If you know your file remote location you can download it with a single command order. Curl supports authentication and encryption. This tutorial will explain how to download files using cURL, how to upload files using cURL, how to resume interrupted downloads or to use a proxy when downloading files among other tips.
If curl isn’t installed in your Debian/Ubuntu Linux distribution type:
For CentOS and Fedora run:
Downloading files using cURL:
Once installed we can start using to download a file from any website like wget. Type:
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Current
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
100 473k 100 473k 0 0 293k 0 0:00:01 0:00:01 –:–:– 293k
We can use cURL to download multiple files from multiple sources with a command:
http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/pool/main/s/snort/snort_2.9.7.0-5_amd64.deb -O
https://www.snort.org/downloads/snort/snort-2.9.13-1.f29.x86_64.rpm
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Current
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
100 473k 100 473k 0 0 271k 0 0:00:01 0:00:01 –:–:– 271k
100 825k 100 825k 0 0 1429k 0 –:–:– –:–:– –:–:– 1429k
100 474 0 474 0 0 74 0 –:–:– 0:00:06 –:–:– 124
root@LinuxHint:/home/linuxhint#
If when using Curl we don’t want to store the files in the working directory, use a low case -o parameter to specify the directory, you can also change the file’s name using this parameter:
main/n/nano/nano_2.7.4-1_amd64.deb
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Current
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
100 473k 100 473k 0 0 313k 0 0:00:01 0:00:01 –:–:– 313k
Additionally to the “-O” parameter, we can resume interrupted downloads using the “-C -” parameter.
You can try downloading nano or any file and interrupt the download pressing ctrl+c:
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Current
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
3 473k 3 15828 0 0 24479 0 0:00:19 –:–:– 0:00:19 24463^C
Then resume the interrupted download using “curl -C – -O <http://destination/file>”:
** Resuming transfer from byte position 151552
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Curren
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
100 325k 100 325k 0 0 221k 0 0:00:01 0:00:01 –:–:– 221k
cURL also supports using proxy and authentication, to download a file using a proxy we need the -x parameter:
nano_2.7.4-1_amd64.deb
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Current
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
100 473k 100 473k 0 0 262k 0 0:00:01 0:00:01 –:–:– 261k
Note: you can find proxy servers for testing at https://free-proxy-list.net/
Uploading files using cURL:
To upload a file using cURL we need to use the –upload-file parameter.
You can test this command for uploading using https://transfer.sh/ free service to share files from the command line.
# curl -O https://transfer.sh/hOlbR/nano.deb
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Current
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
100 473k 100 473k 0 0 140k 0 0:00:03 0:00:03 –:–:– 140k
We just uploaded nano using curl, and downloaded it using cURL through the url provided by https://transfer.sh.
Uploading to an FTP server with authentication:
% Total % Received % Xferd Average Speed Time Time Time Current
Dload Upload Total Spent Left Speed
100 473k 0 0 100 473k 0 107k 0:00:04 0:00:04 –:–:– 107k
Note: image edited to hide the password.
As you see cURL is a great tool to share files from the command line and it supports many protocols.
I hope you found this tutorial useful to get your data fully removed, should you have any inquiry contact us opening a ticket support at LinuxHint Support. Keep following LinuxHint for more tips and updates on Linux.
