Welcome to the Genome Toolbox! I am glad you navigated to the blog and hope you find the contents useful and insightful for your genomic needs. If you find any of the entries particularly helpful, be sure to click the +1 button on the bottom of the post and share with your colleagues. Your input is encouraged, so if you have comments or are aware of more efficient tools not included in a post, I would love to hear from you. Enjoy your time browsing through the Toolbox.

Wednesday, December 18, 2013

Copy and Transfer Files To or From SFTP Site

Transferring files to and from a SFTP site is relatively simple once you have generated a public/private key pair and have your account set up.

To login to the SFTP server, type in sftp username@server at the UNIX command prompt.  Once logged in, you can change directories on the SFTP site similar to how you would change directories in UNIX: with the cd command.  You can also change directories on you local account using the lcd command.  To transfer files from one server to another, you need to first be in the correct local and SFTP directories from which you want the files transferred to/from.

To copy a file from the SFTP server to your local host, use the get command.  For example, if you wanted to get the file ids.txt, you would type get ids.txt at the command prompt.  Conversely, to transfer file to the SFTP site from your local host, use the put command.  The SFTP also uses wildcards (*), so if for example, you wanted to transfer all .jpg files to the SFTP server, you would type in put *.jpeg at the command prompt.  Below are a few other useful commands.

Sftp CommandDescription
cd dirChange directory on the ftp server to dir.
lcd dirChange directory on your machine to dir.
lsList files in the current directory on the ftp server.
llsList files in the current directory on your machine.
pwdPrint the current directory on the ftp server.
lpwdPrint the current directory on your machine.
get fileDownload the file from the ftp server to current directory.
put fileUpload the file from your machine to the ftp server.
exitExit from the sftp program.

Also, remember it is always a good idea to check the checksums of files you have downloaded with those on the SFTP site to ensure you downloaded the files in their entirety.

No comments:

Post a Comment