Delphi ActiveX

Get a Remote File's Creation Time

Demonstrates the Chilkat SFtp.GetFileCreateTimeStr method, which returns a remote file's creation date and time. The arguments are the remote path (or handle), whether symbolic links are followed, and whether the first argument is a handle.

Background: Creation time is the least universally available of the three timestamps: many Unix filesystems historically tracked only modified and accessed times, so a server may return nothing or a placeholder. Where it is supported it is genuinely useful — it does not change when a file is edited, unlike the modified time — but code should tolerate its absence rather than depend on it.

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var
success: Integer;
sftp: TChilkatSFtp;
port: Integer;
password: WideString;
bFollowLinks: Integer;
bIsHandle: Integer;
createTime: WideString;

begin
success := 0;

//  Demonstrates the SFtp.GetFileCreateTimeStr method, which returns a remote file's creation date
//  and time.  The 1st argument is the remote path (or handle), the 2nd selects whether symbolic
//  links are followed, and the 3rd indicates whether the 1st argument is a handle.

sftp := TChilkatSFtp.Create(Self);

//  Connect, authenticate, and initialize the SFTP subsystem.
port := 22;
success := sftp.Connect('sftp.example.com',port);
if (success = 0) then
  begin
    Memo1.Lines.Add(sftp.LastErrorText);
    Exit;
  end;

//  Normally you would not hard-code the password in source.  You should instead obtain it
//  from an interactive prompt, environment variable, or a secrets vault.
password := 'mySshPassword';

success := sftp.AuthenticatePw('mySshLogin',password);
if (success = 0) then
  begin
    Memo1.Lines.Add(sftp.LastErrorText);
    Exit;
  end;

success := sftp.InitializeSftp();
if (success = 0) then
  begin
    Memo1.Lines.Add(sftp.LastErrorText);
    Exit;
  end;

//  The 2nd argument (bFollowLinks) selects whether a symbolic link is followed to its target.
//  The 3rd argument (bIsHandle) is 0 here because the 1st argument is a path, not an
//  open handle.
bFollowLinks := 1;
bIsHandle := 0;

createTime := sftp.GetFileCreateTimeStr('subdir/report.pdf',bFollowLinks,bIsHandle);
if (sftp.LastMethodSuccess = 0) then
  begin
    Memo1.Lines.Add(sftp.LastErrorText);
    Exit;
  end;
Memo1.Lines.Add('Created: ' + createTime);

//  Note: Not all servers and filesystems record a creation time.

sftp.Disconnect();