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It may be more unix-y, but it's less user-friendly if the expectation is to just download a file.

EDIT: Wow, surprised by the downvotes. I don't think I said anything controversial (y'know principle of least surprise and all), but maybe I was being a bit too opaque: wget, by virtue of being the first on the scene, built an expectation that $THING_THAT_GETS_URLS would result in a file without any other input/arguments. Curl, to this day, surprises me because I was around when wget was all you had.



Nonsense. You can use both tools. 'curl' is 'cat url', and by default is meant to behave like 'cat' - that is, send stuff to STDOUT. 'wget' is 'web get', and gets an object from (only) the web or ftp, and plonks it on your filesystem. They both do exactly what they're supposed to (according to name), by default.


> 'curl' is 'cat url',

Whoa... TIL something! I don't know if that's the official etymology, but that's a great mnemonic!

EDIT: ... and yes, I use both tools :).


Well, it looks like I was taught wrong, and it's not 'cat URL' (though that's a good way to think of it), but the rather more direct-to-STDOUT-sounding 'see URL'. TIL something too :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CURL


My first impression is 'cat URL' not 'see URL'. The wikipedia article does not have to be official.


Remove your edit, it makes it more likely for you to get downvotes, not less.

If you post something, stand by it, do not worry about downvotes. I don't really like them, but nevertheless I'm proud when I get a downvote - it means I don't have a hive-mind mentality.


Nah, I don't really mind the downvotes per se. I was just surprised, that's all. Anyway, seems that my further clarification in the edit cleared up some confusion on the content of my post, so it's all good.




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