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Re: Import files on accessible URL and save in

• To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
• Subject: [mg122729] Re: Import files on accessible URL and save in
• From: Todd Gayley <tgayley at wolfram.com>
• Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2011 07:14:50 -0500 (EST)
• Delivered-to: l-mathgroup@mail-archive0.wolfram.com
• References: <201111050945.EAA10302@smc.vnet.net>

At 03:45 AM 11/5/2011, Gy Peng wrote:
>Dear Mathematica friends,
>
>I want to Import some files stored on internet by:
>
>Import["http://url";, ...]
>
>This allow me to see the file in the notebook of mathematica. However, what
>I want to do is to download and save the files in local machine. And since
>I have may be hundreds or thousands files need to be download and save. Is
>there any why in Mathematica to do it in a most optimized and fast way?
>
>And can read the file names in a single string in Mathematica like:
>
>{ file1, file2, file3, file4, ...}
>
>How could I make a loop in Mathematica to download and save all of 
>them in a same directory in local machine by Mathematica?
>
>I would thank you for all your kind reply and help!!!!


The FetchURL function, which is used internally by Import, will do 
what you want:

    In[10]:= << Utilities`URLTools`

    In[11]:= FetchURL["http://www.wolfram.com";]

    Out[11]= 
"C:\\Users\\tgayley\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\Temp65400___www.wolfram.com"

If you want to choose a specific location and filename for the 
downloaded file, you pass it as the second argument:

    In[12]:= FetchURL["http://www.wolfram.com";, "c:\\foo.txt"]

    Out[12]= "c:\\foo.txt"

If you want a program that downloads a list of URLs to a specific 
directory, this will do the trick.

    listOfURLs = {"http://www.wolfram.com";, "http://www.apple.com";, 
"http://www.microsoft.com"};
    downloadDir = "c:\\foo";  (* I assume it exists *)
    n = 1;
    {#, FetchURL[#, ToFileName[downloadDir, "file" <> 
ToString[n++]]]} & /@ listOfURLs

This returns a list of {url, filename} pairs so you can match up each 
URL with the corresponding file. You could also create filenames 
based on the URL so that it was immediately obvious which file was 
the product of which URL.


Todd Gayley
Wolfram Research 

• References:
  • Import files on accessible URL and save in local machine.
    • From: Gy Peng <hitphyopt@gmail.com>