Using the find command on the ftp server

Question

I am logged in to an ftp server and want to find a particular directory within all the directories that exist there. I am looking for a command similar to the Unix find command. Is there something like this available?

I don't think that's off-topic here as I asked myself that question in a professional setting. (Developers of software I use at work have changed the directory layout of their ftp server and I can't find some specific source code there anymore.) Plus, I'd have an answer not yet mentioned here: Many ftp servers have ls-lr.txt.gz files with indices of the server's contents. Downloading that one and grepping through is similar to the Unix command locate which again is similar to find, just with cached contents. — Axel Beckert, Jan 19 '16 at 18:34

score 7 · Answer 1 · answered Oct 12 '12 at 08:35

7

There's lftp too. You can perform things like :

lftp user@ftp.domain.net:/> find . | grep WORD

answered Oct 12 '12 at 08:35

Christophe Drevet

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score 3 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 18 '09 at 10:48

While theoretically possible I'm not aware of any ftp-client to support this.

EDIT: As idursun pointed out Total Commander can do it.

It's not possible with regular ftp, but if you have a shell account you can login with ssh or putty and use find.

If you really have only ftp-access you could try to list all directories recursively to a file and then grep.

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Jun 18 '09 at 11:02

1

Total Commander can do that. Connect to ftp using the built-in ftp client and perform a normal search (Alt+F7) in the ftp tab.

answered Jun 18 '09 at 11:02

idursun

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score 0 · Answer 4 · answered Oct 12 '12 at 11:08

0

Some FTPd have a file database that can be queried:

user@ftp.domain.net:/> site search foo
/pub/beer/foo/
/pub/beer/foo/bar

answered Oct 12 '12 at 11:08

petrus

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score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Jun 27 '13 at 13:23

While there are ways to do this way client side, for example by getting a directory listing, and looping through those directory to get a list; theres no way to do this server side without altering the ftpd code. You arent in a shell server side, you certainly arent spawning a shell server side, so you cant use any commands server side that arent provided by the ftp server, as other answers show.

score -1 · Answer 6 · answered Jun 27 '13 at 13:04

-1

Mount the ftp folder locally using curlftpfs.

answered Jun 27 '13 at 13:04

Joao Luiz

1

Using the find command on the ftp server

6 Answers6