.. title: Deploy Nikola through FTP
.. slug: deploy-nikola-through-ftp
.. date: 2017-12-14 11:30:45 UTC+01:00
.. tags: python, nikola, ftp
.. category: blog
.. link: 
.. description: 
.. type: text

`Nikola <https://www.getnikola.com>`_ is shiped with a `simple deployment <https://getnikola.com/handbook.html#deployment>`_ mechanism and the possibility to easily deploy with GitHub. However, I am currently hosting my personal pages on Free server; the service is free and great but with no possibility to use either SSH (and ``rsync``) or Git. Therefore, the question of FTP deployment was raised for me.

.. TEASER_END

The solution I adopted is `LFTP <http://lftp.yar.ru/>`_ that is a file transfer line-command software to manage your file transfers over a variety of protocols, including FTP.

First steps
-----------

The first steps are quite easy:

.. code-block:: bash

    lftp
    lftp :~> open ftp://user:password@ftp.server.com;

You can then perform a number of basic tasks, both locally (with commands preceeded by ``l``) and remotely:

.. code-block:: bash

    lftp user@ftp.server.com:/~> cd website
    lftp user@ftp.server.com:/website~> pwd
    user@ftp.server.com:/website
    lftp user@ftp.server.com:/website~> lpwd
    /home/user/localdir

The ``mirror`` command allows you to realise copy *à la* ``rsync``, selecting only files that were modified:

.. code-block:: bash

    lftp user@ftp.server.com:/website~> mirror --reverse
    Total: 35 directories, 96 files, 0 symbolic links                                    
    Modifié : 5 files, 0 symbolic links
    49669 octets transfered


Deployment with Nikola
----------------------

Then, you just have to update ``conf.py`` and edit ``DEPLOY_COMMANDS``:

.. code-block:: python

    DEPLOY_COMMANDS = {
        'default': [
            """lftp -c 'set ftp:list-options -a;
            open ftp://user:password@ftp.server.com;
            lcd ./output;
            cd ./website;
            mirror --reverse'""",
        ]
    }

You can then use directly ``nikola deploy`` command!