cURL For Mac

cURL is an open source project that offers you the possibility to quickly transfer data to and from a server via command line. Most of the transfer related capabilities are powered by the libcurl library.

cURL does not come as a binary which means that you must use the files included in the archive to compile and build the app. To get started, open the Terminal.app and navigate to the cURL folder (will be generated when you open the archive).

The next step is to use the “./configure --with-darwinssl” command (cURL is able to use the Apple SSL / TLS implementation), wait until cURL puts everything in place, and then run the “make” command. If everything does smoothly, you will now be able to use the cURL command in your Terminal.

To learn more about all the possibilities and tools provided by cURL you can use the “cURL - h” command and view all the usage options. Note that the cURL archive also includes detailed installation and usage documentation.

cURL is able to work with a wide range of transfer protocols, such as FTP, FTPS, HTTP, HTTPS, IMAP, IMAPS, TELNET, TFTP, DICT, FILE, GOPHER, LDAP, LDAPS, POP3, POP3S, SMTP, SMTPS, SFTP, SCP, RTMP, and RTSP.

cURL includes basic file transfer capabilities, such as the fact that it is able to use proxies, SSL connections, cookies, file transfer resumes, or metalinks.

However, the command line utility also provides useful tricks designed to improve your experience: cURL tries to guess the correct protocol if not provided, to re-use server connections to improve speed, allows you to adjust the progress display and more.

cURL proposes simple yet efficient tools for quickly transferring data to and from a server by using the command line. The app includes several tricks that can help you improve the transfer rate and more.