R help - Nov 2004 - Opening connection to FTP site

Hi

Is it possible to open a connection to an FTP site such that I can read
the directory listing?  Eg:

URL <- url("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org", open="r")
Error in url("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org", open="r") :
	unable to open connection

URL <- url("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org")
open(URL)
Error in open.connection(URL) : unable to open connection

I think perhaps it is because there isn't actually a file there to
connect to, eg this works fine:

URL <- url("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org/pub/README", open="r")

Thanks in advance

Mick

On Tue, 30 Nov 2004, michael watson (IAH-C) wrote:
> Hi
>
> Is it possible to open a connection to an FTP site such that I can read
> the directory listing?  Eg:
>
> URL <- url("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org", open="r")
> Error in url("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org", open="r") :
> 	unable to open connection
>
> URL <- url("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org")
> open(URL)
> Error in open.connection(URL) : unable to open connection
>
> I think perhaps it is because there isn't actually a file there to
> connect to, eg this works fine:
>
> URL <- url("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org/pub/README",
open="r")
It is not possible using url().  Try, e.g.

tmp <- tempfile()
download.file("ftp://ftp.ensembl.org", tmp, method="lynx") #
or "wget"
readLines(tmp)


-- 
Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595