-nc} may not be specified at the same
569 Note that when @samp{-nc} is specified, files with the suffixes
570 @samp{.html} or @samp{.htm} will be loaded from the local disk and
571 parsed as if they had been retrieved from the Web.
573 @cindex continue retrieval
574 @cindex incomplete downloads
575 @cindex resume download
578 Continue getting a partially-downloaded file. This is useful when you
579 want to finish up a download started by a previous instance of Wget, or
580 by another program. For instance:
583 wget -c ftp://sunsite.doc.ic.ac.uk/ls-lR.Z
586 If there is a file named @file{ls-lR.Z} in the current directory, Wget
587 will assume that it is the first portion of the remote file, and will
588 ask the server to continue the retrieval from an offset equal to the
589 length of the local file.
591 Note that you don't need to specify this option if you just want the
592 current invocation of Wget to retry downloading a file should the
593 connection be lost midway through. This is the default behavior.
594 @samp{-c} only affects resumption of downloads started @emph{prior} to
595 this invocation of Wget, and whose local files are still sitting around.
597 Without @samp{-c}, the previous example would just download the remote
598 file to @file{ls-lR.Z.1}, leaving the truncated @file{ls-lR.Z} file
601 Beginning with Wget 1.7, if you use @samp{-c} on a non-empty file, and
602 it turns out that the server does not support continued downloading,
603 Wget will refuse to start the download from scratch, which would
604 effectively ruin existing contents. If you really want the download to
605 start from scratch, remove the file.
607 Also beginning with Wget 1.7, if you use @samp{-c} on a file which is of
608 equal size as the one on the server, Wget will refuse to download the
609 file and print an explanatory message. The same happens when the file
610 is smaller on the server than locally (presumably because it was changed
611 on the server since your last download attempt)---because ``continuing''
612 is not meaningful, no download occurs.
614 On the other side of the coin, while using @samp{-c}, any file that's
615 bigger on the server than locally will be considered an incomplete
616 download and only @code{(length(remote) - length(local))} bytes will be
617 downloaded and tacked onto the end of the local file. This behavior can
618 be desirable in certain cases---for instance, you can use @samp{wget -c}
619 to download just the new portion that's been appended to a data
620 collection or log file.
622 However, if the file is bigger on the server because it's been
623 @emph{changed}, as opposed to just @emph{appended} to, you'll end up
624 with a garbled file. Wget has no way of verifying that the local file
625 is really a valid prefix of the remote file. You need to be especially
626 careful of this when using @samp{-c} in conjunction with @samp{-r},
627 since every file will be considered as an "incomplete download" candidate.
629 Another instance where you'll get a garbled file if you try to use
630 @samp{-c} is if you have a lame @sc{http} proxy that inserts a
631 ``transfer interrupted'' string into the local file. In the future a
632 ``rollback'' option may be added to deal with this case.
634 Note that @samp{-c} only works with @sc{ftp} servers and with @sc{http}
635 servers that support the @code{Range} header.
637 @cindex progress indicator
639 @item --progress=@var{type}
640 Select the type of the progress indicator you wish to use. Legal
641 indicators are ``dot'' and ``bar''.
643 The ``bar'' indicator is used by default. It draws an @sc{ascii} progress
644 bar graphics (a.k.a ``thermometer'' display) indicating the status of
645 retrieval. If the output is not a TTY, the ``dot'' bar will be used by
648 Use @samp{--progress=dot} to switch to the ``dot'' display. It traces
649 the retrieval by printing dots on the screen, each dot representing a
650 fixed amount of downloaded data.
652 When using the dotted retrieval, you may also set the @dfn{style} by
653 specifying the type as @samp{dot:@var{style}}. Different styles assign
654 different meaning to one dot. With the @code{default} style each dot
655 represents 1K, there are ten dots in a cluster and 50 dots in a line.
656 The @code{binary} style has a more ``computer''-like orientation---8K
657 dots, 16-dots clusters and 48 dots per line (which makes for 384K
658 lines). The @code{mega} style is suitable for downloading very large
659 files---each dot represents 64K retrieved, there are eight dots in a
660 cluster, and 48 dots on each line (so each line contains 3M).
662 Note that you can set the default style using the @code{progress}
663 command in @file{.wgetrc}. That setting may be overridden from the
664 command line. The exception is that, when the output is not a TTY, the
665 ``dot'' progress will be favored over ``bar''. To force the bar output,
666 use @samp{--progress=bar:force}.
669 @itemx --timestamping
670 Turn on time-stamping. @xref{Time-Stamping}, for details.
672 @cindex server response, print
674 @itemx --server-response
675 Print the headers sent by @sc{http} servers and responses sent by
678 @cindex Wget as spider
681 When invoked with this option, Wget will behave as a Web @dfn{spider},
682 which means that it will not download the pages, just check that they
683 are there. For example, you can use Wget to check your bookmarks:
686 wget --spider --force-html -i bookmarks.html
689 This feature needs much more work for Wget to get close to the
690 functionality of real web spiders.
694 @itemx --timeout=@var{seconds}
695 Set the network timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. This is equivalent
696 to specifying @samp{--dns-timeout}, @samp{--connect-timeout}, and
697 @samp{--read-timeout}, all at the same time.
699 Whenever Wget connects to or reads from a remote host, it checks for a
700 timeout and aborts the operation if the time expires. This prevents
701 anomalous occurrences such as hanging reads or infinite connects. The
702 only timeout enabled by default is a 900-second timeout for reading.
703 Setting timeout to 0 disables checking for timeouts.
705 Unless you know what you are doing, it is best not to set any of the
706 timeout-related options.
710 @item --dns-timeout=@var{seconds}
711 Set the DNS lookup timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. DNS lookups that
712 don't complete within the specified time will fail. By default, there
713 is no timeout on DNS lookups, other than that implemented by system
716 @cindex connect timeout
717 @cindex timeout, connect
718 @item --connect-timeout=@var{seconds}
719 Set the connect timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. TCP connections that
720 take longer to establish will be aborted. By default, there is no
721 connect timeout, other than that implemented by system libraries.
724 @cindex timeout, read
725 @item --read-timeout=@var{seconds}
726 Set the read (and write) timeout to @var{seconds} seconds. Reads that
727 take longer will fail. The default value for read timeout is 900
730 @cindex bandwidth, limit
732 @cindex limit bandwidth
733 @item --limit-rate=@var{amount}
734 Limit the download speed to @var{amount} bytes per second. Amount may
735 be expressed in bytes, kilobytes with the @samp{k} suffix, or megabytes
736 with the @samp{m} suffix. For example, @samp{--limit-rate=20k} will
737 limit the retrieval rate to 20KB/s. This kind of thing is useful when,
738 for whatever reason, you don't want Wget to consume the entire available
741 Note that Wget implements the limiting by sleeping the appropriate
742 amount of time after a network read that took less time than specified
743 by the rate. Eventually this strategy causes the TCP transfer to slow
744 down to approximately the specified rate. However, it may take some
745 time for this balance to be achieved, so don't be surprised if limiting
746 the rate doesn't work well with very small files.
750 @item -w @var{seconds}
751 @itemx --wait=@var{seconds}
752 Wait the specified number of seconds between the retrievals. Use of
753 this option is recommended, as it lightens the server load by making the
754 requests less frequent. Instead of in seconds, the time can be
755 specified in minutes using the @code{m} suffix, in hours using @code{h}
756 suffix, or in days using @code{d} suffix.
758 Specifying a large value for this option is useful if the network or the
759 destination host is down, so that Wget can wait long enough to
760 reasonably expect the network error to be fixed before the retry.
762 @cindex retries, waiting between
763 @cindex waiting between retries
764 @item --waitretry=@var{seconds}
765 If you don't want Wget to wait between @emph{every} retrieval, but only
766 between retries of failed downloads, you can use this option. Wget will
767 use @dfn{linear backoff}, waiting 1 second after the first failure on a
768 given file, then waiting 2 seconds after the second failure on that
769 file, up to the maximum number of @var{seconds} you specify. Therefore,
770 a value of 10 will actually make Wget wait up to (1 + 2 + ... + 10) = 55
773 Note that this option is turned on by default in the global
779 Some web sites may perform log analysis to identify retrieval programs
780 such as Wget by looking for statistically significant similarities in
781 the time between requests. This option causes the time between requests
782 to vary between 0 and 2 * @var{wait} seconds, where @var{wait} was
783 specified using the @samp{--wait} option, in order to mask Wget's
784 presence from such analysis.
786 A recent article in a publication devoted to development on a popular
787 consumer platform provided code to perform this analysis on the fly.
788 Its author suggested blocking at the class C address level to ensure
789 automated retrieval programs were blocked despite changing DHCP-supplied
792 The @samp{--random-wait} option was inspired by this ill-advised
793 recommendation to block many unrelated users from a web site due to the
800 Turn proxy support on or off. The proxy is on by default if the
801 appropriate environment variable is defined.
803 For more information about the use of proxies with Wget, @xref{Proxies}.
807 @itemx --quota=@var{quota}
808 Specify download quota for automatic retrievals. The value can be
809 specified in bytes (default), kilobytes (with @samp{k} suffix), or
810 megabytes (with @samp{m} suffix).
812 Note that quota will never affect downloading a single file. So if you
813 specify @samp{wget -Q10k ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/ls-lR.gz}, all of the
814 @file{ls-lR.gz} will be downloaded. The same goes even when several
815 @sc{url}s are specified on the command-line. However, quota is
816 respected when retrieving either recursively, or from an input file.
817 Thus you may safely type @samp{wget -Q2m -i sites}---download will be
818 aborted when the quota is exceeded.
820 Setting quota to 0 or to @samp{inf} unlimits the download quota.
823 @cindex caching of DNS lookups
825 Turn off caching of DNS lookups. Normally, Wget remembers the IP
826 addresses it looked up from DNS so it doesn't have to repeatedly
827 contact the DNS server for the same (typically small) set of hosts it
828 retrieves from. This cache exists in memory only; a new Wget run will
831 However, it has been reported that in some situations it is not
832 desirable to cache host names, even for the duration of a
833 short-running application like Wget. With this option Wget issues a
834 new DNS lookup (more precisely, a new call to @code{gethostbyname} or
835 @code{getaddrinfo}) each time it makes a new connection. Please note
836 that this option will @emph{not} affect caching that might be
837 performed by the resolving library or by an external caching layer,
840 If you don't understand exactly what this option does, you probably
843 @cindex file names, restrict
844 @cindex Windows file names
845 @item --restrict-file-names=@var{mode}
846 Change which characters found in remote URLs may show up in local file
847 names generated from those URLs. Characters that are @dfn{restricted}
848 by this option are escaped, i.e. replaced with @samp{%HH}, where
849 @samp{HH} is the hexadecimal number that corresponds to the restricted
852 By default, Wget escapes the characters that are not valid as part of
853 file names on your operating system, as well as control characters that
854 are typically unprintable. This option is useful for changing these
855 defaults, either because you are downloading to a non-native partition,
856 or because you want to disable escaping of the control characters.
858 When mode is set to ``unix'', Wget escapes the character @samp{/} and
859 the control characters in the ranges 0--31 and 128--159. This is the
860 default on Unix-like OS'es.
862 When mode is set to ``windows'', Wget escapes the characters @samp{\},
863 @samp{|}, @samp{/}, @samp{:}, @samp{?}, @samp{"}, @samp{*}, @samp{<},
864 @samp{>}, and the control characters in the ranges 0--31 and 128--159.
865 In addition to this, Wget in Windows mode uses @samp{+} instead of
866 @samp{:} to separate host and port in local file names, and uses
867 @samp{@@} instead of @samp{?} to separate the query portion of the file
868 name from the rest. Therefore, a URL that would be saved as
869 @samp{www.xemacs.org:4300/search.pl?input=blah} in Unix mode would be
870 saved as @samp{www.xemacs.org+4300/search.pl@@input=blah} in Windows
871 mode. This mode is the default on Windows.
873 If you append @samp{,nocontrol} to the mode, as in
874 @samp{unix,nocontrol}, escaping of the control characters is also
875 switched off. You can use @samp{--restrict-file-names=nocontrol} to
876 turn off escaping of control characters without affecting the choice of
877 the OS to use as file name restriction mode.
884 Force connecting to IPv4 or IPv6 addresses. With @samp{--inet4-only}
885 or @samp{-4}, Wget will only connect to IPv4 hosts, ignoring AAAA
886 records in DNS, and refusing to connect to IPv6 addresses specified in
887 URLs. Conversely, with @samp{--inet6-only} or @samp{-6}, Wget will
888 only connect to IPv6 hosts and ignore A records and IPv4 addresses.
890 Neither options should be needed normally. By default, an IPv6-aware
891 Wget will use the address family specified by the host's DNS record.
892 If the DNS specifies both an A record and an AAAA record, Wget will
893 try them in sequence until it finds one it can connect to.
895 These options can be used to deliberately force the use of IPv4 or
896 IPv6 address families on dual family systems, usually to aid debugging
897 or to deal with broken network configuration. Only one of
898 @samp{--inet6-only} and @samp{--inet4-only} may be specified in the
899 same command. Neither option is available in Wget compiled without
902 @item --prefer-family=IPv4/IPv6/none
903 When given a choice of several addresses, connect to the addresses
904 with specified address family first. IPv4 addresses are preferred by
907 This avoids spurious errors and correct attempts when accessing hosts
908 that resolve to both IPv6 and IPv4 addresses from IPv4 networks. For
909 example, @samp{www.kame.net} resolves to
910 @samp{2001:200:0:8002:203:47ff:fea5:3085} and to
911 @samp{203.178.141.194}. When the preferred family is @code{IPv4}, the
912 IPv4 address is used first; when the preferred family is @code{IPv6},
913 the IPv6 address is used first; if the specified value is @code{none},
914 the address order returned by DNS is used without change.
916 Unlike @samp{-4} and @samp{-6}, this option doesn't forbid access to
917 any address family, it only changes the @emph{order} in which the
918 addresses are accessed. Also note that the reordering performed by
919 this option is @dfn{stable}---it doesn't affect order of addresses of
920 the same family. That is, the relative order of all IPv4 addresses
921 and of all IPv6 addresses remains intact in all cases.
924 @node Directory Options
925 @section Directory Options
929 @itemx --no-directories
930 Do not create a hierarchy of directories when retrieving recursively.
931 With this option turned on, all files will get saved to the current
932 directory, without clobbering (if a name shows up more than once, the
933 filenames will get extensions @samp{.n}).
936 @itemx --force-directories
937 The opposite of @samp{-nd}---create a hierarchy of directories, even if
938 one would not have been created otherwise. E.g. @samp{wget -x
939 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/robots.txt} will save the downloaded file to
940 @file{fly.srk.fer.hr/robots.txt}.
943 @itemx --no-host-directories
944 Disable generation of host-prefixed directories. By default, invoking
945 Wget with @samp{-r http://fly.srk.fer.hr/} will create a structure of
946 directories beginning with @file{fly.srk.fer.hr/}. This option disables
949 @item --protocol-directories
950 Use the protocol name as a directory component of local file names. For
951 example, with this option, @samp{wget -r http://@var{host}} will save to
952 @samp{http/@var{host}/...} rather than just to @samp{@var{host}/...}.
954 Disable generation of host-prefixed directories. By default, invoking
955 Wget with @samp{-r http://fly.srk.fer.hr/} will create a structure of
956 directories beginning with @file{fly.srk.fer.hr/}. This option disables
959 @cindex cut directories
960 @item --cut-dirs=@var{number}
961 Ignore @var{number} directory components. This is useful for getting a
962 fine-grained control over the directory where recursive retrieval will
965 Take, for example, the directory at
966 @samp{ftp://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/}. If you retrieve it with
967 @samp{-r}, it will be saved locally under
968 @file{ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/}. While the @samp{-nH} option can
969 remove the @file{ftp.xemacs.org/} part, you are still stuck with
970 @file{pub/xemacs}. This is where @samp{--cut-dirs} comes in handy; it
971 makes Wget not ``see'' @var{number} remote directory components. Here
972 are several examples of how @samp{--cut-dirs} option works.
976 No options -> ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/
978 -nH --cut-dirs=1 -> xemacs/
979 -nH --cut-dirs=2 -> .
981 --cut-dirs=1 -> ftp.xemacs.org/xemacs/
986 If you just want to get rid of the directory structure, this option is
987 similar to a combination of @samp{-nd} and @samp{-P}. However, unlike
988 @samp{-nd}, @samp{--cut-dirs} does not lose with subdirectories---for
989 instance, with @samp{-nH --cut-dirs=1}, a @file{beta/} subdirectory will
990 be placed to @file{xemacs/beta}, as one would expect.
992 @cindex directory prefix
993 @item -P @var{prefix}
994 @itemx --directory-prefix=@var{prefix}
995 Set directory prefix to @var{prefix}. The @dfn{directory prefix} is the
996 directory where all other files and subdirectories will be saved to,
997 i.e. the top of the retrieval tree. The default is @samp{.} (the
1002 @section HTTP Options
1005 @cindex .html extension
1007 @itemx --html-extension
1008 If a file of type @samp{application/xhtml+xml} or @samp{text/html} is
1009 downloaded and the URL does not end with the regexp
1010 @samp{\.[Hh][Tt][Mm][Ll]?}, this option will cause the suffix @samp{.html}
1011 to be appended to the local filename. This is useful, for instance, when
1012 you're mirroring a remote site that uses @samp{.asp} pages, but you want
1013 the mirrored pages to be viewable on your stock Apache server. Another
1014 good use for this is when you're downloading CGI-generated materials. A URL
1015 like @samp{http://site.com/article.cgi?25} will be saved as
1016 @file{article.cgi?25.html}.
1018 Note that filenames changed in this way will be re-downloaded every time
1019 you re-mirror a site, because Wget can't tell that the local
1020 @file{@var{X}.html} file corresponds to remote URL @samp{@var{X}} (since
1021 it doesn't yet know that the URL produces output of type
1022 @samp{text/html} or @samp{application/xhtml+xml}. To prevent this
1023 re-downloading, you must use @samp{-k} and @samp{-K} so that the original
1024 version of the file will be saved as @file{@var{X}.orig} (@pxref{Recursive
1025 Retrieval Options}).
1028 @cindex http password
1029 @cindex authentication
1030 @item --http-user=@var{user}
1031 @itemx --http-passwd=@var{password}
1032 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} on an
1033 @sc{http} server. According to the type of the challenge, Wget will
1034 encode them using either the @code{basic} (insecure) or the
1035 @code{digest} authentication scheme.
1037 Another way to specify username and password is in the @sc{url} itself
1038 (@pxref{URL Format}). Either method reveals your password to anyone who
1039 bothers to run @code{ps}. To prevent the passwords from being seen,
1040 store them in @file{.wgetrc} or @file{.netrc}, and make sure to protect
1041 those files from other users with @code{chmod}. If the passwords are
1042 really important, do not leave them lying in those files either---edit
1043 the files and delete them after Wget has started the download.
1045 For more information about security issues with Wget, @xref{Security
1051 Disable server-side cache. In this case, Wget will send the remote
1052 server an appropriate directive (@samp{Pragma: no-cache}) to get the
1053 file from the remote service, rather than returning the cached version.
1054 This is especially useful for retrieving and flushing out-of-date
1055 documents on proxy servers.
1057 Caching is allowed by default.
1061 Disable the use of cookies. Cookies are a mechanism for maintaining
1062 server-side state. The server sends the client a cookie using the
1063 @code{Set-Cookie} header, and the client responds with the same cookie
1064 upon further requests. Since cookies allow the server owners to keep
1065 track of visitors and for sites to exchange this information, some
1066 consider them a breach of privacy. The default is to use cookies;
1067 however, @emph{storing} cookies is not on by default.
1069 @cindex loading cookies
1070 @cindex cookies, loading
1071 @item --load-cookies @var{file}
1072 Load cookies from @var{file} before the first HTTP retrieval.
1073 @var{file} is a textual file in the format originally used by Netscape's
1074 @file{cookies.txt} file.
1076 You will typically use this option when mirroring sites that require
1077 that you be logged in to access some or all of their content. The login
1078 process typically works by the web server issuing an @sc{http} cookie
1079 upon receiving and verifying your credentials. The cookie is then
1080 resent by the browser when accessing that part of the site, and so
1081 proves your identity.
1083 Mirroring such a site requires Wget to send the same cookies your
1084 browser sends when communicating with the site. This is achieved by
1085 @samp{--load-cookies}---simply point Wget to the location of the
1086 @file{cookies.txt} file, and it will send the same cookies your browser
1087 would send in the same situation. Different browsers keep textual
1088 cookie files in different locations:
1092 The cookies are in @file{~/.netscape/cookies.txt}.
1094 @item Mozilla and Netscape 6.x.
1095 Mozilla's cookie file is also named @file{cookies.txt}, located
1096 somewhere under @file{~/.mozilla}, in the directory of your profile.
1097 The full path usually ends up looking somewhat like
1098 @file{~/.mozilla/default/@var{some-weird-string}/cookies.txt}.
1100 @item Internet Explorer.
1101 You can produce a cookie file Wget can use by using the File menu,
1102 Import and Export, Export Cookies. This has been tested with Internet
1103 Explorer 5; it is not guaranteed to work with earlier versions.
1105 @item Other browsers.
1106 If you are using a different browser to create your cookies,
1107 @samp{--load-cookies} will only work if you can locate or produce a
1108 cookie file in the Netscape format that Wget expects.
1111 If you cannot use @samp{--load-cookies}, there might still be an
1112 alternative. If your browser supports a ``cookie manager'', you can use
1113 it to view the cookies used when accessing the site you're mirroring.
1114 Write down the name and value of the cookie, and manually instruct Wget
1115 to send those cookies, bypassing the ``official'' cookie support:
1118 wget --no-cookies --header "Cookie: @var{name}=@var{value}"
1121 @cindex saving cookies
1122 @cindex cookies, saving
1123 @item --save-cookies @var{file}
1124 Save cookies to @var{file} before exiting. This will not save cookies
1125 that have expired or that have no expiry time (so-called ``session
1126 cookies''), but also see @samp{--keep-session-cookies}.
1128 @cindex cookies, session
1129 @cindex session cookies
1130 @item --keep-session-cookies
1132 When specified, causes @samp{--save-cookies} to also save session
1133 cookies. Session cookies are normally not save because they are
1134 supposed to be forgotten when you exit the browser. Saving them is
1135 useful on sites that require you to log in or to visit the home page
1136 before you can access some pages. With this option, multiple Wget runs
1137 are considered a single browser session as far as the site is concerned.
1139 Since the cookie file format does not normally carry session cookies,
1140 Wget marks them with an expiry timestamp of 0. Wget's
1141 @samp{--load-cookies} recognizes those as session cookies, but it might
1142 confuse other browsers. Also note that cookies so loaded will be
1143 treated as other session cookies, which means that if you want
1144 @samp{--save-cookies} to preserve them again, you must use
1145 @samp{--keep-session-cookies} again.
1147 @cindex Content-Length, ignore
1148 @cindex ignore length
1149 @item --ignore-length
1150 Unfortunately, some @sc{http} servers (@sc{cgi} programs, to be more
1151 precise) send out bogus @code{Content-Length} headers, which makes Wget
1152 go wild, as it thinks not all the document was retrieved. You can spot
1153 this syndrome if Wget retries getting the same document again and again,
1154 each time claiming that the (otherwise normal) connection has closed on
1157 With this option, Wget will ignore the @code{Content-Length} header---as
1158 if it never existed.
1161 @item --header=@var{additional-header}
1162 Define an @var{additional-header} to be passed to the @sc{http} servers.
1163 Headers must contain a @samp{:} preceded by one or more non-blank
1164 characters, and must not contain newlines.
1166 You may define more than one additional header by specifying
1167 @samp{--header} more than once.
1171 wget --header='Accept-Charset: iso-8859-2' \
1172 --header='Accept-Language: hr' \
1173 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/
1177 Specification of an empty string as the header value will clear all
1178 previous user-defined headers.
1181 @cindex proxy password
1182 @cindex proxy authentication
1183 @item --proxy-user=@var{user}
1184 @itemx --proxy-passwd=@var{password}
1185 Specify the username @var{user} and password @var{password} for
1186 authentication on a proxy server. Wget will encode them using the
1187 @code{basic} authentication scheme.
1189 Security considerations similar to those with @samp{--http-passwd}
1190 pertain here as well.
1192 @cindex http referer
1193 @cindex referer, http
1194 @item --referer=@var{url}
1195 Include `Referer: @var{url}' header in HTTP request. Useful for
1196 retrieving documents with server-side processing that assume they are
1197 always being retrieved by interactive web browsers and only come out
1198 properly when Referer is set to one of the pages that point to them.
1200 @cindex server response, save
1201 @item --save-headers
1202 Save the headers sent by the @sc{http} server to the file, preceding the
1203 actual contents, with an empty line as the separator.
1206 @item -U @var{agent-string}
1207 @itemx --user-agent=@var{agent-string}
1208 Identify as @var{agent-string} to the @sc{http} server.
1210 The @sc{http} protocol allows the clients to identify themselves using a
1211 @code{User-Agent} header field. This enables distinguishing the
1212 @sc{www} software, usually for statistical purposes or for tracing of
1213 protocol violations. Wget normally identifies as
1214 @samp{Wget/@var{version}}, @var{version} being the current version
1217 However, some sites have been known to impose the policy of tailoring
1218 the output according to the @code{User-Agent}-supplied information.
1219 While conceptually this is not such a bad idea, it has been abused by
1220 servers denying information to clients other than @code{Mozilla} or
1221 Microsoft @code{Internet Explorer}. This option allows you to change
1222 the @code{User-Agent} line issued by Wget. Use of this option is
1223 discouraged, unless you really know what you are doing.
1226 @item --post-data=@var{string}
1227 @itemx --post-file=@var{file}
1228 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send the specified data
1229 in the request body. @code{--post-data} sends @var{string} as data,
1230 whereas @code{--post-file} sends the contents of @var{file}. Other than
1231 that, they work in exactly the same way.
1233 Please be aware that Wget needs to know the size of the POST data in
1234 advance. Therefore the argument to @code{--post-file} must be a regular
1235 file; specifying a FIFO or something like @file{/dev/stdin} won't work.
1236 It's not quite clear how to work around this limitation inherent in
1237 HTTP/1.0. Although HTTP/1.1 introduces @dfn{chunked} transfer that
1238 doesn't require knowing the request length in advance, a client can't
1239 use chunked unless it knows it's talking to an HTTP/1.1 server. And it
1240 can't know that until it receives a response, which in turn requires the
1241 request to have been completed -- a chicken-and-egg problem.
1243 Note: if Wget is redirected after the POST request is completed, it will
1244 not send the POST data to the redirected URL. This is because URLs that
1245 process POST often respond with a redirection to a regular page
1246 (although that's technically disallowed), which does not desire or
1247 accept POST. It is not yet clear that this behavior is optimal; if it
1248 doesn't work out, it will be changed.
1250 This example shows how to log to a server using POST and then proceed to
1251 download the desired pages, presumably only accessible to authorized
1256 # @r{Log in to the server. This can be done only once.}
1257 wget --save-cookies cookies.txt \
1258 --post-data 'user=foo&password=bar' \
1259 http://server.com/auth.php
1261 # @r{Now grab the page or pages we care about.}
1262 wget --load-cookies cookies.txt \
1263 -p http://server.com/interesting/article.php
1268 @node HTTPS (SSL/TLS) Options
1269 @section HTTPS (SSL/TLS) Options
1272 To support SSL-based HTTP (HTTPS) downloads, Wget must be compiled
1273 with an external SSL library, currently OpenSSL. If Wget is compiled
1274 without SSL support, none of these options are available.
1277 @item --sslcertfile=@var{file}
1278 Use the client certificate stored in @var{file}. This is needed for
1279 servers that are configured to require certificates from the clients
1280 that connect to them. Normally a certificate is not required and this
1283 @cindex SSL certificate
1284 @item --sslcertkey=@var{keyfile}
1285 Read the certificate key from @var{keyfile}.
1287 @cindex SSL certificate authority
1288 @item --sslcadir=@var{directory}
1289 Specifies directory used for certificate authorities (``CA'').
1291 @item --sslcafile=@var{file}
1292 Use @var{file} as the file with the bundle of certificate authorities.
1294 @cindex SSL certificate type, specify
1295 @item --sslcerttype=0/1
1296 Specify the type of the client certificate: 0 means @code{PEM}
1297 (default), 1 means @code{ASN1} (@code{DER}).
1299 @cindex SSL certificate, check
1300 @item --sslcheckcert=0/1
1301 If set to 1, check the server certificate against the specified client
1302 authorities. If this is 0 (the default), Wget will break the SSL
1303 handshake if the server certificate is not valid.
1305 @cindex SSL protocol, choose
1306 @item --sslprotocol=0-3
1307 Choose the SSL protocol to be used. If 0 is specified (the default),
1308 the OpenSSL library chooses the appropriate protocol automatically.
1309 Specifying 1 forces the use of SSLv2, specifying 2 forces SSLv3, and
1310 specifying 3 forces TLSv1.
1312 In most cases the OpenSSL library is capable of making an intelligent
1313 choice of the protocol, but there have been reports of sites that use
1314 old (and presumably buggy) server libraries with which a protocol has
1315 to be specified manually.
1318 @item --egd-file=@var{file}
1319 Use @var{file} as the EGD socket. EGD stands for @dfn{Entropy
1320 Gathering Daemon}, a user-space program that collects data from
1321 various unpredictable system sources and makes it available to other
1322 programs that might need it. Encryption software, such as the SSL
1323 library, needs sources of non-repeating randomness to seed the random
1324 number generator used to produce cryptographically strong keys.
1326 OpenSSL allows the user to specify his own source of entropy using the
1327 @code{RAND_FILE} environment variable. If this variable is unset, or
1328 if the specified file does not produce enough randomness, OpenSSL will
1329 read random data from EGD socket specified using this option.
1331 If this option is not specified (and the equivalent startup command is
1332 not used), EGD is never contacted. EGD is not needed on modern Unix
1333 systems that support @file{/dev/random}.
1337 @section FTP Options
1340 @cindex password, FTP
1341 @item --ftp-passwd=@var{string}
1342 Set the default FTP password to @var{string}. Without this, or the
1343 corresponding startup option, the password defaults to @samp{-wget@@},
1344 normally used for anonymous FTP.
1346 @cindex .listing files, removing
1347 @item --no-remove-listing
1348 Don't remove the temporary @file{.listing} files generated by @sc{ftp}
1349 retrievals. Normally, these files contain the raw directory listings
1350 received from @sc{ftp} servers. Not removing them can be useful for
1351 debugging purposes, or when you want to be able to easily check on the
1352 contents of remote server directories (e.g. to verify that a mirror
1353 you're running is complete).
1355 Note that even though Wget writes to a known filename for this file,
1356 this is not a security hole in the scenario of a user making
1357 @file{.listing} a symbolic link to @file{/etc/passwd} or something and
1358 asking @code{root} to run Wget in his or her directory. Depending on
1359 the options used, either Wget will refuse to write to @file{.listing},
1360 making the globbing/recursion/time-stamping operation fail, or the
1361 symbolic link will be deleted and replaced with the actual
1362 @file{.listing} file, or the listing will be written to a
1363 @file{.listing.@var{number}} file.
1365 Even though this situation isn't a problem, though, @code{root} should
1366 never run Wget in a non-trusted user's directory. A user could do
1367 something as simple as linking @file{index.html} to @file{/etc/passwd}
1368 and asking @code{root} to run Wget with @samp{-N} or @samp{-r} so the file
1369 will be overwritten.
1371 @cindex globbing, toggle
1373 Turn off @sc{ftp} globbing. Globbing refers to the use of shell-like
1374 special characters (@dfn{wildcards}), like @samp{*}, @samp{?}, @samp{[}
1375 and @samp{]} to retrieve more than one file from the same directory at
1379 wget ftp://gnjilux.srk.fer.hr/*.msg
1382 By default, globbing will be turned on if the @sc{url} contains a
1383 globbing character. This option may be used to turn globbing on or off
1386 You may have to quote the @sc{url} to protect it from being expanded by
1387 your shell. Globbing makes Wget look for a directory listing, which is
1388 system-specific. This is why it currently works only with Unix @sc{ftp}
1389 servers (and the ones emulating Unix @code{ls} output).
1392 @item --no-passive-ftp
1393 Disable the use of the @dfn{passive} FTP transfer mode. Passive FTP
1394 mandates that the client connect to the server to establish the data
1395 connection rather than the other way around.
1397 If the machine is connected to the Internet directly, both passive and
1398 active FTP should work equally well. Behind most firewall and NAT
1399 configurations passive FTP has a better chance of working. However,
1400 in some rare firewall configurations, active FTP actually works when
1401 passive FTP doesn't. If you suspect this to be the case, use this
1402 option, or set @code{passive_ftp=off} in your init file.
1404 @cindex symbolic links, retrieving
1405 @item --retr-symlinks
1406 Usually, when retrieving @sc{ftp} directories recursively and a symbolic
1407 link is encountered, the linked-to file is not downloaded. Instead, a
1408 matching symbolic link is created on the local filesystem. The
1409 pointed-to file will not be downloaded unless this recursive retrieval
1410 would have encountered it separately and downloaded it anyway.
1412 When @samp{--retr-symlinks} is specified, however, symbolic links are
1413 traversed and the pointed-to files are retrieved. At this time, this
1414 option does not cause Wget to traverse symlinks to directories and
1415 recurse through them, but in the future it should be enhanced to do
1418 Note that when retrieving a file (not a directory) because it was
1419 specified on the command-line, rather than because it was recursed to,
1420 this option has no effect. Symbolic links are always traversed in this
1423 @cindex Keep-Alive, turning off
1424 @cindex Persistent Connections, disabling
1425 @item --no-http-keep-alive
1426 Turn off the ``keep-alive'' feature for HTTP downloads. Normally, Wget
1427 asks the server to keep the connection open so that, when you download
1428 more than one document from the same server, they get transferred over
1429 the same TCP connection. This saves time and at the same time reduces
1430 the load on the server.
1432 This option is useful when, for some reason, persistent (keep-alive)
1433 connections don't work for you, for example due to a server bug or due
1434 to the inability of server-side scripts to cope with the connections.
1437 @node Recursive Retrieval Options
1438 @section Recursive Retrieval Options
1443 Turn on recursive retrieving. @xref{Recursive Download}, for more
1446 @item -l @var{depth}
1447 @itemx --level=@var{depth}
1448 Specify recursion maximum depth level @var{depth} (@pxref{Recursive
1449 Download}). The default maximum depth is 5.
1451 @cindex proxy filling
1452 @cindex delete after retrieval
1453 @cindex filling proxy cache
1454 @item --delete-after
1455 This option tells Wget to delete every single file it downloads,
1456 @emph{after} having done so. It is useful for pre-fetching popular
1457 pages through a proxy, e.g.:
1460 wget -r -nd --delete-after http://whatever.com/~popular/page/
1463 The @samp{-r} option is to retrieve recursively, and @samp{-nd} to not
1466 Note that @samp{--delete-after} deletes files on the local machine. It
1467 does not issue the @samp{DELE} command to remote FTP sites, for
1468 instance. Also note that when @samp{--delete-after} is specified,
1469 @samp{--convert-links} is ignored, so @samp{.orig} files are simply not
1470 created in the first place.
1472 @cindex conversion of links
1473 @cindex link conversion
1475 @itemx --convert-links
1476 After the download is complete, convert the links in the document to
1477 make them suitable for local viewing. This affects not only the visible
1478 hyperlinks, but any part of the document that links to external content,
1479 such as embedded images, links to style sheets, hyperlinks to non-@sc{html}
1482 Each link will be changed in one of the two ways:
1486 The links to files that have been downloaded by Wget will be changed to
1487 refer to the file they point to as a relative link.
1489 Example: if the downloaded file @file{/foo/doc.html} links to
1490 @file{/bar/img.gif}, also downloaded, then the link in @file{doc.html}
1491 will be modified to point to @samp{../bar/img.gif}. This kind of
1492 transformation works reliably for arbitrary combinations of directories.
1495 The links to files that have not been downloaded by Wget will be changed
1496 to include host name and absolute path of the location they point to.
1498 Example: if the downloaded file @file{/foo/doc.html} links to
1499 @file{/bar/img.gif} (or to @file{../bar/img.gif}), then the link in
1500 @file{doc.html} will be modified to point to
1501 @file{http://@var{hostname}/bar/img.gif}.
1504 Because of this, local browsing works reliably: if a linked file was
1505 downloaded, the link will refer to its local name; if it was not
1506 downloaded, the link will refer to its full Internet address rather than
1507 presenting a broken link. The fact that the former links are converted
1508 to relative links ensures that you can move the downloaded hierarchy to
1511 Note that only at the end of the download can Wget know which links have
1512 been downloaded. Because of that, the work done by @samp{-k} will be
1513 performed at the end of all the downloads.
1515 @cindex backing up converted files
1517 @itemx --backup-converted
1518 When converting a file, back up the original version with a @samp{.orig}
1519 suffix. Affects the behavior of @samp{-N} (@pxref{HTTP Time-Stamping
1524 Turn on options suitable for mirroring. This option turns on recursion
1525 and time-stamping, sets infinite recursion depth and keeps @sc{ftp}
1526 directory listings. It is currently equivalent to
1527 @samp{-r -N -l inf --no-remove-listing}.
1529 @cindex page requisites
1530 @cindex required images, downloading
1532 @itemx --page-requisites
1533 This option causes Wget to download all the files that are necessary to
1534 properly display a given @sc{html} page. This includes such things as
1535 inlined images, sounds, and referenced stylesheets.
1537 Ordinarily, when downloading a single @sc{html} page, any requisite documents
1538 that may be needed to display it properly are not downloaded. Using
1539 @samp{-r} together with @samp{-l} can help, but since Wget does not
1540 ordinarily distinguish between external and inlined documents, one is
1541 generally left with ``leaf documents'' that are missing their
1544 For instance, say document @file{1.html} contains an @code{<IMG>} tag
1545 referencing @file{1.gif} and an @code{<A>} tag pointing to external
1546 document @file{2.html}. Say that @file{2.html} is similar but that its
1547 image is @file{2.gif} and it links to @file{3.html}. Say this
1548 continues up to some arbitrarily high number.
1550 If one executes the command:
1553 wget -r -l 2 http://@var{site}/1.html
1556 then @file{1.html}, @file{1.gif}, @file{2.html}, @file{2.gif}, and
1557 @file{3.html} will be downloaded. As you can see, @file{3.html} is
1558 without its requisite @file{3.gif} because Wget is simply counting the
1559 number of hops (up to 2) away from @file{1.html} in order to determine
1560 where to stop the recursion. However, with this command:
1563 wget -r -l 2 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1566 all the above files @emph{and} @file{3.html}'s requisite @file{3.gif}
1567 will be downloaded. Similarly,
1570 wget -r -l 1 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1573 will cause @file{1.html}, @file{1.gif}, @file{2.html}, and @file{2.gif}
1574 to be downloaded. One might think that:
1577 wget -r -l 0 -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1580 would download just @file{1.html} and @file{1.gif}, but unfortunately
1581 this is not the case, because @samp{-l 0} is equivalent to
1582 @samp{-l inf}---that is, infinite recursion. To download a single @sc{html}
1583 page (or a handful of them, all specified on the command-line or in a
1584 @samp{-i} @sc{url} input file) and its (or their) requisites, simply leave off
1585 @samp{-r} and @samp{-l}:
1588 wget -p http://@var{site}/1.html
1591 Note that Wget will behave as if @samp{-r} had been specified, but only
1592 that single page and its requisites will be downloaded. Links from that
1593 page to external documents will not be followed. Actually, to download
1594 a single page and all its requisites (even if they exist on separate
1595 websites), and make sure the lot displays properly locally, this author
1596 likes to use a few options in addition to @samp{-p}:
1599 wget -E -H -k -K -p http://@var{site}/@var{document}
1602 To finish off this topic, it's worth knowing that Wget's idea of an
1603 external document link is any URL specified in an @code{<A>} tag, an
1604 @code{<AREA>} tag, or a @code{<LINK>} tag other than @code{<LINK
1607 @cindex @sc{html} comments
1608 @cindex comments, @sc{html}
1609 @item --strict-comments
1610 Turn on strict parsing of @sc{html} comments. The default is to terminate
1611 comments at the first occurrence of @samp{-->}.
1613 According to specifications, @sc{html} comments are expressed as @sc{sgml}
1614 @dfn{declarations}. Declaration is special markup that begins with
1615 @samp{<!} and ends with @samp{>}, such as @samp{<!DOCTYPE ...>}, that
1616 may contain comments between a pair of @samp{--} delimiters. @sc{html}
1617 comments are ``empty declarations'', @sc{sgml} declarations without any
1618 non-comment text. Therefore, @samp{<!--foo-->} is a valid comment, and
1619 so is @samp{<!--one-- --two-->}, but @samp{<!--1--2-->} is not.
1621 On the other hand, most @sc{html} writers don't perceive comments as anything
1622 other than text delimited with @samp{<!--} and @samp{-->}, which is not
1623 quite the same. For example, something like @samp{<!------------>}
1624 works as a valid comment as long as the number of dashes is a multiple
1625 of four (!). If not, the comment technically lasts until the next
1626 @samp{--}, which may be at the other end of the document. Because of
1627 this, many popular browsers completely ignore the specification and
1628 implement what users have come to expect: comments delimited with
1629 @samp{<!--} and @samp{-->}.
1631 Until version 1.9, Wget interpreted comments strictly, which resulted in
1632 missing links in many web pages that displayed fine in browsers, but had
1633 the misfortune of containing non-compliant comments. Beginning with
1634 version 1.9, Wget has joined the ranks of clients that implements
1635 ``naive'' comments, terminating each comment at the first occurrence of
1638 If, for whatever reason, you want strict comment parsing, use this
1639 option to turn it on.
1642 @node Recursive Accept/Reject Options
1643 @section Recursive Accept/Reject Options
1646 @item -A @var{acclist} --accept @var{acclist}
1647 @itemx -R @var{rejlist} --reject @var{rejlist}
1648 Specify comma-separated lists of file name suffixes or patterns to
1649 accept or reject (@pxref{Types of Files} for more details).
1651 @item -D @var{domain-list}
1652 @itemx --domains=@var{domain-list}
1653 Set domains to be followed. @var{domain-list} is a comma-separated list
1654 of domains. Note that it does @emph{not} turn on @samp{-H}.
1656 @item --exclude-domains @var{domain-list}
1657 Specify the domains that are @emph{not} to be followed.
1658 (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
1660 @cindex follow FTP links
1662 Follow @sc{ftp} links from @sc{html} documents. Without this option,
1663 Wget will ignore all the @sc{ftp} links.
1665 @cindex tag-based recursive pruning
1666 @item --follow-tags=@var{list}
1667 Wget has an internal table of @sc{html} tag / attribute pairs that it
1668 considers when looking for linked documents during a recursive
1669 retrieval. If a user wants only a subset of those tags to be
1670 considered, however, he or she should be specify such tags in a
1671 comma-separated @var{list} with this option.
1673 @item --ignore-tags=@var{list}
1674 This is the opposite of the @samp{--follow-tags} option. To skip
1675 certain @sc{html} tags when recursively looking for documents to download,
1676 specify them in a comma-separated @var{list}.
1678 In the past, this option was the best bet for downloading a single page
1679 and its requisites, using a command-line like:
1682 wget --ignore-tags=a,area -H -k -K -r http://@var{site}/@var{document}
1685 However, the author of this option came across a page with tags like
1686 @code{<LINK REL="home" HREF="/">} and came to the realization that
1687 specifying tags to ignore was not enough. One can't just tell Wget to
1688 ignore @code{<LINK>}, because then stylesheets will not be downloaded.
1689 Now the best bet for downloading a single page and its requisites is the
1690 dedicated @samp{--page-requisites} option.
1694 Enable spanning across hosts when doing recursive retrieving
1695 (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
1699 Follow relative links only. Useful for retrieving a specific home page
1700 without any distractions, not even those from the same hosts
1701 (@pxref{Relative Links}).
1704 @itemx --include-directories=@var{list}
1705 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to follow when
1706 downloading (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits} for more details.) Elements
1707 of @var{list} may contain wildcards.
1710 @itemx --exclude-directories=@var{list}
1711 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to exclude from
1712 download (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits} for more details.) Elements of
1713 @var{list} may contain wildcards.
1717 Do not ever ascend to the parent directory when retrieving recursively.
1718 This is a useful option, since it guarantees that only the files
1719 @emph{below} a certain hierarchy will be downloaded.
1720 @xref{Directory-Based Limits}, for more details.
1725 @node Recursive Download
1726 @chapter Recursive Download
1729 @cindex recursive download
1731 GNU Wget is capable of traversing parts of the Web (or a single
1732 @sc{http} or @sc{ftp} server), following links and directory structure.
1733 We refer to this as to @dfn{recursive retrieval}, or @dfn{recursion}.
1735 With @sc{http} @sc{url}s, Wget retrieves and parses the @sc{html} from
1736 the given @sc{url}, documents, retrieving the files the @sc{html}
1737 document was referring to, through markup like @code{href}, or
1738 @code{src}. If the freshly downloaded file is also of type
1739 @code{text/html} or @code{application/xhtml+xml}, it will be parsed and
1742 Recursive retrieval of @sc{http} and @sc{html} content is
1743 @dfn{breadth-first}. This means that Wget first downloads the requested
1744 @sc{html} document, then the documents linked from that document, then the
1745 documents linked by them, and so on. In other words, Wget first
1746 downloads the documents at depth 1, then those at depth 2, and so on
1747 until the specified maximum depth.
1749 The maximum @dfn{depth} to which the retrieval may descend is specified
1750 with the @samp{-l} option. The default maximum depth is five layers.
1752 When retrieving an @sc{ftp} @sc{url} recursively, Wget will retrieve all
1753 the data from the given directory tree (including the subdirectories up
1754 to the specified depth) on the remote server, creating its mirror image
1755 locally. @sc{ftp} retrieval is also limited by the @code{depth}
1756 parameter. Unlike @sc{http} recursion, @sc{ftp} recursion is performed
1759 By default, Wget will create a local directory tree, corresponding to
1760 the one found on the remote server.
1762 Recursive retrieving can find a number of applications, the most
1763 important of which is mirroring. It is also useful for @sc{www}
1764 presentations, and any other opportunities where slow network
1765 connections should be bypassed by storing the files locally.
1767 You should be warned that recursive downloads can overload the remote
1768 servers. Because of that, many administrators frown upon them and may
1769 ban access from your site if they detect very fast downloads of big
1770 amounts of content. When downloading from Internet servers, consider
1771 using the @samp{-w} option to introduce a delay between accesses to the
1772 server. The download will take a while longer, but the server
1773 administrator will not be alarmed by your rudeness.
1775 Of course, recursive download may cause problems on your machine. If
1776 left to run unchecked, it can easily fill up the disk. If downloading
1777 from local network, it can also take bandwidth on the system, as well as
1778 consume memory and CPU.
1780 Try to specify the criteria that match the kind of download you are
1781 trying to achieve. If you want to download only one page, use
1782 @samp{--page-requisites} without any additional recursion. If you want
1783 to download things under one directory, use @samp{-np} to avoid
1784 downloading things from other directories. If you want to download all
1785 the files from one directory, use @samp{-l 1} to make sure the recursion
1786 depth never exceeds one. @xref{Following Links}, for more information
1789 Recursive retrieval should be used with care. Don't say you were not
1792 @node Following Links
1793 @chapter Following Links
1795 @cindex following links
1797 When retrieving recursively, one does not wish to retrieve loads of
1798 unnecessary data. Most of the time the users bear in mind exactly what
1799 they want to download, and want Wget to follow only specific links.
1801 For example, if you wish to download the music archive from
1802 @samp{fly.srk.fer.hr}, you will not want to download all the home pages
1803 that happen to be referenced by an obscure part of the archive.
1805 Wget possesses several mechanisms that allows you to fine-tune which
1806 links it will follow.
1809 * Spanning Hosts:: (Un)limiting retrieval based on host name.
1810 * Types of Files:: Getting only certain files.
1811 * Directory-Based Limits:: Getting only certain directories.
1812 * Relative Links:: Follow relative links only.
1813 * FTP Links:: Following FTP links.
1816 @node Spanning Hosts
1817 @section Spanning Hosts
1818 @cindex spanning hosts
1819 @cindex hosts, spanning
1821 Wget's recursive retrieval normally refuses to visit hosts different
1822 than the one you specified on the command line. This is a reasonable
1823 default; without it, every retrieval would have the potential to turn
1824 your Wget into a small version of google.
1826 However, visiting different hosts, or @dfn{host spanning,} is sometimes
1827 a useful option. Maybe the images are served from a different server.
1828 Maybe you're mirroring a site that consists of pages interlinked between
1829 three servers. Maybe the server has two equivalent names, and the @sc{html}
1830 pages refer to both interchangeably.
1833 @item Span to any host---@samp{-H}
1835 The @samp{-H} option turns on host spanning, thus allowing Wget's
1836 recursive run to visit any host referenced by a link. Unless sufficient
1837 recursion-limiting criteria are applied depth, these foreign hosts will
1838 typically link to yet more hosts, and so on until Wget ends up sucking
1839 up much more data than you have intended.
1841 @item Limit spanning to certain domains---@samp{-D}
1843 The @samp{-D} option allows you to specify the domains that will be
1844 followed, thus limiting the recursion only to the hosts that belong to
1845 these domains. Obviously, this makes sense only in conjunction with
1846 @samp{-H}. A typical example would be downloading the contents of
1847 @samp{www.server.com}, but allowing downloads from
1848 @samp{images.server.com}, etc.:
1851 wget -rH -Dserver.com http://www.server.com/
1854 You can specify more than one address by separating them with a comma,
1855 e.g. @samp{-Ddomain1.com,domain2.com}.
1857 @item Keep download off certain domains---@samp{--exclude-domains}
1859 If there are domains you want to exclude specifically, you can do it
1860 with @samp{--exclude-domains}, which accepts the same type of arguments
1861 of @samp{-D}, but will @emph{exclude} all the listed domains. For
1862 example, if you want to download all the hosts from @samp{foo.edu}
1863 domain, with the exception of @samp{sunsite.foo.edu}, you can do it like
1867 wget -rH -Dfoo.edu --exclude-domains sunsite.foo.edu \
1873 @node Types of Files
1874 @section Types of Files
1875 @cindex types of files
1877 When downloading material from the web, you will often want to restrict
1878 the retrieval to only certain file types. For example, if you are
1879 interested in downloading @sc{gif}s, you will not be overjoyed to get
1880 loads of PostScript documents, and vice versa.
1882 Wget offers two options to deal with this problem. Each option
1883 description lists a short name, a long name, and the equivalent command
1886 @cindex accept wildcards
1887 @cindex accept suffixes
1888 @cindex wildcards, accept
1889 @cindex suffixes, accept
1891 @item -A @var{acclist}
1892 @itemx --accept @var{acclist}
1893 @itemx accept = @var{acclist}
1894 The argument to @samp{--accept} option is a list of file suffixes or
1895 patterns that Wget will download during recursive retrieval. A suffix
1896 is the ending part of a file, and consists of ``normal'' letters,
1897 e.g. @samp{gif} or @samp{.jpg}. A matching pattern contains shell-like
1898 wildcards, e.g. @samp{books*} or @samp{zelazny*196[0-9]*}.
1900 So, specifying @samp{wget -A gif,jpg} will make Wget download only the
1901 files ending with @samp{gif} or @samp{jpg}, i.e. @sc{gif}s and
1902 @sc{jpeg}s. On the other hand, @samp{wget -A "zelazny*196[0-9]*"} will
1903 download only files beginning with @samp{zelazny} and containing numbers
1904 from 1960 to 1969 anywhere within. Look up the manual of your shell for
1905 a description of how pattern matching works.
1907 Of course, any number of suffixes and patterns can be combined into a
1908 comma-separated list, and given as an argument to @samp{-A}.
1910 @cindex reject wildcards
1911 @cindex reject suffixes
1912 @cindex wildcards, reject
1913 @cindex suffixes, reject
1914 @item -R @var{rejlist}
1915 @itemx --reject @var{rejlist}
1916 @itemx reject = @var{rejlist}
1917 The @samp{--reject} option works the same way as @samp{--accept}, only
1918 its logic is the reverse; Wget will download all files @emph{except} the
1919 ones matching the suffixes (or patterns) in the list.
1921 So, if you want to download a whole page except for the cumbersome
1922 @sc{mpeg}s and @sc{.au} files, you can use @samp{wget -R mpg,mpeg,au}.
1923 Analogously, to download all files except the ones beginning with
1924 @samp{bjork}, use @samp{wget -R "bjork*"}. The quotes are to prevent
1925 expansion by the shell.
1928 The @samp{-A} and @samp{-R} options may be combined to achieve even
1929 better fine-tuning of which files to retrieve. E.g. @samp{wget -A
1930 "*zelazny*" -R .ps} will download all the files having @samp{zelazny} as
1931 a part of their name, but @emph{not} the PostScript files.
1933 Note that these two options do not affect the downloading of @sc{html}
1934 files; Wget must load all the @sc{html}s to know where to go at
1935 all---recursive retrieval would make no sense otherwise.
1937 @node Directory-Based Limits
1938 @section Directory-Based Limits
1940 @cindex directory limits
1942 Regardless of other link-following facilities, it is often useful to
1943 place the restriction of what files to retrieve based on the directories
1944 those files are placed in. There can be many reasons for this---the
1945 home pages may be organized in a reasonable directory structure; or some
1946 directories may contain useless information, e.g. @file{/cgi-bin} or
1947 @file{/dev} directories.
1949 Wget offers three different options to deal with this requirement. Each
1950 option description lists a short name, a long name, and the equivalent
1951 command in @file{.wgetrc}.
1953 @cindex directories, include
1954 @cindex include directories
1955 @cindex accept directories
1958 @itemx --include @var{list}
1959 @itemx include_directories = @var{list}
1960 @samp{-I} option accepts a comma-separated list of directories included
1961 in the retrieval. Any other directories will simply be ignored. The
1962 directories are absolute paths.
1964 So, if you wish to download from @samp{http://host/people/bozo/}
1965 following only links to bozo's colleagues in the @file{/people}
1966 directory and the bogus scripts in @file{/cgi-bin}, you can specify:
1969 wget -I /people,/cgi-bin http://host/people/bozo/
1972 @cindex directories, exclude
1973 @cindex exclude directories
1974 @cindex reject directories
1976 @itemx --exclude @var{list}
1977 @itemx exclude_directories = @var{list}
1978 @samp{-X} option is exactly the reverse of @samp{-I}---this is a list of
1979 directories @emph{excluded} from the download. E.g. if you do not want
1980 Wget to download things from @file{/cgi-bin} directory, specify @samp{-X
1981 /cgi-bin} on the command line.
1983 The same as with @samp{-A}/@samp{-R}, these two options can be combined
1984 to get a better fine-tuning of downloading subdirectories. E.g. if you
1985 want to load all the files from @file{/pub} hierarchy except for
1986 @file{/pub/worthless}, specify @samp{-I/pub -X/pub/worthless}.
1991 @itemx no_parent = on
1992 The simplest, and often very useful way of limiting directories is
1993 disallowing retrieval of the links that refer to the hierarchy
1994 @dfn{above} than the beginning directory, i.e. disallowing ascent to the
1995 parent directory/directories.
1997 The @samp{--no-parent} option (short @samp{-np}) is useful in this case.
1998 Using it guarantees that you will never leave the existing hierarchy.
1999 Supposing you issue Wget with:
2002 wget -r --no-parent http://somehost/~luzer/my-archive/
2005 You may rest assured that none of the references to
2006 @file{/~his-girls-homepage/} or @file{/~luzer/all-my-mpegs/} will be
2007 followed. Only the archive you are interested in will be downloaded.
2008 Essentially, @samp{--no-parent} is similar to
2009 @samp{-I/~luzer/my-archive}, only it handles redirections in a more
2010 intelligent fashion.
2013 @node Relative Links
2014 @section Relative Links
2015 @cindex relative links
2017 When @samp{-L} is turned on, only the relative links are ever followed.
2018 Relative links are here defined those that do not refer to the web
2019 server root. For example, these links are relative:
2023 <a href="foo/bar.gif">
2024 <a href="../foo/bar.gif">
2027 These links are not relative:
2031 <a href="/foo/bar.gif">
2032 <a href="http://www.server.com/foo/bar.gif">
2035 Using this option guarantees that recursive retrieval will not span
2036 hosts, even without @samp{-H}. In simple cases it also allows downloads
2037 to ``just work'' without having to convert links.
2039 This option is probably not very useful and might be removed in a future
2043 @section Following FTP Links
2044 @cindex following ftp links
2046 The rules for @sc{ftp} are somewhat specific, as it is necessary for
2047 them to be. @sc{ftp} links in @sc{html} documents are often included
2048 for purposes of reference, and it is often inconvenient to download them
2051 To have @sc{ftp} links followed from @sc{html} documents, you need to
2052 specify the @samp{--follow-ftp} option. Having done that, @sc{ftp}
2053 links will span hosts regardless of @samp{-H} setting. This is logical,
2054 as @sc{ftp} links rarely point to the same host where the @sc{http}
2055 server resides. For similar reasons, the @samp{-L} options has no
2056 effect on such downloads. On the other hand, domain acceptance
2057 (@samp{-D}) and suffix rules (@samp{-A} and @samp{-R}) apply normally.
2059 Also note that followed links to @sc{ftp} directories will not be
2060 retrieved recursively further.
2063 @chapter Time-Stamping
2064 @cindex time-stamping
2065 @cindex timestamping
2066 @cindex updating the archives
2067 @cindex incremental updating
2069 One of the most important aspects of mirroring information from the
2070 Internet is updating your archives.
2072 Downloading the whole archive again and again, just to replace a few
2073 changed files is expensive, both in terms of wasted bandwidth and money,
2074 and the time to do the update. This is why all the mirroring tools
2075 offer the option of incremental updating.
2077 Such an updating mechanism means that the remote server is scanned in
2078 search of @dfn{new} files. Only those new files will be downloaded in
2079 the place of the old ones.
2081 A file is considered new if one of these two conditions are met:
2085 A file of that name does not already exist locally.
2088 A file of that name does exist, but the remote file was modified more
2089 recently than the local file.
2092 To implement this, the program needs to be aware of the time of last
2093 modification of both local and remote files. We call this information the
2094 @dfn{time-stamp} of a file.
2096 The time-stamping in GNU Wget is turned on using @samp{--timestamping}
2097 (@samp{-N}) option, or through @code{timestamping = on} directive in
2098 @file{.wgetrc}. With this option, for each file it intends to download,
2099 Wget will check whether a local file of the same name exists. If it
2100 does, and the remote file is older, Wget will not download it.
2102 If the local file does not exist, or the sizes of the files do not
2103 match, Wget will download the remote file no matter what the time-stamps
2107 * Time-Stamping Usage::
2108 * HTTP Time-Stamping Internals::
2109 * FTP Time-Stamping Internals::
2112 @node Time-Stamping Usage
2113 @section Time-Stamping Usage
2114 @cindex time-stamping usage
2115 @cindex usage, time-stamping
2117 The usage of time-stamping is simple. Say you would like to download a
2118 file so that it keeps its date of modification.
2121 wget -S http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/
2124 A simple @code{ls -l} shows that the time stamp on the local file equals
2125 the state of the @code{Last-Modified} header, as returned by the server.
2126 As you can see, the time-stamping info is preserved locally, even
2127 without @samp{-N} (at least for @sc{http}).
2129 Several days later, you would like Wget to check if the remote file has
2130 changed, and download it if it has.
2133 wget -N http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/
2136 Wget will ask the server for the last-modified date. If the local file
2137 has the same timestamp as the server, or a newer one, the remote file
2138 will not be re-fetched. However, if the remote file is more recent,
2139 Wget will proceed to fetch it.
2141 The same goes for @sc{ftp}. For example:
2144 wget "ftp://ftp.ifi.uio.no/pub/emacs/gnus/*"
2147 (The quotes around that URL are to prevent the shell from trying to
2148 interpret the @samp{*}.)
2150 After download, a local directory listing will show that the timestamps
2151 match those on the remote server. Reissuing the command with @samp{-N}
2152 will make Wget re-fetch @emph{only} the files that have been modified
2153 since the last download.
2155 If you wished to mirror the GNU archive every week, you would use a
2156 command like the following, weekly:
2159 wget --timestamping -r ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/
2162 Note that time-stamping will only work for files for which the server
2163 gives a timestamp. For @sc{http}, this depends on getting a
2164 @code{Last-Modified} header. For @sc{ftp}, this depends on getting a
2165 directory listing with dates in a format that Wget can parse
2166 (@pxref{FTP Time-Stamping Internals}).
2168 @node HTTP Time-Stamping Internals
2169 @section HTTP Time-Stamping Internals
2170 @cindex http time-stamping
2172 Time-stamping in @sc{http} is implemented by checking of the
2173 @code{Last-Modified} header. If you wish to retrieve the file
2174 @file{foo.html} through @sc{http}, Wget will check whether
2175 @file{foo.html} exists locally. If it doesn't, @file{foo.html} will be
2176 retrieved unconditionally.
2178 If the file does exist locally, Wget will first check its local
2179 time-stamp (similar to the way @code{ls -l} checks it), and then send a
2180 @code{HEAD} request to the remote server, demanding the information on
2183 The @code{Last-Modified} header is examined to find which file was
2184 modified more recently (which makes it ``newer''). If the remote file
2185 is newer, it will be downloaded; if it is older, Wget will give
2186 up.@footnote{As an additional check, Wget will look at the
2187 @code{Content-Length} header, and compare the sizes; if they are not the
2188 same, the remote file will be downloaded no matter what the time-stamp
2191 When @samp{--backup-converted} (@samp{-K}) is specified in conjunction
2192 with @samp{-N}, server file @samp{@var{X}} is compared to local file
2193 @samp{@var{X}.orig}, if extant, rather than being compared to local file
2194 @samp{@var{X}}, which will always differ if it's been converted by
2195 @samp{--convert-links} (@samp{-k}).
2197 Arguably, @sc{http} time-stamping should be implemented using the
2198 @code{If-Modified-Since} request.
2200 @node FTP Time-Stamping Internals
2201 @section FTP Time-Stamping Internals
2202 @cindex ftp time-stamping
2204 In theory, @sc{ftp} time-stamping works much the same as @sc{http}, only
2205 @sc{ftp} has no headers---time-stamps must be ferreted out of directory
2208 If an @sc{ftp} download is recursive or uses globbing, Wget will use the
2209 @sc{ftp} @code{LIST} command to get a file listing for the directory
2210 containing the desired file(s). It will try to analyze the listing,
2211 treating it like Unix @code{ls -l} output, extracting the time-stamps.
2212 The rest is exactly the same as for @sc{http}. Note that when
2213 retrieving individual files from an @sc{ftp} server without using
2214 globbing or recursion, listing files will not be downloaded (and thus
2215 files will not be time-stamped) unless @samp{-N} is specified.
2217 Assumption that every directory listing is a Unix-style listing may
2218 sound extremely constraining, but in practice it is not, as many
2219 non-Unix @sc{ftp} servers use the Unixoid listing format because most
2220 (all?) of the clients understand it. Bear in mind that @sc{rfc959}
2221 defines no standard way to get a file list, let alone the time-stamps.
2222 We can only hope that a future standard will define this.
2224 Another non-standard solution includes the use of @code{MDTM} command
2225 that is supported by some @sc{ftp} servers (including the popular
2226 @code{wu-ftpd}), which returns the exact time of the specified file.
2227 Wget may support this command in the future.
2230 @chapter Startup File
2231 @cindex startup file
2237 Once you know how to change default settings of Wget through command
2238 line arguments, you may wish to make some of those settings permanent.
2239 You can do that in a convenient way by creating the Wget startup
2240 file---@file{.wgetrc}.
2242 Besides @file{.wgetrc} is the ``main'' initialization file, it is
2243 convenient to have a special facility for storing passwords. Thus Wget
2244 reads and interprets the contents of @file{$HOME/.netrc}, if it finds
2245 it. You can find @file{.netrc} format in your system manuals.
2247 Wget reads @file{.wgetrc} upon startup, recognizing a limited set of
2251 * Wgetrc Location:: Location of various wgetrc files.
2252 * Wgetrc Syntax:: Syntax of wgetrc.
2253 * Wgetrc Commands:: List of available commands.
2254 * Sample Wgetrc:: A wgetrc example.
2257 @node Wgetrc Location
2258 @section Wgetrc Location
2259 @cindex wgetrc location
2260 @cindex location of wgetrc
2262 When initializing, Wget will look for a @dfn{global} startup file,
2263 @file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default (or some prefix other than
2264 @file{/usr/local}, if Wget was not installed there) and read commands
2265 from there, if it exists.
2267 Then it will look for the user's file. If the environmental variable
2268 @code{WGETRC} is set, Wget will try to load that file. Failing that, no
2269 further attempts will be made.
2271 If @code{WGETRC} is not set, Wget will try to load @file{$HOME/.wgetrc}.
2273 The fact that user's settings are loaded after the system-wide ones
2274 means that in case of collision user's wgetrc @emph{overrides} the
2275 system-wide wgetrc (in @file{/usr/local/etc/wgetrc} by default).
2276 Fascist admins, away!
2279 @section Wgetrc Syntax
2280 @cindex wgetrc syntax
2281 @cindex syntax of wgetrc
2283 The syntax of a wgetrc command is simple:
2289 The @dfn{variable} will also be called @dfn{command}. Valid
2290 @dfn{values} are different for different commands.
2292 The commands are case-insensitive and underscore-insensitive. Thus
2293 @samp{DIr__PrefiX} is the same as @samp{dirprefix}. Empty lines, lines
2294 beginning with @samp{#} and lines containing white-space only are
2297 Commands that expect a comma-separated list will clear the list on an
2298 empty command. So, if you wish to reset the rejection list specified in
2299 global @file{wgetrc}, you can do it with:
2305 @node Wgetrc Commands
2306 @section Wgetrc Commands
2307 @cindex wgetrc commands
2309 The complete set of commands is listed below. Legal values are listed
2310 after the @samp{=}. Simple Boolean values can be set or unset using
2311 @samp{on} and @samp{off} or @samp{1} and @samp{0}. A fancier kind of
2312 Boolean allowed in some cases is the @dfn{lockable Boolean}, which may
2313 be set to @samp{on}, @samp{off}, @samp{always}, or @samp{never}. If an
2314 option is set to @samp{always} or @samp{never}, that value will be
2315 locked in for the duration of the Wget invocation---command-line options
2318 Some commands take pseudo-arbitrary values. @var{address} values can be
2319 hostnames or dotted-quad IP addresses. @var{n} can be any positive
2320 integer, or @samp{inf} for infinity, where appropriate. @var{string}
2321 values can be any non-empty string.
2323 Most of these commands have direct command-line equivalents. Also, any
2324 wgetrc command can be specified on the command line using the
2325 @samp{--execute} switch (@pxref{Basic Startup Options}.)
2328 @item accept/reject = @var{string}
2329 Same as @samp{-A}/@samp{-R} (@pxref{Types of Files}).
2331 @item add_hostdir = on/off
2332 Enable/disable host-prefixed file names. @samp{-nH} disables it.
2334 @item continue = on/off
2335 If set to on, force continuation of preexistent partially retrieved
2336 files. See @samp{-c} before setting it.
2338 @item background = on/off
2339 Enable/disable going to background---the same as @samp{-b} (which
2342 @item backup_converted = on/off
2343 Enable/disable saving pre-converted files with the suffix
2344 @samp{.orig}---the same as @samp{-K} (which enables it).
2346 @c @item backups = @var{number}
2347 @c #### Document me!
2349 @item base = @var{string}
2350 Consider relative @sc{url}s in @sc{url} input files forced to be
2351 interpreted as @sc{html} as being relative to @var{string}---the same as
2354 @item bind_address = @var{address}
2355 Bind to @var{address}, like the @samp{--bind-address} option.
2357 @item cache = on/off
2358 When set to off, disallow server-caching. See the @samp{--no-cache}
2361 @item convert_links = on/off
2362 Convert non-relative links locally. The same as @samp{-k}.
2364 @item cookies = on/off
2365 When set to off, disallow cookies. See the @samp{--cookies} option.
2367 @item load_cookies = @var{file}
2368 Load cookies from @var{file}. See @samp{--load-cookies}.
2370 @item save_cookies = @var{file}
2371 Save cookies to @var{file}. See @samp{--save-cookies}.
2373 @item connect_timeout = @var{n}
2374 Set the connect timeout---the same as @samp{--connect-timeout}.
2376 @item cut_dirs = @var{n}
2377 Ignore @var{n} remote directory components.
2379 @item debug = on/off
2380 Debug mode, same as @samp{-d}.
2382 @item delete_after = on/off
2383 Delete after download---the same as @samp{--delete-after}.
2385 @item dir_prefix = @var{string}
2386 Top of directory tree---the same as @samp{-P}.
2388 @item dirstruct = on/off
2389 Turning dirstruct on or off---the same as @samp{-x} or @samp{-nd},
2392 @item dns_cache = on/off
2393 Turn DNS caching on/off. Since DNS caching is on by default, this
2394 option is normally used to turn it off. Same as @samp{--dns-cache}.
2396 @item dns_timeout = @var{n}
2397 Set the DNS timeout---the same as @samp{--dns-timeout}.
2399 @item domains = @var{string}
2400 Same as @samp{-D} (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
2402 @item dot_bytes = @var{n}
2403 Specify the number of bytes ``contained'' in a dot, as seen throughout
2404 the retrieval (1024 by default). You can postfix the value with
2405 @samp{k} or @samp{m}, representing kilobytes and megabytes,
2406 respectively. With dot settings you can tailor the dot retrieval to
2407 suit your needs, or you can use the predefined @dfn{styles}
2408 (@pxref{Download Options}).
2410 @item dots_in_line = @var{n}
2411 Specify the number of dots that will be printed in each line throughout
2412 the retrieval (50 by default).
2414 @item dot_spacing = @var{n}
2415 Specify the number of dots in a single cluster (10 by default).
2417 @item egd_file = @var{string}
2418 Use @var{string} as the EGD socket file name. The same as
2421 @item exclude_directories = @var{string}
2422 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to exclude from
2423 download---the same as @samp{-X} (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}).
2425 @item exclude_domains = @var{string}
2426 Same as @samp{--exclude-domains} (@pxref{Spanning Hosts}).
2428 @item follow_ftp = on/off
2429 Follow @sc{ftp} links from @sc{html} documents---the same as
2430 @samp{--follow-ftp}.
2432 @item follow_tags = @var{string}
2433 Only follow certain @sc{html} tags when doing a recursive retrieval, just like
2434 @samp{--follow-tags}.
2436 @item force_html = on/off
2437 If set to on, force the input filename to be regarded as an @sc{html}
2438 document---the same as @samp{-F}.
2440 @item ftp_passwd = @var{string}
2441 Set your @sc{ftp} password to @var{string}. Without this setting, the
2442 password defaults to @samp{-wget@@}, which is a useful default for
2443 anonymous @sc{ftp} access.
2445 This command used to be named @code{passwd} prior to Wget 1.10.
2447 @item ftp_proxy = @var{string}
2448 Use @var{string} as @sc{ftp} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2452 Turn globbing on/off---the same as @samp{--glob} and @samp{--no-glob}.
2454 @item header = @var{string}
2455 Define an additional header, like @samp{--header}.
2457 @item html_extension = on/off
2458 Add a @samp{.html} extension to @samp{text/html} or
2459 @samp{application/xhtml+xml} files without it, like
2462 @item http_keep_alive = on/off
2463 Turn the keep-alive feature on or off (defaults to on). The same as
2464 `--http-keep-alive'.
2466 @item http_passwd = @var{string}
2467 Set @sc{http} password.
2469 @item http_proxy = @var{string}
2470 Use @var{string} as @sc{http} proxy, instead of the one specified in
2473 @item http_user = @var{string}
2474 Set @sc{http} user to @var{string}.
2476 @item ignore_length = on/off
2477 When set to on, ignore @code{Content-Length} header; the same as
2478 @samp{--ignore-length}.
2480 @item ignore_tags = @var{string}
2481 Ignore certain @sc{html} tags when doing a recursive retrieval, just like
2482 @samp{--ignore-tags}.
2484 @item include_directories = @var{string}
2485 Specify a comma-separated list of directories you wish to follow when
2486 downloading---the same as @samp{-I}.
2488 @item inet4_only = on/off
2489 Force connecting to IPv4 addresses, off by default. You can put this
2490 in the global init file to disable Wget's attempts to resolve and
2491 connect to IPv6 hosts. Available only if Wget was compiled with IPv6
2492 support. The same as @samp{--inet4-only} or @samp{-4}.
2494 @item inet6_only = on/off
2495 Force connecting to IPv6 addresses, off by default. Available only if
2496 Wget was compiled with IPv6 support. The same as @samp{--inet6-only}
2499 @item input = @var{string}
2500 Read the @sc{url}s from @var{string}, like @samp{-i}.
2502 @item kill_longer = on/off
2503 Consider data longer than specified in content-length header as invalid
2504 (and retry getting it). The default behavior is to save as much data
2505 as there is, provided there is more than or equal to the value in
2506 @code{Content-Length}.
2508 @item limit_rate = @var{rate}
2509 Limit the download speed to no more than @var{rate} bytes per second.
2510 The same as @samp{--limit-rate}.
2512 @item logfile = @var{string}
2513 Set logfile---the same as @samp{-o}.
2515 @item login = @var{string}
2516 Your user name on the remote machine, for @sc{ftp}. Defaults to
2519 @item mirror = on/off
2520 Turn mirroring on/off. The same as @samp{-m}.
2522 @item netrc = on/off
2523 Turn reading netrc on or off.
2525 @item noclobber = on/off
2528 @item no_parent = on/off
2529 Disallow retrieving outside the directory hierarchy, like
2530 @samp{--no-parent} (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}).
2532 @item no_proxy = @var{string}
2533 Use @var{string} as the comma-separated list of domains to avoid in
2534 proxy loading, instead of the one specified in environment.
2536 @item output_document = @var{string}
2537 Set the output filename---the same as @samp{-O}.
2539 @item page_requisites = on/off
2540 Download all ancillary documents necessary for a single @sc{html} page to
2541 display properly---the same as @samp{-p}.
2543 @item passive_ftp = on/off/always/never
2544 Change setting of passive @sc{ftp}, equivalent to the
2545 @samp{--passive-ftp} option. Some scripts and @samp{.pm} (Perl
2546 module) files download files using @samp{wget --passive-ftp}. If your
2547 firewall does not allow this, you can set @samp{passive_ftp = never}
2548 to override the command-line.
2550 @item post_data = @var{string}
2551 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send @var{string} in
2552 the request body. The same as @samp{--post-data}.
2554 @item post_file = @var{file}
2555 Use POST as the method for all HTTP requests and send the contents of
2556 @var{file} in the request body. The same as @samp{--post-file}.
2558 @item prefer_family = IPv4/IPv6/none
2559 When given a choice of several addresses, connect to the addresses
2560 with specified address family first. IPv4 addresses are preferred by
2561 default. The same as @samp{--prefer-family}, which see for a detailed
2562 discussion of why this is useful.
2564 @item progress = @var{string}
2565 Set the type of the progress indicator. Legal types are ``dot'' and
2568 @item protocol_directories = on/off
2569 When set, use the protocol name as a directory component of local file
2570 names. The same as @samp{--protocol-directories}.
2572 @item proxy_user = @var{string}
2573 Set proxy authentication user name to @var{string}, like @samp{--proxy-user}.
2575 @item proxy_passwd = @var{string}
2576 Set proxy authentication password to @var{string}, like @samp{--proxy-passwd}.
2578 @item quiet = on/off
2579 Quiet mode---the same as @samp{-q}.
2581 @item quota = @var{quota}
2582 Specify the download quota, which is useful to put in the global
2583 @file{wgetrc}. When download quota is specified, Wget will stop
2584 retrieving after the download sum has become greater than quota. The
2585 quota can be specified in bytes (default), kbytes @samp{k} appended) or
2586 mbytes (@samp{m} appended). Thus @samp{quota = 5m} will set the quota
2587 to 5 mbytes. Note that the user's startup file overrides system
2590 @item read_timeout = @var{n}
2591 Set the read (and write) timeout---the same as @samp{--read-timeout}.
2593 @item reclevel = @var{n}
2594 Recursion level---the same as @samp{-l}.
2596 @item recursive = on/off
2597 Recursive on/off---the same as @samp{-r}.
2599 @item referer = @var{string}
2600 Set HTTP @samp{Referer:} header just like @samp{--referer}. (Note it
2601 was the folks who wrote the @sc{http} spec who got the spelling of
2602 ``referrer'' wrong.)
2604 @item relative_only = on/off
2605 Follow only relative links---the same as @samp{-L} (@pxref{Relative
2608 @item remove_listing = on/off
2609 If set to on, remove @sc{ftp} listings downloaded by Wget. Setting it
2610 to off is the same as @samp{--no-remove-listing}.
2612 @item restrict_file_names = unix/windows
2613 Restrict the file names generated by Wget from URLs. See
2614 @samp{--restrict-file-names} for a more detailed description.
2616 @item retr_symlinks = on/off
2617 When set to on, retrieve symbolic links as if they were plain files; the
2618 same as @samp{--retr-symlinks}.
2620 @item robots = on/off
2621 Specify whether the norobots convention is respected by Wget, ``on'' by
2622 default. This switch controls both the @file{/robots.txt} and the
2623 @samp{nofollow} aspect of the spec. @xref{Robot Exclusion}, for more
2624 details about this. Be sure you know what you are doing before turning
2627 @item server_response = on/off
2628 Choose whether or not to print the @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} server
2629 responses---the same as @samp{-S}.
2631 @item span_hosts = on/off
2634 @item ssl_cert_file = @var{string}
2635 Set the client certificate file name to @var{string}. The same as
2636 @samp{--sslcertfile}.
2638 @item ssl_cert_key = @var{string}
2639 Set the certificate key file to @var{string}. The same as
2640 @samp{--sslcertkey}.
2642 @item ssl_ca_dir = @var{string}
2643 Set the directory used for certificate authorities. The same as
2646 @item ssl_ca_file = @var{string}
2647 Set the certificate authority bundle file to @var{string}. The same
2648 as @samp{--sslcafile}.
2650 @item ssl_cert_type = 0/1
2651 Specify the type of the client certificate: 0 means @code{PEM}
2652 (default), 1 means @code{ASN1} (@code{DER}). The same as
2653 @samp{--sslcerttype}.
2655 @item ssl_check_cert = 0/1
2656 If this is set to 1, the server certificate is checked against the
2657 specified client authorities. The same as @samp{--sslcheckcert}.
2659 @item ssl_protocol = 0-3
2660 Choose the SSL protocol to be used. 0 means choose automatically, 1
2661 means force SSLv2, 2 means force SSLv3, and 3 means force TLSv1. The
2662 same as @samp{--sslprotocol}.
2664 @item strict_comments = on/off
2665 Same as @samp{--strict-comments}.
2667 @item timeout = @var{n}
2668 Set timeout value---the same as @samp{-T}.
2670 @item timestamping = on/off
2671 Turn timestamping on/off. The same as @samp{-N} (@pxref{Time-Stamping}).
2673 @item tries = @var{n}
2674 Set number of retries per @sc{url}---the same as @samp{-t}.
2676 @item use_proxy = on/off
2677 Turn proxy support on/off. The same as @samp{-Y}.
2679 @item verbose = on/off
2680 Turn verbose on/off---the same as @samp{-v}/@samp{-nv}.
2682 @item wait = @var{n}
2683 Wait @var{n} seconds between retrievals---the same as @samp{-w}.
2685 @item waitretry = @var{n}
2686 Wait up to @var{n} seconds between retries of failed retrievals
2687 only---the same as @samp{--waitretry}. Note that this is turned on by
2688 default in the global @file{wgetrc}.
2690 @item randomwait = on/off
2691 Turn random between-request wait times on or off. The same as
2692 @samp{--random-wait}.
2696 @section Sample Wgetrc
2697 @cindex sample wgetrc
2699 This is the sample initialization file, as given in the distribution.
2700 It is divided in two section---one for global usage (suitable for global
2701 startup file), and one for local usage (suitable for
2702 @file{$HOME/.wgetrc}). Be careful about the things you change.
2704 Note that almost all the lines are commented out. For a command to have
2705 any effect, you must remove the @samp{#} character at the beginning of
2709 @include sample.wgetrc.munged_for_texi_inclusion
2716 @c man begin EXAMPLES
2717 The examples are divided into three sections loosely based on their
2721 * Simple Usage:: Simple, basic usage of the program.
2722 * Advanced Usage:: Advanced tips.
2723 * Very Advanced Usage:: The hairy stuff.
2727 @section Simple Usage
2731 Say you want to download a @sc{url}. Just type:
2734 wget http://fly.srk.fer.hr/
2738 But what will happen if the connection is slow, and the file is lengthy?
2739 The connection will probably fail before the whole file is retrieved,
2740 more than once. In this case, Wget will try getting the file until it
2741 either gets the whole of it, or exceeds the default number of retries
2742 (this being 20). It is easy to change the number of tries to 45, to
2743 insure that the whole file will arrive safely:
2746 wget --tries=45 http://fly.srk.fer.hr/jpg/flyweb.jpg
2750 Now let's leave Wget to work in the background, and write its progress
2751 to log file @file{log}. It is tiring to type @samp{--tries}, so we
2752 shall use @samp{-t}.
2755 wget -t 45 -o log http://fly.srk.fer.hr/jpg/flyweb.jpg &
2758 The ampersand at the end of the line makes sure that Wget works in the
2759 background. To unlimit the number of retries, use @samp{-t inf}.
2762 The usage of @sc{ftp} is as simple. Wget will take care of login and
2766 wget ftp://gnjilux.srk.fer.hr/welcome.msg
2770 If you specify a directory, Wget will retrieve the directory listing,
2771 parse it and convert it to @sc{html}. Try:
2774 wget ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/
2779 @node Advanced Usage
2780 @section Advanced Usage
2784 You have a file that contains the URLs you want to download? Use the
2791 If you specify @samp{-} as file name, the @sc{url}s will be read from
2795 Create a five levels deep mirror image of the GNU web site, with the
2796 same directory structure the original has, with only one try per
2797 document, saving the log of the activities to @file{gnulog}:
2800 wget -r http://www.gnu.org/ -o gnulog
2804 The same as the above, but convert the links in the @sc{html} files to
2805 point to local files, so you can view the documents off-line:
2808 wget --convert-links -r http://www.gnu.org/ -o gnulog
2812 Retrieve only one @sc{html} page, but make sure that all the elements needed
2813 for the page to be displayed, such as inline images and external style
2814 sheets, are also downloaded. Also make sure the downloaded page
2815 references the downloaded links.
2818 wget -p --convert-links http://www.server.com/dir/page.html
2821 The @sc{html} page will be saved to @file{www.server.com/dir/page.html}, and
2822 the images, stylesheets, etc., somewhere under @file{www.server.com/},
2823 depending on where they were on the remote server.
2826 The same as the above, but without the @file{www.server.com/} directory.
2827 In fact, I don't want to have all those random server directories
2828 anyway---just save @emph{all} those files under a @file{download/}
2829 subdirectory of the current directory.
2832 wget -p --convert-links -nH -nd -Pdownload \
2833 http://www.server.com/dir/page.html
2837 Retrieve the index.html of @samp{www.lycos.com}, showing the original
2841 wget -S http://www.lycos.com/
2845 Save the server headers with the file, perhaps for post-processing.
2848 wget -s http://www.lycos.com/
2853 Retrieve the first two levels of @samp{wuarchive.wustl.edu}, saving them
2857 wget -r -l2 -P/tmp ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/
2861 You want to download all the @sc{gif}s from a directory on an @sc{http}
2862 server. You tried @samp{wget http://www.server.com/dir/*.gif}, but that
2863 didn't work because @sc{http} retrieval does not support globbing. In
2867 wget -r -l1 --no-parent -A.gif http://www.server.com/dir/
2870 More verbose, but the effect is the same. @samp{-r -l1} means to
2871 retrieve recursively (@pxref{Recursive Download}), with maximum depth
2872 of 1. @samp{--no-parent} means that references to the parent directory
2873 are ignored (@pxref{Directory-Based Limits}), and @samp{-A.gif} means to
2874 download only the @sc{gif} files. @samp{-A "*.gif"} would have worked
2878 Suppose you were in the middle of downloading, when Wget was
2879 interrupted. Now you do not want to clobber the files already present.
2883 wget -nc -r http://www.gnu.org/
2887 If you want to encode your own username and password to @sc{http} or
2888 @sc{ftp}, use the appropriate @sc{url} syntax (@pxref{URL Format}).
2891 wget ftp://hniksic:mypassword@@unix.server.com/.emacs
2894 Note, however, that this usage is not advisable on multi-user systems
2895 because it reveals your password to anyone who looks at the output of
2898 @cindex redirecting output
2900 You would like the output documents to go to standard output instead of
2904 wget -O - http://jagor.srce.hr/ http://www.srce.hr/
2907 You can also combine the two options and make pipelines to retrieve the
2908 documents from remote hotlists:
2911 wget -O - http://cool.list.com/ | wget --force-html -i -
2915 @node Very Advanced Usage
2916 @section Very Advanced Usage
2921 If you wish Wget to keep a mirror of a page (or @sc{ftp}
2922 subdirectories), use @samp{--mirror} (@samp{-m}), which is the shorthand
2923 for @samp{-r -l inf -N}. You can put Wget in the crontab file asking it
2924 to recheck a site each Sunday:
2928 0 0 * * 0 wget --mirror http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2932 In addition to the above, you want the links to be converted for local
2933 viewing. But, after having read this manual, you know that link
2934 conversion doesn't play well with timestamping, so you also want Wget to
2935 back up the original @sc{html} files before the conversion. Wget invocation
2936 would look like this:
2939 wget --mirror --convert-links --backup-converted \
2940 http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2944 But you've also noticed that local viewing doesn't work all that well
2945 when @sc{html} files are saved under extensions other than @samp{.html},
2946 perhaps because they were served as @file{index.cgi}. So you'd like
2947 Wget to rename all the files served with content-type @samp{text/html}
2948 or @samp{application/xhtml+xml} to @file{@var{name}.html}.
2951 wget --mirror --convert-links --backup-converted \
2952 --html-extension -o /home/me/weeklog \
2956 Or, with less typing:
2959 wget -m -k -K -E http://www.gnu.org/ -o /home/me/weeklog
2968 This chapter contains all the stuff that could not fit anywhere else.
2971 * Proxies:: Support for proxy servers
2972 * Distribution:: Getting the latest version.
2973 * Mailing List:: Wget mailing list for announcements and discussion.
2974 * Reporting Bugs:: How and where to report bugs.
2975 * Portability:: The systems Wget works on.
2976 * Signals:: Signal-handling performed by Wget.
2983 @dfn{Proxies} are special-purpose @sc{http} servers designed to transfer
2984 data from remote servers to local clients. One typical use of proxies
2985 is lightening network load for users behind a slow connection. This is
2986 achieved by channeling all @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} requests through the
2987 proxy which caches the transferred data. When a cached resource is
2988 requested again, proxy will return the data from cache. Another use for
2989 proxies is for companies that separate (for security reasons) their
2990 internal networks from the rest of Internet. In order to obtain
2991 information from the Web, their users connect and retrieve remote data
2992 using an authorized proxy.
2994 Wget supports proxies for both @sc{http} and @sc{ftp} retrievals. The
2995 standard way to specify proxy location, which Wget recognizes, is using
2996 the following environment variables:
3000 This variable should contain the @sc{url} of the proxy for @sc{http}
3004 This variable should contain the @sc{url} of the proxy for @sc{ftp}
3005 connections. It is quite common that @sc{http_proxy} and @sc{ftp_proxy}
3006 are set to the same @sc{url}.
3009 This variable should contain a comma-separated list of domain extensions
3010 proxy should @emph{not} be used for. For instance, if the value of
3011 @code{no_proxy} is @samp{.mit.edu}, proxy will not be used to retrieve
3015 In addition to the environment variables, proxy location and settings
3016 may be specified from within Wget itself.
3022 @itemx proxy = on/off
3023 This option may be used to turn the proxy support on or off. Proxy
3024 support is on by default, provided that the appropriate environment
3027 @item http_proxy = @var{URL}
3028 @itemx ftp_proxy = @var{URL}
3029 @itemx no_proxy = @var{string}
3030 These startup file variables allow you to override the proxy settings
3031 specified by the environment.
3034 Some proxy servers require authorization to enable you to use them. The
3035 authorization consists of @dfn{username} and @dfn{password}, which must
3036 be sent by Wget. As with @sc{http} authorization, several
3037 authentication schemes exist. For proxy authorization only the
3038 @code{Basic} authentication scheme is currently implemented.
3040 You may specify your username and password either through the proxy
3041 @sc{url} or through the command-line options. Assuming that the
3042 company's proxy is located at @samp{proxy.company.com} at port 8001, a
3043 proxy @sc{url} location containing authorization data might look like
3047 http://hniksic:mypassword@@proxy.company.com:8001/
3050 Alternatively, you may use the @samp{proxy-user} and
3051 @samp{proxy-password} options, and the equivalent @file{.wgetrc}
3052 settings @code{proxy_user} and @code{proxy_passwd} to set the proxy
3053 username and password.
3056 @section Distribution
3057 @cindex latest version
3059 Like all GNU utilities, the latest version of Wget can be found at the
3060 master GNU archive site ftp.gnu.org, and its mirrors. For example,
3061 Wget @value{VERSION} can be found at
3062 @url{ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/wget/wget-@value{VERSION}.tar.gz}
3065 @section Mailing List
3066 @cindex mailing list
3069 There are several Wget-related mailing lists, all hosted by
3070 SunSITE.dk. The general discussion list is at
3071 @email{wget@@sunsite.dk}. It is the preferred place for bug reports
3072 and suggestions, as well as for discussion of development. You are
3073 invited to subscribe.
3075 To subscribe, simply send mail to @email{wget-subscribe@@sunsite.dk}
3076 and follow the instructions. Unsubscribe by mailing to
3077 @email{wget-unsubscribe@@sunsite.dk}. The mailing list is archived at
3078 @url{http://www.mail-archive.com/wget%40sunsite.dk/} and at
3079 @url{http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.web.wget.general}.
3081 The second mailing list is at @email{wget-patches@@sunsite.dk}, and is
3082 used to submit patches for review by Wget developers. A ``patch'' is
3083 a textual representation of change to source code, readable by both
3084 humans and programs. The file @file{PATCHES} that comes with Wget
3085 covers the creation and submitting of patches in detail. Please don't
3086 send general suggestions or bug reports to @samp{wget-patches}; use it
3087 only for patch submissions.
3089 To subscribe, simply send mail to @email{wget-subscribe@@sunsite.dk}
3090 and follow the instructions. Unsubscribe by mailing to
3091 @email{wget-unsubscribe@@sunsite.dk}. The mailing list is archived at
3092 @url{http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.web.wget.patches}.
3094 Finally, there is a read-only list at @email{wget-cvs@@sunsite.dk}
3095 that tracks commits to the Wget CVS repository. To subscribe to that
3096 list, send mail to @email{wget-cvs-subscribe@@sunsite.dk}. The list
3099 @node Reporting Bugs
3100 @section Reporting Bugs
3102 @cindex reporting bugs
3106 You are welcome to send bug reports about GNU Wget to
3107 @email{bug-wget@@gnu.org}.
3109 Before actually submitting a bug report, please try to follow a few
3114 Please try to ascertain that the behavior you see really is a bug. If
3115 Wget crashes, it's a bug. If Wget does not behave as documented,
3116 it's a bug. If things work strange, but you are not sure about the way
3117 they are supposed to work, it might well be a bug.
3120 Try to repeat the bug in as simple circumstances as possible. E.g. if
3121 Wget crashes while downloading @samp{wget -rl0 -kKE -t5 -Y0
3122 http://yoyodyne.com -o /tmp/log}, you should try to see if the crash is
3123 repeatable, and if will occur with a simpler set of options. You might
3124 even try to start the download at the page where the crash occurred to
3125 see if that page somehow triggered the crash.
3127 Also, while I will probably be interested to know the contents of your
3128 @file{.wgetrc} file, just dumping it into the debug message is probably
3129 a bad idea. Instead, you should first try to see if the bug repeats
3130 with @file{.wgetrc} moved out of the way. Only if it turns out that
3131 @file{.wgetrc} settings affect the bug, mail me the relevant parts of
3135 Please start Wget with @samp{-d} option and send us the resulting
3136 output (or relevant parts thereof). If Wget was compiled without
3137 debug support, recompile it---it is @emph{much} easier to trace bugs
3138 with debug support on.
3140 Note: please make sure to remove any potentially sensitive information
3141 from the debug log before sending it to the bug address. The
3142 @code{-d} won't go out of its way to collect sensitive information,
3143 but the log @emph{will} contain a fairly complete transcript of Wget's
3144 communication with the server, which may include passwords and pieces
3145 of downloaded data. Since the bug address is publically archived, you
3146 may assume that all bug reports are visible to the public.
3149 If Wget has crashed, try to run it in a debugger, e.g. @code{gdb `which
3150 wget` core} and type @code{where} to get the backtrace. This may not
3151 work if the system administrator has disabled core files, but it is
3157 @section Portability
3159 @cindex operating systems
3161 Like all GNU software, Wget works on the GNU system. However, since it
3162 uses GNU Autoconf for building and configuring, and mostly avoids using
3163 ``special'' features of any particular Unix, it should compile (and
3164 work) on all common Unix flavors.
3166 Various Wget versions have been compiled and tested under many kinds
3167 of Unix systems, including GNU/Linux, Solaris, SunOS 4.x, OSF (aka
3168 Digital Unix or Tru64), Ultrix, *BSD, IRIX, AIX, and others. Some of
3169 those systems are no longer in widespread use and may not be able to
3170 support recent versions of Wget. If Wget fails to compile on your
3171 system, we would like to know about it.
3173 Thanks to kind contributors, this version of Wget compiles and works
3174 on 32-bit Microsoft Windows platforms. It has been compiled
3175 successfully using MS Visual C++ 6.0, Watcom, Borland C, and GCC
3176 compilers. Naturally, it is crippled of some features available on
3177 Unix, but it should work as a substitute for people stuck with
3178 Windows. Note that Windows-specific portions of Wget are not
3179 guaranteed to be supported in the future, although this has been the
3180 case in practice for many years now. All questions and problems in
3181 Windows usage should be reported to Wget mailing list at
3182 @email{wget@@sunsite.dk} where the volunteers who maintain the
3183 Windows-related features might look at them.
3187 @cindex signal handling
3190 Since the purpose of Wget is background work, it catches the hangup
3191 signal (@code{SIGHUP}) and ignores it. If the output was on standard
3192 output, it will be redirected to a file named @file{wget-log}.
3193 Otherwise, @code{SIGHUP} is ignored. This is convenient when you wish
3194 to redirect the output of Wget after having started it.
3197 $ wget http://www.gnus.org/dist/gnus.tar.gz &
3200 SIGHUP received, redirecting output to `wget-log'.
3203 Other than that, Wget will not try to interfere with signals in any way.
3204 @kbd{C-c}, @code{kill -TERM} and @code{kill -KILL} should kill it alike.
3209 This chapter contains some references I consider useful.
3212 * Robot Exclusion:: Wget's support for RES.
3213 * Security Considerations:: Security with Wget.
3214 * Contributors:: People who helped.
3217 @node Robot Exclusion
3218 @section Robot Exclusion
3219 @cindex robot exclusion
3221 @cindex server maintenance
3223 It is extremely easy to make Wget wander aimlessly around a web site,
3224 sucking all the available data in progress. @samp{wget -r @var{site}},
3225 and you're set. Great? Not for the server admin.
3227 As long as Wget is only retrieving static pages, and doing it at a
3228 reasonable rate (see the @samp{--wait} option), there's not much of a
3229 problem. The trouble is that Wget can't tell the difference between the
3230 smallest static page and the most demanding CGI. A site I know has a
3231 section handled by a CGI Perl script that converts Info files to @sc{html} on
3232 the fly. The script is slow, but works well enough for human users
3233 viewing an occasional Info file. However, when someone's recursive Wget
3234 download stumbles upon the index page that links to all the Info files
3235 through the script, the system is brought to its knees without providing
3236 anything useful to the user (This task of converting Info files could be
3237 done locally and access to Info documentation for all installed GNU
3238 software on a system is available from the @code{info} command).
3240 To avoid this kind of accident, as well as to preserve privacy for
3241 documents that need to be protected from well-behaved robots, the
3242 concept of @dfn{robot exclusion} was invented. The idea is that
3243 the server administrators and document authors can specify which
3244 portions of the site they wish to protect from robots and those
3245 they will permit access.
3247 The most popular mechanism, and the @i{de facto} standard supported by
3248 all the major robots, is the ``Robots Exclusion Standard'' (RES) written
3249 by Martijn Koster et al. in 1994. It specifies the format of a text
3250 file containing directives that instruct the robots which URL paths to
3251 avoid. To be found by the robots, the specifications must be placed in
3252 @file{/robots.txt} in the server root, which the robots are expected to
3255 Although Wget is not a web robot in the strictest sense of the word, it
3256 can downloads large parts of the site without the user's intervention to
3257 download an individual page. Because of that, Wget honors RES when
3258 downloading recursively. For instance, when you issue:
3261 wget -r http://www.server.com/
3264 First the index of @samp{www.server.com} will be downloaded. If Wget
3265 finds that it wants to download more documents from that server, it will
3266 request @samp{http://www.server.com/robots.txt} and, if found, use it
3267 for further downloads. @file{robots.txt} is loaded only once per each
3270 Until version 1.8, Wget supported the first version of the standard,
3271 written by Martijn Koster in 1994 and available at
3272 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/norobots.html}. As of version 1.8,
3273 Wget has supported the additional directives specified in the internet
3274 draft @samp{<draft-koster-robots-00.txt>} titled ``A Method for Web
3275 Robots Control''. The draft, which has as far as I know never made to
3276 an @sc{rfc}, is available at
3277 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/norobots-rfc.txt}.
3279 This manual no longer includes the text of the Robot Exclusion Standard.
3281 The second, less known mechanism, enables the author of an individual
3282 document to specify whether they want the links from the file to be
3283 followed by a robot. This is achieved using the @code{META} tag, like
3287 <meta name="robots" content="nofollow">
3290 This is explained in some detail at
3291 @url{http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/meta-user.html}. Wget supports this
3292 method of robot exclusion in addition to the usual @file{/robots.txt}
3295 If you know what you are doing and really really wish to turn off the
3296 robot exclusion, set the @code{robots} variable to @samp{off} in your
3297 @file{.wgetrc}. You can achieve the same effect from the command line
3298 using the @code{-e} switch, e.g. @samp{wget -e robots=off @var{url}...}.
3300 @node Security Considerations
3301 @section Security Considerations
3304 When using Wget, you must be aware that it sends unencrypted passwords
3305 through the network, which may present a security problem. Here are the
3306 main issues, and some solutions.
3310 The passwords on the command line are visible using @code{ps}. The best
3311 way around it is to use @code{wget -i -} and feed the @sc{url}s to
3312 Wget's standard input, each on a separate line, terminated by @kbd{C-d}.
3313 Another workaround is to use @file{.netrc} to store passwords; however,
3314 storing unencrypted passwords is also considered a security risk.
3317 Using the insecure @dfn{basic} authentication scheme, unencrypted
3318 passwords are transmitted through the network routers and gateways.
3321 The @sc{ftp} passwords are also in no way encrypted. There is no good
3322 solution for this at the moment.
3325 Although the ``normal'' output of Wget tries to hide the passwords,
3326 debugging logs show them, in all forms. This problem is avoided by
3327 being careful when you send debug logs (yes, even when you send them to
3332 @section Contributors
3333 @cindex contributors
3336 GNU Wget was written by Hrvoje Nik@v{s}i@'{c} @email{hniksic@@xemacs.org}.
3339 GNU Wget was written by Hrvoje Niksic @email{hniksic@@xemacs.org}.
3341 However, its development could never have gone as far as it has, were it
3342 not for the help of many people, either with bug reports, feature
3343 proposals, patches, or letters saying ``Thanks!''.
3345 Special thanks goes to the following people (no particular order):
3349 Karsten Thygesen---donated system resources such as the mailing list,
3350 web space, and @sc{ftp} space, along with a lot of time to make these
3354 Shawn McHorse---bug reports and patches.
3357 Kaveh R. Ghazi---on-the-fly @code{ansi2knr}-ization. Lots of
3361 Gordon Matzigkeit---@file{.netrc} support.
3365 Zlatko @v{C}alu@v{s}i@'{c}, Tomislav Vujec and Dra@v{z}en
3366 Ka@v{c}ar---feature suggestions and ``philosophical'' discussions.
3369 Zlatko Calusic, Tomislav Vujec and Drazen Kacar---feature suggestions
3370 and ``philosophical'' discussions.
3374 Darko Budor---initial port to Windows.
3377 Antonio Rosella---help and suggestions, plus the Italian translation.
3381 Tomislav Petrovi@'{c}, Mario Miko@v{c}evi@'{c}---many bug reports and
3385 Tomislav Petrovic, Mario Mikocevic---many bug reports and suggestions.
3390 Fran@,{c}ois Pinard---many thorough bug reports and discussions.
3393 Francois Pinard---many thorough bug reports and discussions.
3397 Karl Eichwalder---lots of help with internationalization and other
3401 Junio Hamano---donated support for Opie and @sc{http} @code{Digest}
3405 The people who provided donations for development, including Brian
3409 The following people have provided patches, bug/build reports, useful
3410 suggestions, beta testing services, fan mail and all the other things
3411 that make maintenance so much fun:
3431 Kristijan @v{C}onka@v{s},
3451 Aleksandar Erkalovi@'{c},
3454 Aleksandar Erkalovic,
3474 Erik Magnus Hulthen,
3493 Goran Kezunovi@'{c},
3504 $\Sigma\acute{\iota}\mu o\varsigma\;
3505 \Xi\varepsilon\nu\iota\tau\acute{\epsilon}\lambda\lambda\eta\varsigma$
3506 (Simos KSenitellis),
3514 Nicol@'{a}s Lichtmeier,
3520 Alexander V. Lukyanov,
3551 @c Texinfo doesn't grok @'{@i}, so we have to use TeX itself.
3553 Juan Jos\'{e} Rodr\'{\i}gues,
3556 Juan Jose Rodrigues,
3570 Szakacsits Szabolcs,
3584 Douglas E. Wegscheid,
3595 Apologies to all who I accidentally left out, and many thanks to all the
3596 subscribers of the Wget mailing list.
3603 @cindex free software
3605 GNU Wget is licensed under the GNU General Public License (GNU GPL),
3606 which makes it @dfn{free software}. Please note that ``free'' in ``free
3607 software'' refers to liberty, not price. As some people like to point
3608 out, it's the ``free'' of ``free speech'', not the ``free'' of ``free
3611 The exact and legally binding distribution terms are spelled out below.
3612 The GPL guarantees that you have the right (freedom) to run and change
3613 GNU Wget and distribute it to others, and even---if you want---charge
3614 money for doing any of those things. With these rights comes the
3615 obligation to distribute the source code along with the software and to
3616 grant your recipients the same rights and impose the same restrictions.
3618 This licensing model is also known as @dfn{open source} because it,
3619 among other things, makes sure that all recipients will receive the
3620 source code along with the program, and be able to improve it. The GNU
3621 project prefers the term ``free software'' for reasons outlined at
3622 @url{http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html}.
3624 The exact license terms are defined by this paragraph and the GNU
3625 General Public License it refers to:
3628 GNU Wget is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
3629 under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the
3630 Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your
3631 option) any later version.
3633 GNU Wget is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
3634 ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or
3635 FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License
3638 A copy of the GNU General Public License is included as part of this
3639 manual; if you did not receive it, write to the Free Software
3640 Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
3643 In addition to this, this manual is free in the same sense:
3646 Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
3647 under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or
3648 any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with the
3649 Invariant Sections being ``GNU General Public License'' and ``GNU Free
3650 Documentation License'', with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no
3651 Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section
3652 entitled ``GNU Free Documentation License''.
3655 @c #### Maybe we should wrap these licenses in ifinfo? Stallman says
3656 @c that the GFDL needs to be present in the manual, and to me it would
3657 @c suck to include the license for the manual and not the license for
3660 The full texts of the GNU General Public License and of the GNU Free
3661 Documentation License are available below.
3664 * GNU General Public License::
3665 * GNU Free Documentation License::
3668 @node GNU General Public License
3669 @section GNU General Public License
3670 @center Version 2, June 1991
3673 Copyright @copyright{} 1989, 1991 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3674 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
3676 Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
3677 of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
3680 @unnumberedsec Preamble
3682 The licenses for most software are designed to take away your
3683 freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public
3684 License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free
3685 software---to make sure the software is free for all its users. This
3686 General Public License applies to most of the Free Software
3687 Foundation's software and to any other program whose authors commit to
3688 using it. (Some other Free Software Foundation software is covered by
3689 the GNU Library General Public License instead.) You can apply it to
3692 When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not
3693 price. Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you
3694 have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for
3695 this service if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it
3696 if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it
3697 in new free programs; and that you know you can do these things.
3699 To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid
3700 anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights.
3701 These restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you
3702 distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it.
3704 For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether
3705 gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that
3706 you have. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the
3707 source code. And you must show them these terms so they know their
3710 We protect your rights with two steps: (1) copyright the software, and
3711 (2) offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy,
3712 distribute and/or modify the software.
3714 Also, for each author's protection and ours, we want to make certain
3715 that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free
3716 software. If the software is modified by someone else and passed on, we
3717 want its recipients to know that what they have is not the original, so
3718 that any problems introduced by others will not reflect on the original
3719 authors' reputations.
3721 Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software
3722 patents. We wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free
3723 program will individually obtain patent licenses, in effect making the
3724 program proprietary. To prevent this, we have made it clear that any
3725 patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all.
3727 The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and
3728 modification follow.
3731 @unnumberedsec TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
3734 @center TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
3739 This License applies to any program or other work which contains
3740 a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed
3741 under the terms of this General Public License. The ``Program'', below,
3742 refers to any such program or work, and a ``work based on the Program''
3743 means either the Program or any derivative work under copyright law:
3744 that is to say, a work containing the Program or a portion of it,
3745 either verbatim or with modifications and/or translated into another
3746 language. (Hereinafter, translation is included without limitation in
3747 the term ``modification''.) Each licensee is addressed as ``you''.
3749 Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not
3750 covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of
3751 running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program
3752 is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the
3753 Program (independent of having been made by running the Program).
3754 Whether that is true depends on what the Program does.
3757 You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program's
3758 source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you
3759 conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate
3760 copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the
3761 notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty;
3762 and give any other recipients of the Program a copy of this License
3763 along with the Program.
3765 You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and
3766 you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.
3769 You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion
3770 of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and
3771 distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1
3772 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
3776 You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices
3777 stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
3780 You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
3781 whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
3782 part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
3783 parties under the terms of this License.
3786 If the modified program normally reads commands interactively
3787 when run, you must cause it, when started running for such
3788 interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an
3789 announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a
3790 notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide
3791 a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under
3792 these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this
3793 License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but
3794 does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on
3795 the Program is not required to print an announcement.)
3798 These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If
3799 identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program,
3800 and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in
3801 themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those
3802 sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you
3803 distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based
3804 on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of
3805 this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the
3806 entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.
3808 Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest
3809 your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to
3810 exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or
3811 collective works based on the Program.
3813 In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program
3814 with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of
3815 a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under
3816 the scope of this License.
3819 You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it,
3820 under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of
3821 Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:
3825 Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable
3826 source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections
3827 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
3830 Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three
3831 years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your
3832 cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete
3833 machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be
3834 distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium
3835 customarily used for software interchange; or,
3838 Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer
3839 to distribute corresponding source code. (This alternative is
3840 allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you
3841 received the program in object code or executable form with such
3842 an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)
3845 The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for
3846 making modifications to it. For an executable work, complete source
3847 code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any
3848 associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to
3849 control compilation and installation of the executable. However, as a
3850 special exception, the source code distributed need not include
3851 anything that is normally distributed (in either source or binary
3852 form) with the major components (compiler, kernel, and so on) of the
3853 operating system on which the executable runs, unless that component
3854 itself accompanies the executable.
3856 If distribution of executable or object code is made by offering
3857 access to copy from a designated place, then offering equivalent
3858 access to copy the source code from the same place counts as
3859 distribution of the source code, even though third parties are not
3860 compelled to copy the source along with the object code.
3863 You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program
3864 except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt
3865 otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is
3866 void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License.
3867 However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under
3868 this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such
3869 parties remain in full compliance.
3872 You are not required to accept this License, since you have not
3873 signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or
3874 distribute the Program or its derivative works. These actions are
3875 prohibited by law if you do not accept this License. Therefore, by
3876 modifying or distributing the Program (or any work based on the
3877 Program), you indicate your acceptance of this License to do so, and
3878 all its terms and conditions for copying, distributing or modifying
3879 the Program or works based on it.
3882 Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the
3883 Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the
3884 original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to
3885 these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further
3886 restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
3887 You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to
3891 If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent
3892 infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues),
3893 conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or
3894 otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not
3895 excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot
3896 distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this
3897 License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you
3898 may not distribute the Program at all. For example, if a patent
3899 license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Program by
3900 all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then
3901 the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to
3902 refrain entirely from distribution of the Program.
3904 If any portion of this section is held invalid or unenforceable under
3905 any particular circumstance, the balance of the section is intended to
3906 apply and the section as a whole is intended to apply in other
3909 It is not the purpose of this section to induce you to infringe any
3910 patents or other property right claims or to contest validity of any
3911 such claims; this section has the sole purpose of protecting the
3912 integrity of the free software distribution system, which is
3913 implemented by public license practices. Many people have made
3914 generous contributions to the wide range of software distributed
3915 through that system in reliance on consistent application of that
3916 system; it is up to the author/donor to decide if he or she is willing
3917 to distribute software through any other system and a licensee cannot
3920 This section is intended to make thoroughly clear what is believed to
3921 be a consequence of the rest of this License.
3924 If the distribution and/or use of the Program is restricted in
3925 certain countries either by patents or by copyrighted interfaces, the
3926 original copyright holder who places the Program under this License
3927 may add an explicit geographical distribution limitation excluding
3928 those countries, so that distribution is permitted only in or among
3929 countries not thus excluded. In such case, this License incorporates
3930 the limitation as if written in the body of this License.
3933 The Free Software Foundation may publish revised and/or new versions
3934 of the General Public License from time to time. Such new versions will
3935 be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to
3936 address new problems or concerns.
3938 Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program
3939 specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and ``any
3940 later version'', you have the option of following the terms and conditions
3941 either of that version or of any later version published by the Free
3942 Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of
3943 this License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software
3947 If you wish to incorporate parts of the Program into other free
3948 programs whose distribution conditions are different, write to the author
3949 to ask for permission. For software which is copyrighted by the Free
3950 Software Foundation, write to the Free Software Foundation; we sometimes
3951 make exceptions for this. Our decision will be guided by the two goals
3952 of preserving the free status of all derivatives of our free software and
3953 of promoting the sharing and reuse of software generally.
3956 @heading NO WARRANTY
3964 BECAUSE THE PROGRAM IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY
3965 FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. EXCEPT WHEN
3966 OTHERWISE STATED IN WRITING THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND/OR OTHER PARTIES
3967 PROVIDE THE PROGRAM ``AS IS'' WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED
3968 OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
3969 MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS
3970 TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM IS WITH YOU. SHOULD THE
3971 PROGRAM PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING,
3972 REPAIR OR CORRECTION.
3975 IN NO EVENT UNLESS REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW OR AGREED TO IN WRITING
3976 WILL ANY COPYRIGHT HOLDER, OR ANY OTHER PARTY WHO MAY MODIFY AND/OR
3977 REDISTRIBUTE THE PROGRAM AS PERMITTED ABOVE, BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR DAMAGES,
3978 INCLUDING ANY GENERAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING
3979 OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THE PROGRAM (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED
3980 TO LOSS OF DATA OR DATA BEING RENDERED INACCURATE OR LOSSES SUSTAINED BY
3981 YOU OR THIRD PARTIES OR A FAILURE OF THE PROGRAM TO OPERATE WITH ANY OTHER
3982 PROGRAMS), EVEN IF SUCH HOLDER OR OTHER PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE
3983 POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
3987 @heading END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
3990 @center END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
3994 @unnumberedsec How to Apply These Terms to Your New Programs
3996 If you develop a new program, and you want it to be of the greatest
3997 possible use to the public, the best way to achieve this is to make it
3998 free software which everyone can redistribute and change under these terms.
4000 To do so, attach the following notices to the program. It is safest
4001 to attach them to the start of each source file to most effectively
4002 convey the exclusion of warranty; and each file should have at least
4003 the ``copyright'' line and a pointer to where the full notice is found.
4006 @var{one line to give the program's name and an idea of what it does.}
4007 Copyright (C) 20@var{yy} @var{name of author}
4009 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
4010 modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License
4011 as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2
4012 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
4014 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
4015 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
4016 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
4017 GNU General Public License for more details.
4019 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
4020 along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
4021 Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
4024 Also add information on how to contact you by electronic and paper mail.
4026 If the program is interactive, make it output a short notice like this
4027 when it starts in an interactive mode:
4030 Gnomovision version 69, Copyright (C) 20@var{yy} @var{name of author}
4031 Gnomovision comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details
4032 type `show w'. This is free software, and you are welcome
4033 to redistribute it under certain conditions; type `show c'
4037 The hypothetical commands @samp{show w} and @samp{show c} should show
4038 the appropriate parts of the General Public License. Of course, the
4039 commands you use may be called something other than @samp{show w} and
4040 @samp{show c}; they could even be mouse-clicks or menu items---whatever
4043 You should also get your employer (if you work as a programmer) or your
4044 school, if any, to sign a ``copyright disclaimer'' for the program, if
4045 necessary. Here is a sample; alter the names:
4049 Yoyodyne, Inc., hereby disclaims all copyright
4050 interest in the program `Gnomovision'
4051 (which makes passes at compilers) written
4054 @var{signature of Ty Coon}, 1 April 1989
4055 Ty Coon, President of Vice
4059 This General Public License does not permit incorporating your program into
4060 proprietary programs. If your program is a subroutine library, you may
4061 consider it more useful to permit linking proprietary applications with the
4062 library. If this is what you want to do, use the GNU Library General
4063 Public License instead of this License.
4068 @unnumbered Concept Index