Linux – How to know if a given file has finished uploading from another location

linuxscpUbuntuupload

Let's say we have machine 1 and machine 2.
Machine 2, which is linux based, is receiving a file (let's say cat.jpg sent via SCP from machine 1 (doesn't really matter which operating system..).

How can I know in machine 2, that the file has finished uploading from machine 1 ?
Please note that by "knowing" I mean by running a command (via a cron that runs every minute), and not by an event driven way ("make the scp issue a command when it is finished uploading").

Another limitation I have is that I can't change anything in machine 1 or in the way it SCP files.

If it really matters:

the files being transferred are video file, MP4 extension.
machine 2 is ubuntu 10.10

Best Answer

you should be able to use the lsof command to check if the file is open in another program.

lsof | grep filename

if you get a result the file is open in another process and probably still uploading. If the result is blank the file is finished uploading or possibly the transfer failed for some reason.

Related Solutions

Way to tell if a file is done copying

A common way of doing this is to first copy it to a temporary file name, preferably a hidden file. When the copy finishes, the script that is doing the copy then renames it to the non-hidden filename.

The script on machine B could then watch for non-hidden files.

The script on machine A would look something like this:

for file in `ls *` ; do
    scp $file user@host:~/.${file}.tmp
    ssh user@host "mv ~/.${file}.tmp $file"
done

Although this does not satisfy OP's desire to use the one-line

scp * user@host:~/

it accomplishes the same thing and also allows machine B to transfer each file as it finishes without waiting for the next file.

Linux – scp certain files only

here's what I do when a host ony allows pushing stuff, and no rsync:

create a "shadow" directory on your local machine to resemble the target structure
use rsync to push to this shadow directory, and capture the output (there's --log-file if you want to script it)
from the rsync output, determine the files you need to delete, or push and make a list
maybe (depends on the way you push): create a package from the files that need to be changed only
start your push tool - ftp, scp, whatever - and let it run on the files from the list

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Way to tell if a file is done copying

Linux – scp certain files only

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