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Overview
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   GNU Wget is a free utility for non-interactive download of files from
the Web.  It supports HTTP, HTTPS, and FTP protocols, as well as
retrieval through HTTP proxies.

   This chapter is a partial overview of Wget's features.

   * Wget is non-interactive, meaning that it can work in the
     background, while the user is not logged on.  This allows you to
     start a retrieval and disconnect from the system, letting Wget
     finish the work.  By contrast, most of the Web browsers require
     constant user's presence, which can be a great hindrance when
     transferring a lot of data.


   * Wget can follow links in HTML pages and create local versions of
     remote web sites, fully recreating the directory structure of the
     original site.  This is sometimes referred to as "recursive
     downloading."  While doing that, Wget respects the Robot Exclusion
     Standard (`/robots.txt').  Wget can be instructed to convert the
     links in downloaded HTML files to the local files for offline
     viewing.


   * File name wildcard matching and recursive mirroring of directories
     are available when retrieving via FTP.  Wget can read the
     time-stamp information given by both HTTP and FTP servers, and
     store it locally.  Thus Wget can see if the remote file has
     changed since last retrieval, and automatically retrieve the new
     version if it has.  This makes Wget suitable for mirroring of FTP
     sites, as well as home pages.


   * Wget has been designed for robustness over slow or unstable network
     connections; if a download fails due to a network problem, it will
     keep retrying until the whole file has been retrieved.  If the
     server supports regetting, it will instruct the server to continue
     the download from where it left off.


   * Wget supports proxy servers, which can lighten the network load,
     speed up retrieval and provide access behind firewalls.  However,
     if you are behind a firewall that requires that you use a socks
     style gateway, you can get the socks library and build Wget with
     support for socks.  Wget also supports the passive FTP downloading
     as an option.


   * Builtin features offer mechanisms to tune which links you wish to
     follow (Note: Following Links).


   * The retrieval is conveniently traced with printing dots, each dot
     representing a fixed amount of data received (1KB by default).
     These representations can be customized to your preferences.


   * Most of the features are fully configurable, either through
     command line options, or via the initialization file `.wgetrc'
     (Note: Startup File).  Wget allows you to define "global"
     startup files (`/etc/wgetrc' by default) for site settings.


   * Finally, GNU Wget is free software.  This means that everyone may
     use it, redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the
     GNU General Public License, as published by the Free Software
     Foundation (Note: Copying).