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Upload directory of files to FTP server using WebClient

I have searched and searched and cannot find a way to do this. I have files in a directory I want to upload. The file names change constantly so I cannot upload by file name. Here is what I have tried.
using (WebClient client = new WebClient())
{
client.Credentials = new NetworkCredential("User", "Password");
foreach (var filePath in files)
client.UploadFile("ftp://site.net//PICS_CAM1//", "STOR", #"PICS_CAM1\");
}
But I am getting a compiler error:
The name 'files' does not exist in the current context
Everything I have researched says this should work.
Does anyone have a good way to upload a directory of files via WebClient?

You have to define and set the files. If you wanted to upload all files in a certain local directory, use for example Directory.EnumerateFiles.
Also the address argument of WebClient.UploadFile has to be a full URL to a target file, not just a URL to a target directory.
IEnumerable<string> files = Directory.EnumerateFiles(#"C:\local\folder");
using (WebClient client = new WebClient())
{
client.Credentials = new NetworkCredential("username", "password");
foreach (string file in files)
{
client.UploadFile(
"ftp://example.com/remote/folder/" + Path.GetFileName(file), file);
}
}
For a recursive upload, see:
Recursive upload to FTP server in C#

I think your web client upload will work fine. Your issue is that your variable files is not in scope.
You need to post more of your code so we can see better

ftpWebReponse (ListDirectory) FTP approved log in process, but not returning folder data

I've been experimenting with using Visual C# to connect to a remote FTP server, and list the folders on the server. Ultimately, I'm trying to figure out how to automatically upload a file to this server with the click of a button. I figured my first step would be to see how the folders are structured on the remote FTP server. However, when I try to view the results passed in debug, it appears to be empty, although I didn't receive any errors from the process, and the parameters in debug make it look like I was successfully logged in. I also received the file transfer complete message 226 in the response data. Here's the latest code I have tried, although I have tried various things in the FtpWebRequest function. If I turn off UsePassive, it sits there forever and I never get a response back from the server. Does anyone have any ideas on a setting that might be causing this or some parameter that might need to be set?
private void button4_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
FtpWebRequest ftpRequest = (FtpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create("ftp://sampleftpplace.com/");
ftpRequest.UseBinary = true;
ftpRequest.Credentials = new NetworkCredential("username", "password");
ftpRequest.EnableSsl = true;
ftpRequest.Method = WebRequestMethods.Ftp.ListDirectory;
ftpRequest.Proxy = null;
ftpRequest.Timeout = -1;
ftpRequest.KeepAlive = false;
//ftpRequest.UsePassive = false;
FtpWebResponse response = (FtpWebResponse)ftpRequest.GetResponse();
StreamReader streamReader = new StreamReader(response.GetResponseStream());
List<string> directories = new List<string>();
string line = streamReader.ReadLine();
while (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(line))
{
directories.Add(line);
line = streamReader.ReadLine();
}
streamReader.Close();
}
When the "string line = streamReader.Readline();" is executed, the variable "line" is null. All I am really after is to see what folders are available so I can see how the original programmer of the FTP server structured their folders, and what naming convention they used. Is this possible if that programmer isn't available any more?

I just had a crazy thought, and it turned out that it worked! Basically, I changed the first couple of lines to read like this:
Uri uri = new Uri("ftp://sampleftpplace.com//");
FtpWebRequest ftpRequest = (FtpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create(uri);
First, I used the command Uri. Not sure if that matters or not, but what really mattered was the 2nd "/" in the URL address. I think the server didn't see it as the root directory until I added this. Once I put that in, I'm seeing the folders now. Thanks!

FTP - Filename not allowed

I'm trying to upload a file to an FTP server using code based on this Microsoft Article
My code looks like this for testing purposes:
string ftpUrl = "ftp://" + ftpSite + ftpPath + "test.txt";
//string ftpUrl = ftpSite;
FtpWebRequest request = (FtpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create(ftpUrl);
request.Credentials = new NetworkCredential(ftpUsername, ftpPassword);
request.Method = WebRequestMethods.Ftp.UploadFile;
StreamReader srcStream = new StreamReader(filePath);
byte[] fileContents = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(srcStream.ReadToEnd());
request.ContentLength = fileContents.Length;
Stream requestStream = request.GetRequestStream();
requestStream.Write(fileContents, 0, fileContents.Length);
requestStream.Close();
FtpWebResponse response = (FtpWebResponse)request.GetResponse();
Every time I try to upload the file, I get a "Filename not allowed" error back from the FTP server. If I use an FTP client application like WS_FTP, I'm able to FTP the same file just fine.
Any thoughts on how to correct this? I've already tried setting active/passive FTP mode, keepalive, and binary modes without any luck.
EDIT
This is a winforms application - the filename comes in from an OpenFileDialog prompt and the FTP address is based on settings in App.Config.

Without seeing your full code, I will say there is a very good chance the constructed FTP URL / path is incorrect, in comparison to what you expect it to be when you manually connect to the FTP site through a FTP client.
If you post your app.config code and how you assign values to ftpSite and ftpPath, it would be helpful in answering this question.

You can get that particular error for many cases.
Most common issue is that the path you are accessing is not valid by the permissions allowed, and using a relative path or changing thew path might get it fixed.

Retrieving creation date of file (FTP)

I'm using the System.Net.FtpWebRequest class and my code is as follows:
FtpWebRequest request = (FtpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create("ftp://example.com/folder");
request.Method = WebRequestMethods.Ftp.ListDirectory;
request.Credentials = new NetworkCredential("username", "password");
FtpWebResponse response = (FtpWebResponse)request.GetResponse();
Stream responseStream = response.GetResponseStream();
StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(responseStream);
string names = reader.ReadToEnd();
reader.Close();
response.Close();
This is based off of the examples provided on MSDN but I couldn't find anything more detailed.
I'm storing all the filenames in the folder in names but how can I now iterate through each of those and retrieve their dates? I want to retrieve the dates so I can find the newest files. Thanks.

This seems to work just fine
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.net.ftpwebresponse.lastmodified(v=VS.90).aspx
FtpWebRequest request = (FtpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create (serverUri);
request.Method = WebRequestMethods.Ftp.GetDateTimestamp;
FtpWebResponse response = (FtpWebResponse)request.GetResponse ();
Console.WriteLine ("{0} {1}",serverUri,response.LastModified);

WebRequestMethods.Ftp.ListDirectory returns a "short listing" of all the files in an FTP directory. This type of listing is only going to provide file names - not additional details on the file (like permissions or last modified date).
Use WebRequestMethods.Ftp.ListDirectoryDetails instead. This method will return a long listing of files on the FTP server. Once you've retrieved this list into the names variable, you can split the names variable into an array based on an end of line character. This will result in each array element being a file (or directory) name listing that includes the permissions, last modified date owner, etc...
At this point, you can iterate over this array, examine the last modified date for each file, and decide whether to download the file.
I hope this helps!!

Unfortunately, there's no really reliable and efficient way to retrieve timestamps using features offered by .NET framework, as it does not support the FTP MLSD command. The MLSD command provides a listing of remote directory in a standardized machine-readable format. The command and the format is standardized by RFC 3659.
Alternatives you can use, that are supported by .NET framework:
ListDirectoryDetails method (the FTP LIST command) to retrieve details of all files in a directory and then you deal with FTP server specific format of the details (*nix format similar to the ls *nix command is the most common, a drawback is that the format may change over time, as for newer files "May 8 17:48" format is used and for older files "Oct 18 2009" format is used).
DOS/Windows format: C# class to parse WebRequestMethods.Ftp.ListDirectoryDetails FTP response
*nix format: Parsing FtpWebRequest ListDirectoryDetails line
GetDateTimestamp method (the FTP MDTM command) to individually retrieve timestamps for each file. An advantage is that the response is standardized by RFC 3659 to YYYYMMDDHHMMSS[.sss]. A disadvantage is that you have to send a separate request for each file, what can be quite inefficient.
const string uri = "ftp://example.com/remote/path/file.txt";
FtpWebRequest request = (FtpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create(uri);
request.Method = WebRequestMethods.Ftp.GetDateTimestamp;
FtpWebResponse response = (FtpWebResponse)request.GetResponse();
Console.WriteLine("{0} {1}", uri, response.LastModified);
Alternatively you can use a 3rd party FTP client implementation that supports the modern MLSD command.
For example WinSCP .NET assembly supports that.
There's even an example for your specific task: Downloading the most recent file.
The example is for PowerShell and the SFTP, but translates to C# and the FTP easily:
// Setup session options
SessionOptions sessionOptions = new SessionOptions
{
Protocol = Protocol.Ftp,
HostName = "example.com",
UserName = "username",
Password = "password",
};
using (Session session = new Session())
{
// Connect
session.Open(sessionOptions);
// Get list of files in the directory
string remotePath = "/remote/path/";
RemoteDirectoryInfo directoryInfo = session.ListDirectory(remotePath);
// Select the most recent file
RemoteFileInfo latest =
directoryInfo.Files
.OrderByDescending(file => file.LastWriteTime)
.First();
// Download the selected file
string localPath = #"C:\local\path\";
string sourcePath = RemotePath.EscapeFileMask(remotePath + latest.Name);
session.GetFiles(sourcePath, localPath).Check();
}
(I'm the author of WinSCP)

First you will need to break apart the names using String.Split on the filename delimiter. Then iterate through all of the strings and navigate the directories

Downloading all files using FTP and C#

What is the best way to download all files in a remote directory using C# and FTP and save them to a local directory?
Thanks.

downloading all files in a specific folder seems to be an easy task. However, there are some issues which has to be solved. To name a few:
How to get list of files (System.Net.FtpWebRequest gives you unparsed list and directory list format is not standardized in any RFC)
What if remote directory has both files and subdirectories. Do we have to dive into the subdirs and download it's content?
What if some of the remote files already exist on the local computer? Should they be overwritten? Skipped? Should we overwrite older files only?
What if the local file is not writable? Should the whole transfer fail? Should we skip the file and continue to the next?
How to handle files on a remote disk which are unreadable because we don’t have sufficient access rights?
How are the symlinks, hard links and junction points handled? Links can easily be used to create an infinite recursive directory tree structure. Consider folder A with subfolder B which in fact is not the real folder but the *nix hard link pointing back to folder A. The naive approach will end in an application which never ends (at least if nobody manage to pull the plug).
Decent third party FTP component should have a method for handling those issues. Following code uses our Rebex FTP for .NET.
using (Ftp client = new Ftp())
{
// connect and login to the FTP site
client.Connect("mirror.aarnet.edu.au");
client.Login("anonymous", "my#password");
// download all files
client.GetFiles(
"/pub/fedora/linux/development/i386/os/EFI/*",
"c:\\temp\\download",
FtpBatchTransferOptions.Recursive,
FtpActionOnExistingFiles.OverwriteAll
);
client.Disconnect();
}
The code is taken from my blogpost available at blog.rebex.net. The blogpost also references a sample which shows how ask the user how to handle each problem (e.g. Overwrite/Overwrite older/Skip/Skip all).

Using C# FtpWebRequest and FtpWebReponse, you can use the following recursion (make sure the folder strings terminate in '\'):
public void GetAllDirectoriesAndFiles(string getFolder, string putFolder)
{
List<string> dirIitems = DirectoryListing(getFolder);
foreach (var item in dirIitems)
{
if ( item.Contains('.') )
{
GetFile(getFolder + item, putFolder + item);
}
else
{
var subDirPut = new DirectoryInfo(putFolder + "\\" + item);
subDirPut.Create();
GetAllDirectoriesAndFiles(getFolder + item + "\\", subDirPut.FullName + "\\");
}
}
}
The "item.Contains('.')" is a bit primitive, but has worked for my purposes. Post a comment if you need an example of the methods:
GetFile(string getFileAndPath, string putFileAndPath)
or
DirectoryListing(getFolder)

For FTP protocol you can use FtpWebRequest class from .NET framework. Though it does not have any explicit support for recursive file operations (including downloads). You have to implement the recursion yourself:
List the remote directory
Iterate the entries, downloading files and recursing into subdirectories (listing them again, etc.)
Tricky part is to identify files from subdirectories. There's no way to do that in a portable way with the FtpWebRequest. The FtpWebRequest unfortunately does not support the MLSD command, which is the only portable way to retrieve directory listing with file attributes in FTP protocol. See also Checking if object on FTP server is file or directory.
Your options are:
Do an operation on a file name that is certain to fail for file and succeeds for directories (or vice versa). I.e. you can try to download the "name". If that succeeds, it's a file, if that fails, it's a directory. But that can become a performance problem, when you have a large number of entries.
You may be lucky and in your specific case, you can tell a file from a directory by a file name (i.e. all your files have an extension, while subdirectories do not)
You use a long directory listing (LIST command = ListDirectoryDetails method) and try to parse a server-specific listing. Many FTP servers use *nix-style listing, where you identify a directory by the d at the very beginning of the entry. But many servers use a different format. The following example uses this approach (assuming the *nix format)
void DownloadFtpDirectory(
string url, NetworkCredential credentials, string localPath)
{
FtpWebRequest listRequest = (FtpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create(url);
listRequest.UsePassive = true;
listRequest.Method = WebRequestMethods.Ftp.ListDirectoryDetails;
listRequest.Credentials = credentials;
List<string> lines = new List<string>();
using (WebResponse listResponse = listRequest.GetResponse())
using (Stream listStream = listResponse.GetResponseStream())
using (StreamReader listReader = new StreamReader(listStream))
{
while (!listReader.EndOfStream)
{
lines.Add(listReader.ReadLine());
}
}
foreach (string line in lines)
{
string[] tokens =
line.Split(new[] { ' ' }, 9, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
string name = tokens[8];
string permissions = tokens[0];
string localFilePath = Path.Combine(localPath, name);
string fileUrl = url + name;
if (permissions[0] == 'd')
{
Directory.CreateDirectory(localFilePath);
DownloadFtpDirectory(fileUrl + "/", credentials, localFilePath);
}
else
{
var downloadRequest = (FtpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create(fileUrl);
downloadRequest.UsePassive = true;
downloadRequest.UseBinary = true;
downloadRequest.Method = WebRequestMethods.Ftp.DownloadFile;
downloadRequest.Credentials = credentials;
var response = downloadRequest.GetResponse();
using (Stream ftpStream = response.GetResponseStream())
using (Stream fileStream = File.Create(localFilePath))
{
ftpStream.CopyTo(fileStream);
}
}
}
}
The url must be like:
ftp://example.com/ or
ftp://example.com/path/
Or use 3rd party library that supports recursive downloads.
For example with WinSCP .NET assembly you can download whole directory with a single call to Session.GetFiles:
// Setup session options
SessionOptions sessionOptions = new SessionOptions
{
Protocol = Protocol.Ftp,
HostName = "example.com",
UserName = "user",
Password = "mypassword",
};
using (Session session = new Session())
{
// Connect
session.Open(sessionOptions);
// Download files
session.GetFiles("/home/user/*", #"d:\download\").Check();
}
Internally, WinSCP uses the MLSD command, if supported by the server. If not, it uses the LIST command and supports dozens of different listing formats.
(I'm the author of WinSCP)

You could use System.Net.WebClient.DownloadFile(), which supports FTP. MSDN Details here

You can use FTPClient from laedit.net. It's under Apache license and easy to use.
It use FtpWebRequest :
first you need to use WebRequestMethods.Ftp.ListDirectoryDetails to get the detail of all the list of the folder
for each files you need to use WebRequestMethods.Ftp.DownloadFile to download it to a local folder