download a file from ftp using curl and php

Question

I'm trying to download a file from an ftp server using curl and php but I can't find any documentation to help

$curl = curl_init();
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_URL,"ftp://$_FTP[server]");
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_FTPLISTONLY, 1);
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_USERPWD, "$_FTP[username]:$_FTP[password]");
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);

$result = curl_exec ($curl);

i can get a list of files but thats about it

Answer 1

My guess is that your URL is pointing towards a directory, not a file. You would need to feed CURLOPT_URL the full URL to the file. Also if you want to download a file you might want to save it somewhere.

Working example:

$curl = curl_init();
$file = fopen("ls-lR.gz", 'w');
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_URL, "ftp://ftp.sunet.se/ls-lR.gz"); #input
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_FILE, $file); #output
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_USERPWD, "$_FTP[username]:$_FTP[password]");
curl_exec($curl);
curl_close($curl);
fclose($file);