Introduction to Wget
Wget is one of the most versatile and reliable tools any Linux user can have in their arsenal. Designed to work from the command line, it allows downloading files via HTTP, HTTPS, and FTP protocols with a simple yet powerful syntax. Its name comes from “World Wide Web get”, and since its appearance in the late 1990s it has become a standard for system administrators, developers, and advanced users who need to automate the retrieval of network resources.
Installation and verification
In most Linux distributions, Wget comes preinstalled, but if it’s missing, installation is trivial. On Debian/Ubuntu: sudo apt update && sudo apt install wget. On Red Hat, CentOS, or Fedora: sudo dnf install wget (or yum on older versions). After installing, verify the version with wget –version, which shows the release number and compiled features, such as SSL or IPv6 support.
Basic syntax
The fundamental syntax is wget [options] URL. The URL indicates the resource to retrieve (file, FTP directory, or web page). Options modify behavior: target directory, number of retries, speed limit, authentication, etc. For example, wget -O informe.pdf https://ejemplo.com/informe.pdf downloads and saves the file with the specified name.
Most used options
The following are the options most commonly used in day-to-day work.
- -O file: defines the output file name.
- -c: