PowerShell FTP automation issue

Question

I am working on a FTP automation script that will upload certain files from a network share to a specific location on a FTP server. I found the below, but am unable to edit it to navigate to the desired destination directory.

#ftp server 
$ftp = "ftp://SERVER/OtherUser/" 
$user = "MyUser" 
$pass = "MyPass"  

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

#list every sql server trace file 
foreach($item in (dir $Dir "*.trc")){ 
    "Uploading $item..." 
    $uri = New-Object System.Uri($ftp+$item.Name) 
    $webclient.UploadFile($uri, $item.FullName) 
 } 

I have credentials to the FTP server but am defaulted to /home/MyUser/ and I need to direct to /home/OtherUser/. I do have permissions to browse to and upload to that directory, but I can't figure out how to, essentially, cd to that location.

Here is the current error received:

Exception calling "UploadFile" with "2" argument(s): "The remote server returned an erro
r: (550) File unavailable (e.g., file not found, no access)."
At line:26 char:26
+     $webclient.UploadFile <<<< ($uri, $item.FullName) 
    + CategoryInfo          : NotSpecified: (:) [], MethodInvocationException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : DotNetMethodException

Answer 1

You need to use the FtpWebRequest type. The WebClient is used for HTTP traffic.

I have written and tested a parameterized function that will upload a file to a FTP server, called Send-FtpFile. I used the sample C# code from MSDN to translate this into PowerShell code, and it works quite well.

function Send-FtpFile {
    [CmdletBinding()]
    param (
          [ValidateScript({ Test-Path -Path $_; })]
          [string] $Path
        , [string] $Destination
        , [string] $Username
        , [string] $Password
    )
    $Credential = New-Object -TypeName System.Net.NetworkCredential -ArgumentList $Username,$Password;

    # Create the FTP request and upload the file
    $FtpRequest = [System.Net.FtpWebRequest][System.Net.WebRequest]::Create($Destination);
    $FtpRequest.Method = [System.Net.WebRequestMethods+Ftp]::UploadFile;
    $FtpRequest.Credentials = $Credential;

    # Get the request stream, and write the file bytes to the stream
    $RequestStream = $FtpRequest.GetRequestStream();
    Get-Content -Path $Path -Encoding Byte | % { $RequestStream.WriteByte($_); };
    $RequestStream.Close();

    # Get the FTP response
    [System.Net.FtpWebResponse]$FtpRequest.GetResponse();
}

Send-FtpFile -Path 'C:\Users\Trevor\Downloads\asdf.jpg' `
    -Destination 'ftp://google.com/folder/asdf.jpg' `
    -Username MyUsername -Password MyPassword;