FTP
The FTP connector lets you connect to a FTP server and perform file transfer operations.
Before you begin
Before using the FTP connector, do the following tasks:
- In your Google Cloud project:
- Grant the roles/connectors.admin IAM role to the user configuring the connector.
- Grant the following IAM roles to the service account that you want to use for the connector:
roles/secretmanager.viewer
roles/secretmanager.secretAccessor
A service account is a special type of Google account intended to represent a non-human user that needs to authenticate and be authorized to access data in Google APIs. If you don't have a service account, you must create a service account. For more information, see Creating a service account.
- Enable the following services:
secretmanager.googleapis.com
(Secret Manager API)connectors.googleapis.com
(Connectors API)
To understand how to enable services, see Enabling services.
If these services or permissions have not been enabled for your project previously, you are prompted to enable them when configuring the connector.
Configure the connector
Configuring the connector requires you to create a connection to your data source (backend system). A connection is specific to a data source. It means that if you have many data sources, you must create a separate connection for each data source. To create a connection, do the following steps:
- In the Cloud console, go to the Integration Connectors > Connections page and then select or create a Google Cloud project.
- Click + Create new to open the Create Connection page.
- In the Location section, choose the location for the connection.
- Region: Select a location from the drop-down list.
For the list of all the supported regions, see Locations.
- Click Next.
- Region: Select a location from the drop-down list.
- In the Connection Details section, complete the following:
- Connector: Select FTP from the drop down list of available Connectors.
- Connector version: Select the Connector version from the drop down list of available versions.
- In the Connection Name field, enter a name for the Connection instance.
Connection names must meet the following criteria:
- Connection names can use letters, numbers, or hyphens.
- Letters must be lower-case.
- Connection names must begin with a letter and end with a letter or number.
- Connection names cannot exceed 63 characters.
- Optionally, enter a Description for the connection instance.
- Optionally, enable Cloud logging,
and then select a log level. By default, the log level is set to
Error
. - Service Account: Select a service account that has the required roles.
- Optionally, configure the Connection node settings:
- Minimum number of nodes: Enter the minimum number of connection nodes.
- Maximum number of nodes: Enter the maximum number of connection nodes.
A node is a unit (or replica) of a connection that processes transactions. More nodes are required to process more transactions for a connection and conversely, fewer nodes are required to process fewer transactions. To understand how the nodes affect your connector pricing, see Pricing for connection nodes. If you don't enter any values, by default the minimum nodes are set to 2 (for better availability) and the maximum nodes are set to 50.
- File Retrieval Depth: Specify the depth level of folders you want to query from the Root table.
- Passive: Controls whether to direct the server into passive mode. Recommended if behind a firewall.
- Remote Path: The current path in the FTP server.
- SSL Mode: The authentication mechanism to be used when connecting to the FTP server.
- Table Depth: The depth level to display subfolders as views.
- Use MLSD: Uses listings for machine processing. Used only for FTP servers.
- Optionally, click + Add label to add a label to the Connection in the form of a key/value pair.
- Click Next.
- In the Destinations section, enter details of the remote host (backend system) you want to connect to.
- Destination Type: Select a Destination Type.
- Select Host address from the list to specify the hostname or IP address of the destination.
- If you want to establish a private connection to your backend systems, select Endpoint attachment from the list, and then select the required endpoint attachment from the Endpoint Attachment list.
If you want to establish a public connection to your backend systems with additional security, you can consider configuring static outbound IP addresses for your connections, and then configure your firewall rules to allowlist only the specific static IP addresses.
To enter additional destinations, click +Add Destination.
- Click Next.
- Destination Type: Select a Destination Type.
-
In the Authentication section, enter the authentication details.
- Select an Authentication type and enter the relevant details.
The following authentication types are supported by the FTP connection:
- Username and password
- Click Next.
To understand how to configure these authentication types, see Configure authentication.
- Select an Authentication type and enter the relevant details.
- Review: Review your connection and authentication details.
- Click Create.
Configure authentication
Enter the details based on the authentication you want to use.
-
Username and password
- Username: The FTP username to use for the connection.
- Password: Secret Manager Secret containing the password associated with the FTP username.
Entities, operations, and actions
All the Integration Connectors provide a layer of abstraction for the objects of the connected application. You can access an application's objects only through this abstraction. The abstraction is exposed to you as entities, operations, and actions.
- Entity: An entity can be thought of as an object, or a collection of properties, in the
connected application or service. The definition of an entity differs from a connector to a
connector. For example, in a database connector, tables are the entities, in a
file server connector, folders are the entities, and in a messaging system connector,
queues are the entities.
However, it is possible that a connector doesn't support or have any entities, in which case the
Entities
list will be empty. - Operation: An operation is the activity that you can perform on an entity. You can perform
any of the following operations on an entity:
Selecting an entity from the available list, generates a list of operations available for the entity. For a detailed description of the operations, see the Connectors task's entity operations. However, if a connector doesn't support any of the entity operations, such unsupported operations aren't listed in the
Operations
list. - Action: An action is a first class function that is made available to the integration
through the connector interface. An action lets you make changes to an entity or entities, and
vary from connector to connector. Normally, an action will have some input parameters, and an output
parameter. However, it is possible
that a connector doesn't support any action, in which case the
Actions
list will be empty.
System limitations
The FTP connector can process 1 transaction per second, per node, and throttles any transactions beyond this limit. By default, Integration Connectors allocates 2 nodes (for better availability) for a connection.
For information on the limits applicable to Integration Connectors, see Limits.
Actions
This section lists some of the actions supported by the connector. To understand how to configure the actions, see Action examples.
Upload action
The following table describes the input parameters of the Upload
action.
Parameter name | Data type | Required | Description |
---|---|---|---|
Content | String | No | Content to upload as a file. |
ContentBytes | String | No | Bytes content (as a Base64 string) to upload as a file. Use this to upload binary data. |
HasBytes | Boolean | No | Specifies if the content should be uploaded as bytes. The default value is false . |
RemoteFile | String | Yes | The file name on the remote host. |
Overwrite | Boolean | No | Specifies if the remote file should be overwritten. The default value is false . |
For examples on how to configure the Upload
action, see Examples.
Download action
The following table describes the input parameters of the Download
action.
Parameter name | Data type | Required | Description |
---|---|---|---|
RemoteFile | String | Yes | The file name on the remote host. |
HasBytes | Boolean | No | Specifies if the content should be downloaded as bytes. The default value is false . |
For examples on how to configure the Download
action, see Examples.
MoveFile action
The following table describes the input parameters of the MoveFile
action.
Parameter name | Data type | Required | Description |
---|---|---|---|
RemoteFile | String | Yes | The path of the remote file to be moved. |
DestinationPath | String | Yes | The new path you want to move the file to. |
For examples on how to configure the MoveFile
action, see Examples.
RenameFile action
The following table describes the input parameters of the RenameFile
action.
Parameter name | Data type | Required | Description |
---|---|---|---|
RemoteFile | String | Yes | Remote file path and name to be renamed. |
NewFileName | String | Yes | New name of the remote file. |
For examples on how to configure the RenameFile
action, see Examples.
Examples
This section describes how to perform some of the entity operations and actions in this connector. The examples describe the following operations:
- List all files in the root directory
- List files that match a pattern in a directory
- Move a file
- Rename a file
- Delete a file
- Upload an ASCII text file
- Upload a binary file
- Download an ASCII text file
- Download a binary file
The following table lists the sample scenarios and the corresponding configuration in the Connectors task:
Task | Sample command | Configuration |
---|---|---|
List all files in the root directory | ls / |
|
List .csv files in a directory |
ls /tmp/*.csv |
|
Move a file | mv /tmp/dir_A/hello_world.txt /dir_B/dir_C/ |
This example moves the [{ "Success":"true" }] |
Rename a file | mv /tmp/hello_world.txt /tmp/hello_world_new.txt |
This example renames the [{ "Success":"true" }] |
Delete a file | rm /tmp/myfile.csv |
|
Upload an ASCII text file | put file_1.txt /tmp/file_1.txt |
This sample creates the Setting the |
Upload a binary file | put image_1.png /tmp/image_1.png |
To upload a binary content, you must first encode the content
in the Base64 format. You can choose a tool of your choice to
encode the content. Steps for encoding the content are out of
the scope of this document. After you have the content as
a Base64 string, perform the following steps:
This sample creates the Setting the |
Download an ASCII text file | get /tmp/myfile.txt |
The content of the downloaded file is available as a string
in the |
Download a binary file | get /tmp/myfile.png |
The content of the downloaded file is available as a Base64 encoded string
in the |
JSON schema for payload
All the entity objects in a FTP connection have a pre-defined JSON schema. Having a good understanding of the schema, lets you easily configure the input or output payload values. The entity objects in a FTP connection use the following JSON schema:
{ "type": "object", "properties": { "FilePath": { "type": "string", "readOnly": false }, "Filename": { "type": [ "string", "null" ], "readOnly": false, "description": "The name of the file or directory." }, "FileSize": { "type": [ "number", "null" ], "readOnly": false, "description": "The size of the file." }, "LastModified": { "type": [ "string", "null" ], "readOnly": false }, "IsDirectory": { "type": [ "boolean", "null" ], "readOnly": false }, "Permissions": { "type": [ "string", "null" ], "readOnly": false }, "Owner": { "type": [ "string", "null" ], "readOnly": false }, "OwnerId": { "type": [ "string", "null" ], "readOnly": false }, "Group": { "type": [ "string", "null" ], "readOnly": false }, "GroupId": { "type": [ "string", "null" ], "readOnly": false } } }
Dynamic configuration of filterClause
For the List, Update, and Delete operations, you can set the value of the filterClasue input
variable dynamically at runtime by using the
Data Mapping
task in your integration. For example, you might want to send the filter clause's value
when invoking the API trigger
in your integration. The following image shows a sample mapping for
the filterClause
variable in the Data Mapping editor of the
Data Mapping task:
Use terraform to create connections
You can use the Terraform resource to create a new connection.To learn how to apply or remove a Terraform configuration, see Basic Terraform commands.
To view a sample terraform template for connection creation, see sample template.
When creating this connection by using Terraform, you must set the following variables in your Terraform configuration file:
Parameter name | Data type | Required | Description |
---|---|---|---|
file_retrieval_depth | STRING | False | Specify the depth level of folders you want to query from the Root table. |
passive | BOOLEAN | False | Controls whether to direct the server into passive mode. Recommended if behind a firewall. |
remote_path | STRING | False | The current path in the FTP server. |
table_depth | INTEGER | False | The depth level to display subfolders as views. |
use_mlsd | BOOLEAN | False | Uses listings for machine processing. Used only for FTP servers. |
Use the FTP connection in an integration
After you create the connection, it becomes available in both Apigee Integration and Application Integration. You can use the connection in an integration through the Connectors task.
- To understand how to create and use the Connectors task in Apigee Integration, see Connectors task.
- To understand how to create and use the Connectors task in Application Integration, see Connectors task.
Get help from the Google Cloud community
You can post your questions and discuss this connector in the Google Cloud community at Cloud Forums.What's next
- Understand how to suspend and resume a connection.
- Understand how to monitor connector usage.
- Understand how to view connector logs.