Connect to FTP Data and Transfer Data in Talend

This article shows how you can easily integrate the CData JDBC driver for FTP into your workflow in Talend. This article uses the CData JDBC Driver for FTP to transfer FTP data in a job flow in Talend.

Connect to FTP in Talend as a JDBC Data Source

You can follow the procedure below to establish a JDBC connection to FTP:

1. Add a new database connection to FTP data: To add a new connection, expand the Metadata node, right-click the Db Connections node, and then click Create Connection.
2. In the resulting wizard, enter a name for the connection.

3. On the next page, select Generic JDBC from the DB Type menu and enter the JDBC URL.

   To connect to FTP or SFTP servers, specify at least RemoteHost and FileProtocol. Specify the port with RemotePort.

   Set User and Password to perform Basic authentication. Set SSHAuthMode to use SSH authentication. See the Getting Started section of the data provider help documentation for more information on authenticating via SSH.

   Set SSLMode and SSLServerCert to secure connections with SSL.

   The data provider lists the tables based on the available folders in your FTP server. Set the following connection properties to control the relational view of the file system:

   • RemotePath: Set this to the current working directory.
   • TableDepth: Set this to control the depth of folders to list as views.
   • FileRetrievalDepth: Set this to retrieve and list files recursively from the root table.

   Stored Procedures are available to download files, upload files, and send protocol commands. See the Data Model chapter of the FTP data provider documentation for more information.

   Built-in Connection String Designer

   For assistance in constructing the JDBC URL, use the connection string designer built into the FTP JDBC Driver. Either double-click the JAR file or execute the jar file from the command-line.

   java -jar cdata.jdbc.ftp.jar

   Fill in the connection properties and copy the connection string to the clipboard.

   A typical JDBC URL is below:

   jdbc:ftp:RemoteHost=MyFTPServer;
4. Enter the path to the cdata.jdbc.ftp.jar file, located in the lib subfolder of the installation directory.
5. Right-click the connection and then click Retrieve Schema.
6. Click Next with the default options to select the tables you want to import.
7. Finish the wizard with the default options.

Output the MyDirectory Table to a Flat File

You can follow the procedure below to transfer the MyDirectory table to a flat file output component:

1. In the Table Schemas node, drag the tables to the workspace.
2. In the dialog that is displayed, select the tJDBCInput component.
3. Next, drag a tFileOutputDelimited component from the Business Intelligence tab of the Palette into the workspace.
4. Right-click the MyDirectory tJDBCInput component and drag a vector to the output file.

Run the project to transfer the data.