[powershell] Upload files with FTP using PowerShell

I want to use PowerShell to transfer files with FTP to an anonymous FTP server. I would not use any extra packages. How?

There must be no risk that the script hangs or crashes.

I recently wrote for powershell several functions for communicating with FTP, see https://github.com/AstralisSomnium/PowerShell-No-Library-Just-Functions/blob/master/FTPModule.ps1. The second function below, you can send a whole local folder to FTP. In the module are even functions for removing / adding / reading folders and files recursively.

#Add-FtpFile -ftpFilePath "ftp://myHost.com/folder/somewhere/uploaded.txt" -localFile "C:\temp\file.txt" -userName "User" -password "pw"
function Add-FtpFile($ftpFilePath, $localFile, $username, $password) {
    $ftprequest = New-FtpRequest -sourceUri $ftpFilePath -method ([System.Net.WebRequestMethods+Ftp]::UploadFile) -username $username -password $password
    Write-Host "$($ftpRequest.Method) for '$($ftpRequest.RequestUri)' complete'"
    $content = $content = [System.IO.File]::ReadAllBytes($localFile)
    $ftprequest.ContentLength = $content.Length
    $requestStream = $ftprequest.GetRequestStream()
    $requestStream.Write($content, 0, $content.Length)
    $requestStream.Close()
    $requestStream.Dispose()
}

#Add-FtpFolderWithFiles -sourceFolder "C:\temp\" -destinationFolder "ftp://myHost.com/folder/somewhere/" -userName "User" -password "pw"
function Add-FtpFolderWithFiles($sourceFolder, $destinationFolder, $userName, $password) {
    Add-FtpDirectory $destinationFolder $userName $password
    $files = Get-ChildItem $sourceFolder -File
    foreach($file in $files) {
        $uploadUrl ="$destinationFolder/$($file.Name)"
        Add-FtpFile -ftpFilePath $uploadUrl -localFile $file.FullName -username $userName -password $password
    }
}

#Add-FtpFolderWithFilesRecursive -sourceFolder "C:\temp\" -destinationFolder "ftp://myHost.com/folder/" -userName "User" -password "pw"
function Add-FtpFolderWithFilesRecursive($sourceFolder, $destinationFolder, $userName, $password) {
    Add-FtpFolderWithFiles -sourceFolder $sourceFolder -destinationFolder $destinationFolder -userName $userName -password $password
    $subDirectories = Get-ChildItem $sourceFolder -Directory
    $fromUri = new-object System.Uri($sourceFolder)
    foreach($subDirectory in $subDirectories) {
        $toUri  = new-object System.Uri($subDirectory.FullName)
        $relativeUrl = $fromUri.MakeRelativeUri($toUri)
        $relativePath = [System.Uri]::UnescapeDataString($relativeUrl.ToString())
        $lastFolder = $relativePath.Substring($relativePath.LastIndexOf("/")+1)
        Add-FtpFolderWithFilesRecursive -sourceFolder $subDirectory.FullName -destinationFolder "$destinationFolder/$lastFolder" -userName $userName -password $password
    }
}

I'm not gonna claim that this is more elegant than the highest-voted solution...but this is cool (well, at least in my mind LOL) in its own way:

$server = "ftp.lolcats.com"
$filelist = "file1.txt file2.txt"   

"open $server
user $user $password
binary  
cd $dir     
" +
($filelist.split(' ') | %{ "put ""$_""`n" }) | ftp -i -in

As you can see, it uses that dinky built-in windows FTP client. Much shorter and straightforward, too. Yes, I've actually used this and it works!

Easiest way

The most trivial way to upload a binary file to an FTP server using PowerShell is using WebClient.UploadFile:

$client = New-Object System.Net.WebClient
$client.Credentials = New-Object System.Net.NetworkCredential("username", "password")
$client.UploadFile("ftp://ftp.example.com/remote/path/file.zip", "C:\local\path\file.zip")

Advanced options

If you need a greater control, that WebClient does not offer (like TLS/SSL encryption, etc), use FtpWebRequest. Easy way is to just copy a FileStream to FTP stream using Stream.CopyTo:

$request = [Net.WebRequest]::Create("ftp://ftp.example.com/remote/path/file.zip")
$request.Credentials = New-Object System.Net.NetworkCredential("username", "password")
$request.Method = [System.Net.WebRequestMethods+Ftp]::UploadFile 

$fileStream = [System.IO.File]::OpenRead("C:\local\path\file.zip")
$ftpStream = $request.GetRequestStream()

$fileStream.CopyTo($ftpStream)

$ftpStream.Dispose()
$fileStream.Dispose()

Progress monitoring

If you need to monitor an upload progress, you have to copy the contents by chunks yourself:

$request = [Net.WebRequest]::Create("ftp://ftp.example.com/remote/path/file.zip")
$request.Credentials = New-Object System.Net.NetworkCredential("username", "password")
$request.Method = [System.Net.WebRequestMethods+Ftp]::UploadFile 

$fileStream = [System.IO.File]::OpenRead("C:\local\path\file.zip")
$ftpStream = $request.GetRequestStream()

$buffer = New-Object Byte[] 10240
while (($read = $fileStream.Read($buffer, 0, $buffer.Length)) -gt 0)
{
    $ftpStream.Write($buffer, 0, $read)
    $pct = ($fileStream.Position / $fileStream.Length)
    Write-Progress `
        -Activity "Uploading" -Status ("{0:P0} complete:" -f $pct) `
        -PercentComplete ($pct * 100)
}

$ftpStream.Dispose()
$fileStream.Dispose()

Uploading folder

If you want to upload all files from a folder, see
PowerShell Script to upload an entire folder to FTP

You can use this function :

function SendByFTP {
    param (
        $userFTP = "anonymous",
        $passFTP = "anonymous",
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$True)]$serverFTP,
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$True)]$localFile,
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$True)]$remotePath
    )
    if(Test-Path $localFile){
        $remoteFile = $localFile.Split("\")[-1]
        $remotePath = Join-Path -Path $remotePath -ChildPath $remoteFile
        $ftpAddr = "ftp://${userFTP}:${passFTP}@${serverFTP}/$remotePath"
        $browser = New-Object System.Net.WebClient
        $url = New-Object System.Uri($ftpAddr)
        $browser.UploadFile($url, $localFile)    
    }
    else{
        Return "Unable to find $localFile"
    }
}

This function send specified file by FTP. You must call the function with these parameters :

• userFTP = "anonymous" by default or your username
• passFTP = "anonymous" by default or your password
• serverFTP = IP address of the FTP server
• localFile = File to send
• remotePath = the path on the FTP server

For example :

SendByFTP -userFTP "USERNAME" -passFTP "PASSWORD" -serverFTP "MYSERVER" -localFile "toto.zip" -remotePath "path/on/the/FTP/"

There are some other ways too. I have used the following script:

$File = "D:\Dev\somefilename.zip";
$ftp = "ftp://username:[email protected]/pub/incoming/somefilename.zip";

Write-Host -Object "ftp url: $ftp";

$webclient = New-Object -TypeName System.Net.WebClient;
$uri = New-Object -TypeName System.Uri -ArgumentList $ftp;

Write-Host -Object "Uploading $File...";

$webclient.UploadFile($uri, $File);

And you could run a script against the windows FTP command line utility using the following command

ftp -s:script.txt 

(Check out this article)

The following question on SO also answers this: How to script FTP upload and download?

You can simply handle file uploads through PowerShell, like this. Complete project is available on Github here https://github.com/edouardkombo/PowerShellFtp

#Directory where to find pictures to upload
$Dir= 'c:\fff\medias\'

#Directory where to save uploaded pictures
$saveDir = 'c:\fff\save\'

#ftp server params
$ftp = 'ftp://10.0.1.11:21/'
$user = 'user'
$pass = 'pass'

#Connect to ftp webclient
$webclient = New-Object System.Net.WebClient 
$webclient.Credentials = New-Object System.Net.NetworkCredential($user,$pass)  

#Initialize var for infinite loop
$i=0

#Infinite loop
while($i -eq 0){ 

    #Pause 1 seconde before continue
    Start-Sleep -sec 1

    #Search for pictures in directory
    foreach($item in (dir $Dir "*.jpg"))
    {
        #Set default network status to 1
        $onNetwork = "1"

        #Get picture creation dateTime...
        $pictureDateTime = (Get-ChildItem $item.fullName).CreationTime

        #Convert dateTime to timeStamp
        $pictureTimeStamp = (Get-Date $pictureDateTime).ToFileTime()

        #Get actual timeStamp
        $timeStamp = (Get-Date).ToFileTime() 

        #Get picture lifeTime
        $pictureLifeTime = $timeStamp - $pictureTimeStamp

        #We only treat pictures that are fully written on the disk
        #So, we put a 2 second delay to ensure even big pictures have been fully wirtten   in the disk
        if($pictureLifeTime -gt "2") {    

            #If upload fails, we set network status at 0
            try{

                $uri = New-Object System.Uri($ftp+$item.Name)

                $webclient.UploadFile($uri, $item.FullName)

            } catch [Exception] {

                $onNetwork = "0"
                write-host $_.Exception.Message;
            }

            #If upload succeeded, we do further actions
            if($onNetwork -eq "1"){
                "Copying $item..."
                Copy-Item -path $item.fullName -destination $saveDir$item 

                "Deleting $item..."
                Remove-Item $item.fullName
            }


        }  
    }
}   

Here's my super cool version BECAUSE IT HAS A PROGRESS BAR :-)

Which is a completely useless feature, I know, but it still looks cool \m/ \m/

$webclient = New-Object System.Net.WebClient
Register-ObjectEvent -InputObject $webclient -EventName "UploadProgressChanged" -Action { Write-Progress -Activity "Upload progress..." -Status "Uploading" -PercentComplete $EventArgs.ProgressPercentage } > $null

$File = "filename.zip"
$ftp = "ftp://user:password@server/filename.zip"
$uri = New-Object System.Uri($ftp)
try{
    $webclient.UploadFileAsync($uri, $File)
}
catch  [Net.WebException]
{
    Write-Host $_.Exception.ToString() -foregroundcolor red
}
while ($webclient.IsBusy) { continue }

PS. Helps a lot, when I'm wondering "did it stop working, or is it just my slow ASDL connection?"

Goyuix's solution works great, but as presented it gives me this error: "The requested FTP command is not supported when using HTTP proxy."

Adding this line after $ftp.UsePassive = $true fixed the problem for me:

$ftp.Proxy = $null;