Getting the whole site from the server in FTP by Zaweba

Sometimes the server is simply right and your PC is wrong. You may have been trying ideas locally that did not work out, or a colleague has rebuilt a section and you want their version of everything, or you just want a clean, known copy of what is live before a big change. In those moments the careful tools that protect newer local files get in the way. Get Entire Site in FTP by Zaweba is the deliberate opposite: it fetches every server file, including those where your local copy is newer.

Where to find it

There are several routes in. The toolbar has Get site, and the Site menu has Get Entire Site. For one part of the site, right-click a folder and choose Get All from Server, Ignore Newer Local. For a handful of files, select them and use Get Selected, Ignore Newer Local. All of them work the same way and differ only in how much they cover.

The preview

Each route opens a preview listing every server file in scope, all ticked, including the ones that are newer on your PC. That is the point of the command, but it also means the list deserves a careful read. Untick anything you want to keep as it is locally.

Files that are identical on both sides are skipped, because downloading them would change nothing. If you want them downloaded anyway (for example, to be sure every file on your PC has been freshly written from the server), tick Also download files that are the same.

What stays safe

Two rules make this safer than it sounds. Files that exist only on your PC are never touched, so new work you have not uploaded yet, notes, drafts and anything else local stays where it is. And every file that is replaced goes into the local version history first. If you realise afterwards that one of your local changes was worth keeping, open the history, compare the kept version with the current file and restore it.

That history lives only on your PC and never touches the server. Its limits (versions per file, a total size cap and a maximum file size) are set in File, Options, so if you plan to replace a lot of large files it is worth checking those settings first.

When to use something else

For everyday catching up, Get Newer from Server or Get Recent from Server is the better choice. They leave your newer local files alone and only bring down what changed on the server. Sync, with its direction set to Server to local, sits in between: it shows each action with a reason, and you can choose whether deletions are included.

Get Entire Site is for when you have decided that the server copy should win across the board, or for a chosen folder. Being explicit about that decision is why it has its own name rather than being an option hidden inside another tool.

A sensible routine

Before you run it on a whole site, think about whether any local changes are unsent. A quick look at the local tree with the date filter set to Today or Last 7 days shows what you have touched recently. Put up anything you want to keep first, or untick those files in the preview. Then run the command, read the list, and let it go.

On a large site, the folder version is often enough. If only the theme needs resetting, right-click the theme folder rather than fetching every image upload too. The download will be faster, and the preview will be short enough to read properly.

Remember that exclusion patterns apply here as everywhere else. Anything the site's Exclude box matches is never transferred, so it will not be fetched even by Get Entire Site.

Used with care, this is the cleanest way to make your PC match the live site again, without losing anything you might want back later.