Perl

Get a Remote File's Last-Modified Time

Demonstrates the Chilkat SFtp.GetFileLastModifiedStr method, which returns a remote file's last-modified 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: The last-modified time is the workhorse timestamp — it updates whenever a file's contents change and is what incremental-sync logic compares to decide whether a file needs re-transferring. It is the most reliably supported of the three across servers and filesystems, which is why timestamp-based sync keys off it.

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Perl

use chilkat();

$success = 0;

#  Demonstrates the SFtp.GetFileLastModifiedStr method, which returns a remote file's last-modified
#  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 = chilkat::CkSFtp->new();

#  Connect, authenticate, and initialize the SFTP subsystem.
$port = 22;
$success = $sftp->Connect("sftp.example.com",$port);
if ($success == 0) {
    print $sftp->lastErrorText() . "\r\n";
    exit;
}

#  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) {
    print $sftp->lastErrorText() . "\r\n";
    exit;
}

$success = $sftp->InitializeSftp();
if ($success == 0) {
    print $sftp->lastErrorText() . "\r\n";
    exit;
}

#  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;

$lastModified = $sftp->getFileLastModifiedStr("subdir/report.pdf",$bFollowLinks,$bIsHandle);
if ($sftp->get_LastMethodSuccess() == 0) {
    print $sftp->lastErrorText() . "\r\n";
    exit;
}

print "Last modified: " . $lastModified . "\r\n";

$sftp->Disconnect();