How To Use Wget to Download Files and Interact with REST APIs

The author selected the COVID-19 Relief Fund to receive a donation as part of the Write for DOnations program.

Introduction

Wget is a networking command-line tool that lets you download files and interact with REST APIs. It supports the HTTP,HTTPS, FTP, and FTPS internet protocols. Wget can deal with unstable and slow network connections. In the event of a download failure, Wget keeps trying until the entire file has been retrieved. Wget also lets you resume a file download that was interrupted without starting from scratch.

You can also use Wget to interact with REST APIs without having to install any additional external programs. You can make GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE HTTP requests with single and multiple headers right in the terminal.

In this tutorial, you will use Wget to download files, interact with REST API endpoints, and create and manage a Droplet in your DigitalOcean account.

You can use your local system or a remote server to open a terminal and run the commands there.

Prerequisites

To complete this tutorial, you will need:

• Wget installed. Most Linux distributions have Wget installed by default. To check, type wget in your terminal and press ENTER. If it is not installed, it will display: command not found. You can install it by running the following command: sudo apt-get install wget.

• A DigitalOcean account. If you do not have one, sign up for a new account.

• A DigitalOcean Personal Access Token, which you can create via the DigitalOcean control panel. Instructions to do that can be found here: How to Generate a Personal Access Token.

Downloading Files

In this section, you will use Wget to customize your download experience. For example, you will learn to download a single file and multiple files, handle file downloads in unstable network conditions, and, in the case of a download interruption, resume a download.

First, create a directory to save the files that you will download throughout this tutorial:

mkdir -p DigitalOcean-Wget-Tutorial/Downloads

With the command above, you have created a directory named DigitalOcean-Wget-Tutorial, and inside of it, you created a subdirectory named Downloads. This directory and its subdirectory will be where you will store the files you download.

Navigate to the DigitalOcean-Wget-Tutorial directory:

cd DigitalOcean-Wget-Tutorial

You have successfully created the directory where you will store the files you download.

Downloading a file

In order to download a file using Wget, type wget followed by the URL of the file that you wish to download. Wget will download the file in the given URL and save it in the current directory.

Let’s download a minified version of jQuery using the following command:

wget https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.6.0.min.js

Don’t worry if you don’t know what jQuery is – you could have downloaded any file available on the internet. All you need to know is that you successfully used Wget to download a file from the internet.

The output will look similar to this:

Output
--2021-07-21 16:25:11--  https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.6.0.min.js
Resolving code.jquery.com (code.jquery.com)... 69.16.175.10, 69.16.175.42, 2001:4de0:ac18::1:a:1a, ...
Connecting to code.jquery.com (code.jquery.com)|69.16.175.10|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 89501 (87K) [application/javascript]
Saving to: ‘jquery-3.6.0.min.js’

jquery-3.6.0.min.js 100%[===================>]  87.40K   114KB/s    in 0.8s    

2021-07-21 16:25:13 (114 KB/s) - ‘jquery-3.6.0.min.js’ saved [89501/89501]

According to the output above, you have successfully downloaded and saved a file named jquery-3.6.0.min.js to your current directory.

You can check the contents of the current directory using the following command:

ls 

The output will look similar to this:

Output
Downloads  jquery-3.6.0.min.js

Specifying the filename for the downloaded file

When downloading a file, Wget defaults to storing it using the name that the file has on the server. You can change that by using the -O option to specify a new name.

Download the jQuery file you downloaded previously, but this time save it under a different name:

wget -O jquery.min.js https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.6.0.min.js

With the command above, you set the jQuery file to be saved as jquery.min.js instead of jquery-3.6.0.min.js

The output will look similar to this:

Output
--2021-07-21 16:27:01--  https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.6.0.min.js
Resolving code.jquery.com (code.jquery.com)... 69.16.175.10, 69.16.175.42, 2001:4de0:ac18::1:a:2b, ...
Connecting to code.jquery.com (code.jquery.com)|69.16.175.10|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 89501 (87K) [application/javascript]
Saving to: ‘jquery.min.js’

jquery.min.js            100%[==================================>]  87.40K   194KB/s    in 0.4s    

2021-07-21 16:27:03 (194 KB/s) - ‘jquery.min.js’ saved [89501/89501]

According to the output above, you have successfully downloaded the jQuery file and saved it as jquery.min.js.

You can use the ls command to list the contents of your current directory, and you will see the jquery.min.js file there:

ls

The output will look similar to this:

Output
Downloads  jquery-3.6.0.min.js  jquery.min.js

So far, you have used wget to download files to the current directory. Next, you will download to a specific directory.

Downloading a file to a specific directory

When downloading a file, Wget stores it in the current directory by default. You can change that by using the -P option to specify the name of the directory where you want to save the file.

Download the jQuery file you downloaded previously, but this time save it in the Downloads subdirectory.

wget -P Downloads/  https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.6.0.min.js

The output will look similar to this:

Output
--2021-07-21 16:28:50--  https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.6.0.min.js
Resolving code.jquery.com (code.jquery.com)... 69.16.175.42, 69.16.175.10, 2001:4de0:ac18::1:a:2b, ...
Connecting to code.jquery.com (code.jquery.com)|69.16.175.42|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 89501 (87K) [application/javascript]
Saving to: ‘Downloads/jquery-3.6.0.min.js’

jquery-3.6.0.min.js      100%[==================================>]  87.40K  43.6KB/s    in 2.0s    

2021-07-21 16:28:53 (43.6 KB/s) - ‘Downloads/jquery-3.6.0.min.js’ saved  [89501/89501]

Notice the last line where it says that the jquery-3.6.0.min.js file was saved in the Downloads directory.

If you use the ls Downloads command to list the contents of the Downloads directory, you will see the jQuery file there:

Run the ls command:

ls Downloads

The output will look similar to this:

Output
jquery-3.6.0.min.js

Turning Wget’s output off

By default, Wget outputs a lot of information to the terminal when you download a file. You can use the -q option to turn off all output.

Download the jQuery file, but this time without showing any output:

wget -q  https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.6.0.min.js 

You won’t see any output, but if you use the ls command to list the contents of the current directory you will find a file named jquery-3.6.0.min.js.1:

ls

The output will look similar to this:

Output
Downloads  jquery-3.6.0.min.js  jquery-3.6.0.min.js.1  jquery.min.js

Before saving a file, Wget checks whether the file exists in the desired directory. If it does, Wget adds a number to the end of the file. If you ran the command above one more time, Wget would create a file named jquery-3.6.0.min.js.2. This number increases every time you download a file to a directory that already has a file with the same name.

You have successfully turned off Wget’s output, but now you can’t monitor the download progress. Let’s look at how to show the download progress bar.

Showing the download progress bar

Wget lets you show the download progress bar but hide any other output by using the -q option alongside the --show-progress option.

Download the jQuery file, but this time only show the download progress bar:

wget -q --show-progress https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.6.0.min.js 

The output will look similar to this:

Output
jquery-3.6.0.min.js.2         100%[================================================>]  87.40K   207KB/s    in 0.4s

Use the ls command to check the contents of the current directory and you will find the file you have just downloaded with the name jquery-3.6.0.min.js.2

From this point forward you will be using the -q and --show-progress options in most of the subsequent Wget commands.

So far you have only downloaded a single file. Next, you will download multiple files.

Downloading multiple files

In order to download multiples files using Wget, you need to create a .txt file and insert the URLs of the files you wish to download. After inserting the URLs inside the file, use the wget command with the -i option followed by the name of the .txt file containing the URLs.

Create a file named images.txt:

nano images.txt

In images.txt, add the following URLs:

https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2016/12/13/05/15/puppy-1903313__340.jpg
https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2016/01/05/17/51/maltese-1123016__340.jpg
https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2020/06/30/22/34/dog-5357794__340.jpg

The URLs link to three random images of dogs found on Pixabay. After you have added the URLs, save and close the file.

Now you will use the -i option alongside the -P,-q and --show-progress options that you learned earlier to download all three images to the Downloads directory:

wget -i images.txt -P Downloads/ -q --show-progress

The output will look similar to this:

Output
puppy-1903313__340.jp 100%[=========================>]  26.44K  93.0KB/s    in 0.3s    
maltese-1123016__340. 100%[=========================>]  50.81K  --.-KB/s    in 0.06s   
dog-5357794__340.jpg  100%[=========================>]  30.59K  --.-KB/s    in 0.07s

If you use the ls Downloads command to list the contents of the Downloads directory, you will find the names of the three images you have just downloaded:

ls Downloads

The output will look similar to this:

Output
dog-5357794__340.jpg  jquery-3.6.0.min.js  maltese-1123016__340.jpg  puppy-1903313__340.jpg

Limiting download speed

So far, you have download files with the maximum available download speed. However, you might want to limit the download speed to preserve resources for other tasks. You can limit the download speed by using the --limit-rate option followed by the maximum speed allowed in kiloBits per second and the letter k.

Download the first image in the images.txt file with a speed of 15 kB/S to the Downloads directory:

wget --limit-rate 15k -P Downloads/ -q --show-progress https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2016/12/13/05/15/puppy-1903313__340.jpg

The output will look similar to this:

Output
puppy-1903313__340.jpg.1       100%[====================================================>]  26.44K  16.1KB/s    in 1.6s

If you use the ls Downloads command to check the contents of the Downloads directory, you will see the file you have just downloaded with the name puppy-1903313__340.jpg.1.

When downloading a file that already exists, Wget creates a new file instead of overwriting the existing file. Next, you will overwrite a downloaded file.

Overwriting a downloaded file

You can overwrite a file you have downloaded by using the -O option alongside the name of the file. In the code below, you will first download the second image listed in the images.txt file to the current directory and then you will overwrite it.

First, download the second image to the current directory and set the name to image2.jpg:

wget -O image2.jpg -q --show-progress  https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2016/12/13/05/15/puppy-1903313__340.jpg 

The output will look similar to this::

Output
image2.jpg                     100%[====================================================>]  26.44K  --.-KB/s    in 0.04s

If you use the ls command to check the contents of the current directory, you will see the file you have just downloaded with the name image2.jpg.

If you wish to overwrite this image2.jpg file, you can run the same command you ran earlier :

wget -O image2.jpg -q --show-progress  https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2016/12/13/05/15/puppy-1903313__340.jpg 

You can run the command above as many times as you like and Wget will download the file and overwrite the existing one. If you run the command above without the -O option, Wget will create a new file each time you run it.

Resuming a download

Thus far, you have successfully downloaded multiple files without interruption. However, if the download was interrupted, you can resume it by using the -c option.

Run the following command to download a random image of a dog found on Pixabay. Note that in the command, you have set the maximum speed to 1 KB/S. Before the image finishes downloading, press Ctrl+C to cancel the download:

wget --limit-rate 1k -q --show-progress https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2018/03/07/19/51/grass-3206938__340.jpg 

To resume the download, pass the -c option. Note that this will only work if you run this command in the same directory as the incomplete file:

wget -c --limit-rate 1k -q --show-progress https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2018/03/07/19/51/grass-3206938__340.jpg

Up until now, you have only downloaded files in the foreground. Next, you will download files in the background.

Downloading in the background

You can download files in the background by using the -b option.

Run the command below to download a random image of a dog from Pixabay in the background:

wget -b https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2018/03/07/19/51/grass-3206938__340.jpg

When you download files in the background, Wget creates a file named wget-log in the current directory and redirects all output to this file. If you wish to watch the status of the download, you can use the following command:

tail -f wget-log

The output will look similar to this:

Output
Resolving cdn.pixabay.com (cdn.pixabay.com)... 104.18.20.183, 104.18.21.183, 2606:4700::6812:14b7, ...
Connecting to cdn.pixabay.com (cdn.pixabay.com)|104.18.20.183|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 33520 (33K) [image/jpeg]
Saving to: ‘grass-3206938__340.jpg’

     0K .......... .......... .......... ..                   100%  338K=0.1s

2021-07-20 23:49:52 (338 KB/s) - ‘grass-3206938__340.jpg’ saved [33520/33520]

Setting a timeout

Until this point, we have assumed that the server that you are trying to download files from is working properly. However, let’s assume that the server is not working properly. You can use Wget to first limit the amount of time that you wait for the server to respond and then limit the number of times that Wget tries to reach the server.

If you wish to download a file but you are unsure if the server is working properly, you can set a timeout by using the -T option followed by the time in seconds.

In the following command, you are setting the timeout to 5 seconds:

wget -T 5 -q --show-progress https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2016/12/13/05/15/puppy-1903313__340.jpg 

Setting maximum number of tries

You can also set how many times Wget attempts to download a file after being interrupted by passing the --tries option followed by the number of tries.

By running the command below, you are limiting the number of tries to 3:

wget --tries=3 -q --show-progress https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2018/03/07/19/51/grass-3206938__340.jpg 

If you would like to try indefinitely you can pass inf alongside the --tries option:

wget --tries=inf -q --show-progress https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2018/03/07/19/51/grass-3206938__340.jpg 

In this section, you used Wget to download a single file and multiple files, resume downloads, and handle network issues. In the next section, you will learn to interact with REST API endpoints.

Interacting with REST APIs

In this section, you will use Wget to interact with REST APIs without having to install an external program. You will learn the syntax to send the most commonly used HTTP methods: GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE.

We are going to use JSONPlaceholder as the mock REST API. JSONPlaceholder is a free online REST API that you can use for fake data. (The requests you send to it won’t affect any databases and the data won’t be saved.)

Sending GET requests

Wget lets you send GET requests by running a command that looks like the following:

wget -O- [ URL ]

In the command above, the - after the -O option means standard output, so Wget will send the output of the URL to the terminal instead of sending it to a file as you did in the previous section. GET is the default HTTP method that Wget uses.

Run the following command in the terminal window:

wget -O- https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts?_limit=2

In the command above, you used wget to send a GET request to JSON Placeholder in order to retrieve two posts from the REST API.

The output will look similar to this:

Output
--2021-07-21 16:52:51--  https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts?_limit=2
Resolving jsonplaceholder.typicode.com (jsonplaceholder.typicode.com)... 104.21.10.8, 172.67.189.217, 2606:4700:3032::6815:a08, ...
Connecting to jsonplaceholder.typicode.com (jsonplaceholder.typicode.com)|104.21.10.8|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK'
Length: 600 [application/json]
Saving to: ‘STDOUT’

-                          0%[                                   ]       0  --.-KB/s               [
  {
    "userId": 1,
    "id": 1,
    "title": "sunt aut facere repellat provident occaecati excepturi optio reprehenderit",
    "body": "quia et suscipit\nsuscipit recusandae consequuntur expedita et cum\nreprehenderit molestiae ut ut quas totam\nnostrum rerum est autem sunt rem eveniet architecto"
  },
  {
    "userId": 1,
    "id": 2,
    "title": "qui est esse",
    "body": "est rerum tempore vitae\nsequi sint nihil reprehenderit dolor beatae ea dolores neque\nfugiat blanditiis voluptate porro vel nihil molestiae ut reiciendis\nqui aperiam non debitis possimus qui neque nisi nulla"
  }
-                        100%[==================================>]     600  --.-KB/s    in 0s      

2021-07-21 16:52:53 (4.12 MB/s) - written to stdout [600/600]

Notice the line where it says HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK, which means that you have successfully sent a GET request to JSONPlaceholder.

If that is too much output you can use the -q option that you learned in the previous section to restrict the output to the results of the GET request:

wget -O- -q https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts?_limit=2

The output will look similar to this:

Output
[
  {
    "userId": 1,
    "id": 1,
    "title": "sunt aut facere repellat provident occaecati excepturi optio reprehenderit",
    "body": "quia et suscipit\nsuscipit recusandae consequuntur expedita et cum\nreprehenderit molestiae ut ut quas totam\nnostrum rerum est autem sunt rem eveniet architecto"
  },
  {
    "userId": 1,
    "id": 2,
    "title": "qui est esse",
    "body": "est rerum tempore vitae\nsequi sint nihil reprehenderit dolor beatae ea dolores neque\nfugiat blanditiis voluptate porro vel nihil molestiae ut reiciendis\nqui aperiam non debitis possimus qui neque nisi nulla"
  }
]

Sending POST requests

Wget lets you send POST requests by running a command that looks like the following:

wget --method==[post] -O- --body-data=[ body in json format ] --header=[ String ] [ URL ]

Run the following command:

wget --method=post -O- -q --body-data='{"title": "Wget POST","body": "Wget POST example body","userId":1}' --header=Content-Type:application/json https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts

In the command above, you used wget to send a POST request to JSON Placeholder to create a new post. You set the method to post, the Header to Content-Type:application/json and sent the following request body to it :{"title": "Wget POST","body": "Wget POST example body","userId":1}.

The output will look similar to this:

Output
{
  "title": "Wget POST",
  "body": "Wget POST example body",
  "userId": 1,
  "id": 101
}

Sending PUT requests

Wget lets you send PUT requests by running a command that looks like the following:

wget --method==[put] -O- --body-data=[ body in json format ] --header=[ String ] [ URL ]

Run the following command:

wget --method=put -O- -q --body-data='{"title": "Wget PUT", "body": "Wget PUT example body", "userId": 1, "id":1}' --header=Content-Type:application/json https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts/1 

In the command above you used wget to send a PUT request to JSON Placeholder to edit the first post in this REST API. You set the method to put, the Header to Content-Type:application/json and sent the following request body to it :{"title": "Wget PUT", "body": "Wget PUT example body", "userId": 1, "id":1} .

The output will look similar to this:

Output
{
  "body": "Wget PUT example body",
  "title": "Wget PUT",
  "userId": 1,
  "id": 1
}

Sending DELETE requests

Wget lets you send DELETE requests by running a command that looks like the following:

wget --method==[delete] -O- [ URL ]

Run the following command:

wget --method=delete -O- -q --header=Content-Type:application/json https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts/1

In the command above you used wget to send a DELETE request to JSON Placeholder to delete the first post in this REST API. You set the method to delete, and set the post you want to delete to 1 in the URL.

The output will look similar to this:

Output
{}

In this section, you learned how to use Wget to send GET, POST, PUT and DELETE requests with only one header field. In the next section, you will learn how to send multiple header fields in order to create and manage a Droplet in your DigitalOcean account.

Creating and Managing a DigitalOcean Droplet

In this section, you will apply what you learned in the previous section and use Wget to create and manage a Droplet in your DigitalOcean account. But before you do that, you will learn how to send multiple headers fields in a HTTP method.

The syntax for a command to send multiple headers looks like this:

wget --header=[ first header ] --header=[ second header] --header=[ N header] [ URL ]

You can have as many headers fields as you like by repeating the --header option as many times as you need.

To create a Droplet or interact with any other resource in the DigitalOcean API, you will need to send two request headers:

Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer your_personal_access_token

You already saw the first header in the previous section. The second header is what lets you authenticate your account. It has the String named Bearer followed by your DigitalOcean account Personal Access Token.

Run the following command, replacing your_personal_access_token with your DigitalOcean Personal Access Token:

wget --method=post -O- -q --header="Content-Type: application/json" --header="Authorization: Bearer your_personal_access_token" --body-data='{"name":"Wget-example","region":"nyc1","size":"s-1vcpu-1gb","image":"ubuntu-20-04-x64","tags": ["Wget-tutorial"]}' https://api.digitalocean.com/v2/droplets

With the command above, you have created an ubuntu-20-04-x64 Droplet in the nyc1 region named Wget-example with 1vcpu and 1gb of memory, and you have set the tag to Wget-tutorial. For more information about the attributes in the body-data field, see the DigitalOcean API documentation.

The output will look similar to this:

Output
{"droplet":{"id":237171073,"name":"Wget-example","memory":1024,"vcpus":1,"disk":25,"locked":false,"status":"new","kernel":null,"created_at":"2021-03-16T12:38:59Z","features":[],"backup_ids":[],"next_backup_window":null,"snapshot_ids":[],"image":{"id":72067660,"name":"20.04 (LTS) x64","distribution":"Ubuntu","slug":"ubuntu-20-04-x64","public":true,"regions":["nyc3","nyc1","sfo1","nyc2","ams2","sgp1","lon1","ams3","fra1","tor1","sfo2","blr1","sfo3"],"created_at":"2020-10-20T16:34:30Z","min_disk_size":15,"type":"base","size_gigabytes":0.52,"description":"Ubuntu 20.04 x86","tags":[],"status":"available"},"volume_ids":[],"size":{"slug":"s-1vcpu-1gb","memory":1024,"vcpus":1,"disk":25,"transfer":1.0,"price_monthly":5.0,"price_hourly":0.00744,"regions":["ams2","ams3","blr1","fra1","lon1","nyc1","nyc2","nyc3","sfo1","sfo3","sgp1","tor1"],"available":true,"description":"Basic"},"size_slug":"s-1vcpu-1gb","networks":{"v4":[],"v6":[]},"region":{"name":"New York 1","slug":"nyc1","features":["backups","ipv6","metadata","install_agent","storage","image_transfer"],"available":true,"sizes":["s-1vcpu-1gb","s-1vcpu-1gb-intel","s-1vcpu-2gb","s-1vcpu-2gb-intel","s-2vcpu-2gb","s-2vcpu-2gb-intel","s-2vcpu-4gb","s-2vcpu-4gb-intel","s-4vcpu-8gb","c-2","c2-2vcpu-4gb","s-4vcpu-8gb-intel","g-2vcpu-8gb","gd-2vcpu-8gb","s-8vcpu-16gb","m-2vcpu-16gb","c-4","c2-4vcpu-8gb","s-8vcpu-16gb-intel","m3-2vcpu-16gb","g-4vcpu-16gb","so-2vcpu-16gb","m6-2vcpu-16gb","gd-4vcpu-16gb","so1_5-2vcpu-16gb","m-4vcpu-32gb","c-8","c2-8vcpu-16gb","m3-4vcpu-32gb","g-8vcpu-32gb","so-4vcpu-32gb","m6-4vcpu-32gb","gd-8vcpu-32gb","so1_5-4vcpu-32gb","m-8vcpu-64gb","c-16","c2-16vcpu-32gb","m3-8vcpu-64gb","g-16vcpu-64gb","so-8vcpu-64gb","m6-8vcpu-64gb","gd-16vcpu-64gb","so1_5-8vcpu-64gb","m-16vcpu-128gb","c-32","c2-32vcpu-64gb","m3-16vcpu-128gb","m-24vcpu-192gb","g-32vcpu-128gb","so-16vcpu-128gb","m6-16vcpu-128gb","gd-32vcpu-128gb","m3-24vcpu-192gb","g-40vcpu-160gb","so1_5-16vcpu-128gb","m-32vcpu-256gb","gd-40vcpu-160gb","so-24vcpu-192gb","m6-24vcpu-192gb","m3-32vcpu-256gb","so1_5-24vcpu-192gb"]},"tags":["Wget-tutorial"]},"links":{"actions":[{"id":1164336542,"rel":"create","href":"https://api.digitalocean.com/v2/actions/1164336542"}]}}

If you see an output similar to the one above that means that you have successfully created a Droplet.

Now let’s get a list of all the Droplets in your account that have the tag Wget-tutorial. Run the following command, replacing your_personal_access_token with your DigitalOcean Personal Access Token:

wget -O- -q --header="Content-Type: application/json" --header="Authorization: Bearer your_personal_access_token" https://api.digitalocean.com/v2/droplets?tag_name=Wget-tutorial

You should see the name of the Droplet you have just created in the output:

Output
{"droplets":[{"id":237171073,"name":"Wget-example","memory":1024,"vcpus":1,"disk":25,"locked":false,"status":"active","kernel":null,"created_at":"2021-03-16T12:38:59Z","features":["private_networking"],"backup_ids":[],"next_backup_window":null,"snapshot_ids":[],"image":{"id":72067660,"name":"20.04 (LTS) x64","distribution":"Ubuntu","slug":"ubuntu-20-04-x64","public":true,"regions":["nyc3","nyc1","sfo1","nyc2","ams2","sgp1","lon1","ams3","fra1","tor1","sfo2","blr1","sfo3"],"created_at":"2020-10-20T16:34:30Z","min_disk_size":15,"type":"base","size_gigabytes":0.52,"description":"Ubuntu 20.04 x86","tags":[],"status":"available"},"volume_ids":[],"size":{"slug":"s-1vcpu-1gb","memory":1024,"vcpus":1,"disk":25,"transfer":1.0,"price_monthly":5.0,"price_hourly":0.00744,"regions":["ams2","ams3","blr1","fra1","lon1","nyc1","nyc2","nyc3","sfo1","sfo3","sgp1","tor1"],"available":true,"description":"Basic"},"size_slug":"s-1vcpu-1gb","networks":{"v4":[{"ip_address":"10.116.0.2","netmask":"255.255.240.0","gateway":"","type":"private"},{"ip_address":"204.48.20.197","netmask":"255.255.240.0","gateway":"204.48.16.1","type":"public"}],"v6":[]},"region":{"name":"New York 1","slug":"nyc1","features":["backups","ipv6","metadata","install_agent","storage","image_transfer"],"available":true,"sizes":["s-1vcpu-1gb","s-1vcpu-1gb-intel","s-1vcpu-2gb","s-1vcpu-2gb-intel","s-2vcpu-2gb","s-2vcpu-2gb-intel","s-2vcpu-4gb","s-2vcpu-4gb-intel","s-4vcpu-8gb","c-2","c2-2vcpu-4gb","s-4vcpu-8gb-intel","g-2vcpu-8gb","gd-2vcpu-8gb","s-8vcpu-16gb","m-2vcpu-16gb","c-4","c2-4vcpu-8gb","s-8vcpu-16gb-intel","m3-2vcpu-16gb","g-4vcpu-16gb","so-2vcpu-16gb","m6-2vcpu-16gb","gd-4vcpu-16gb","so1_5-2vcpu-16gb","m-4vcpu-32gb","c-8","c2-8vcpu-16gb","m3-4vcpu-32gb","g-8vcpu-32gb","so-4vcpu-32gb","m6-4vcpu-32gb","gd-8vcpu-32gb","so1_5-4vcpu-32gb","m-8vcpu-64gb","c-16","c2-16vcpu-32gb","m3-8vcpu-64gb","g-16vcpu-64gb","so-8vcpu-64gb","m6-8vcpu-64gb","gd-16vcpu-64gb","so1_5-8vcpu-64gb","m-16vcpu-128gb","c-32","c2-32vcpu-64gb","m3-16vcpu-128gb","m-24vcpu-192gb","g-32vcpu-128gb","so-16vcpu-128gb","m6-16vcpu-128gb","gd-32vcpu-128gb","m3-24vcpu-192gb","g-40vcpu-160gb","so1_5-16vcpu-128gb","m-32vcpu-256gb","gd-40vcpu-160gb","so-24vcpu-192gb","m6-24vcpu-192gb","m3-32vcpu-256gb","so1_5-24vcpu-192gb"]},"tags":["Wget-tutorial"],"vpc_uuid":"5ee0a168-39d1-4c60-a89c-0b47390f3f7e"}],"links":{},"meta":{"total":1}}

Now let’s take the id of the Droplet you have created and use it to delete the Droplet. Run the following command, replacing your_personal_access_token with your DigitalOcean Personal Access Token and your_droplet_id with your Droplet id:

wget --method=delete -O- --header="Content-Type: application/json" --header="Authorization: Bearer your_personal_access_token" https://api.digitalocean.com/v2/droplets/your_droplet_id

In the command above, you added your Droplet id to the URL to delete it. If you are seeing a 204 No Content in the output, that means that you succeeded in deleting the Droplet.

In this section, you used Wget to send multiple headers. Then, you created and managed a Droplet in your DigitalOcean account.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, you used Wget to download files in stable and unstable network conditions and interact with REST API endpoints. You then used this knowledge to create and manage a Droplet in your DigitalOcean account. If you would like to learn more about Wget, visit this tool’s manual page. For more Linux command-line tutorials visit DigitalOcean community tutorials.