Requirements for Retrieving Files from an FTP server :

• FTP server address
• Account information(username and password on FTP server if FTP is password protected)
• Directory containing the files

Here is the Code!

#getfromfpt.py
import ftplib
import os
from django.core.management.base import BaseCommand
class Command(BaseCommand):
     args = 'TAKES NO ARGUMENT'  #this command takes no argument
     def handle(self, *args, **options):
            print 'this command gets the files from an FTP Server'
            username = 'yaseen'      #this is  your username on ftp server, yaseen in my case
            password = '*******'      #this is the password
        		         directory ='/mydirectory/'    #this is the directory  on FTP server which  contains  files
            ftp = ftplib.FTP('ftp.trialx.smartteam.com')  #establish the connection
            ftp.login(username, password) #login with the username and password provided
            ftp.cwd(directory) #changing to the directory containing the files
           for filename in ftp.nlst():  # ftp.nlist() Returns a list of file names in the directory
                fhandle = open(filename, 'wb')
                ftp.retrbinary('RETR ' + filename, fhandle.write)  #retrieve the file
                fhandle.close()

To use this command we have to type  the file name after manage.py inside the Django Project

i.e   python managy.py getfromftp

Automating the File Retrieving Process

To automate this process we can setup a Cronjob which runs the command at the desired time.

• Type crontab –e in the terminal
• Click Enter
• Add your cron

for example
30 10  *  *  *   Pythonpath     Projectpath/manage.py getfromftp

Pythonpath  is the path of the python in the environment( if virtual environment is used) and Projectpath is the path of Django Project.

The above example sets up a Cronjob which runs everyday at 10:30am to get files from the Ftp server.