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How to delete a file with '&' in its name on SFTP

From: Martijn Nabben <martijn.nabben_at_stuff.co.nz>
Date: Fri, 3 May 2019 10:03:30 +1200

Hi,

We have a curl process that downloads files from an SFTP site and then
removes the downloaded file from the SFTP source. It works fine for
'normal' filenames so syntactically there's nothing wrong with the command
we use:

C:\Progra~1\RipCurl\cURL\curl.exe -f --connect-timeout 10 --retry 1
--retry-delay 30 -s -S -k -u "<uname>:<pword>" "sftp://<sftp
site>/transfer/Waikato/blah.txt" -o "E:\<...>\Waikato\Download\blah.txt" -Q
"-rm """/transfer/Waikato/blah.txt"" -w "%{size_download} bytes,
%{time_total} ms"

However when the file to be deleted contains an ampersand (&) the command
fails with the following error:
*curl: (21) Syntax error: Bad first parameter*

Attempt to resolve it that don't work:

1) Using the {} option

C:\Users\Administrator>C:\Progra~1\RipCurl\cURL\curl.exe -f
--connect-timeout 10 --retry 1 --retry-delay 30 -s -S -k -u "
<uname>:<pword> " "sftp://<sftp site>/transfer/Waikato/{Alw&Ded.txt}" -Q
"rm /transfer/Waikato/#1"

The SFTP response is now a better one but still not allowing the file to be
deleted:
curl: (21) rm command failed: No such file or directory
Even with additional double-quotes for the quote command (-Q "-rm
\"/transfer/Waikato/#1\"") the (21) SFTP response is still generated.

2) Replace & with %26 or \x26 - doesn't work.

We use curl version 7.23.1.
How can a file with '&' in its name be deleted on SFTP?

Thank you,
Martijn

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Received on 2019-05-03