LFTP - Deploy an application in command line

Here we will see how to automatically deploy an application with lftp in command line.

Friday, December 31, 2021

Installation
Use lftp
Manual

Installation

First, we need to install lftp on our system:

# On Debian / Ubuntu
sudo apt install lftp

# On Fedora
yum install lftp

# On Alpine
apk add lftp

Use lftp

Here, we define 3 variables:

$(FTP_USERNAME) represents the FTP username ; example: alex
$(FTP_PASSWORD) represents the FTP password ; example: SuperSpiciesMeltingMountains67
$(FTP_HOSTNAME) represents the FTP host ; example: ftp://alexandre@ftp.cluster473.hosting.domain.net

lftp -u $(FTP_USERNAME),$(FTP_PASSWORD) -e "mirror --ignore-time --reverse --parallel --verbose --delete -R ./ www/; quit" $(FTP_HOSTNAME)

This line uses lftp to connect to the ftp server.

The command mirror is used to synchronize local files and server files together. Here we sync the local ./ directory with the www/ FTP directory.

Manual

If you need more informations, here are the available flags from the manual:

-c, --continue                Continue a mirror job if possible
-e, --delete                  Delete files not present at remote site
    --delete-first            Delete old files before transferring new ones
    --depth-first             Descend into subdirectories before transferring files
-s, --allow-suid              Set suid/sgid bits according to remote site
    --allow-chown             Try to set owner and group on files
    --ascii                   Use ascii mode transfers (implies --ignore-size)
    --ignore-time             Ignore time when deciding whether to download
    --ignore-size             Ignore size when deciding whether to download
    --only-missing            Download only missing files
    --only-existing           Download only files already existing at target
-n, --only-newer              Download only newer files (-c won't work)
    --no-empty-dirs           Don't create empty directories (implies --depth-first)
-r, --no-recursion            Don't go to subdirectories
    --no-symlinks             Don't create symbolic links
-p, --no-perms                Don't set file permissions
    --no-umask                Don't apply umask to file modes
-R, --reverse                 Reverse mirror (put files)
-L, --dereference             Download symbolic links as files
-N, --newer-than=SPEC         Download only files newer than specified time
    --on-change=CMD           Execute the command if anything has been changed
    --older-than=SPEC         Download only files older than specified time
    --size-range=RANGE        Download only files with size in specified range
-P, --parallel[=N]            Download N files in parallel
    --use-pget[-n=N]          Use pget to transfer every single file
    --loop                    Loop until no changes found
-i RX, --include              RX include matching files
-x RX, --exclude              RX exclude matching files
-I GP, --include-glob         GP include matching files
-X GP, --exclude-glob         GP exclude matching files
-v, --verbose[=level]         Verbose operation
    --log=FILE                Write lftp commands being executed to FILE
    --script=FILE             Write lftp commands to FILE, but don't execute them
    --just-print, --dry-run   Same as --script=-
    --use-cache               Use cached directory listings
--Remove-source-files         Remove files after transfer (use with caution)
-a                            Same as --allow-chown --allow-suid --no-umask