I thought so too and tried without success:
. copy ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/time.series/sm/sm.data.1.Alabama Alabama.txt
unknown network protocol
r(671);
on my Windows system. -help netio- documents http<stuff> but
not ftp<stuff>, so far as I can see.
Nick
[email protected]
Anders Alexandersson
> Paulo Guimaraes <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > I would like to know if it is possible to read data
> directly from an ftp
> > site.
> > My interest in this is because I need to access some flat
> files at the
> > BLS web site.
> > Right now what I do is to open the file in my web browser
> and then save
> > it and insheet it into Stata.
> > For example, to read the employment time series for the
> state of Alabama
> > I need to open the file in my web browser
> > with the command:
> > ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/time.series/sm/sm.data.1.Alabama
> > and then save it and read it into Stata.
> > Is it possible to read the data directly from within Stata?
>
> I don't think you need to resort to mapping. The user manual [U] 28.2
> suggests the Stata -copy- command for sharing other files than Stata
> datasets (for which -use- is a direct solution). Although the URL
> examples are for http, and I have not tried ftp, ftp is another type
> of URL so it should work.
*
* For searches and help try:
* http://www.stata.com/support/faqs/res/findit.html
* http://www.stata.com/support/statalist/faq
* http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/
