How to delete files from a server and get them back

With FTP by Zaweba, files you delete on the server can go to a server-side trash instead of vanishing. When you want them back, open the Trash window, tick the items and press Restore ticked. They go back exactly where they were.

Ordinary FTP has no undo for deletes. This is the app's answer to that, and it's worth knowing how it behaves before the day you need it.

How the trash works

When you delete from the server pane, the items can be moved into a trash on the server rather than removed. Your site keeps working without them, because they're no longer in their old places, but they still exist and can be brought back.

On your own PC, local deletes go to the Windows Recycle Bin in the usual way. So whichever side you delete from, there's a way back by default.

The one exception is Delete Permanently (Shift+Del, or on the right-click menu). That skips both the Recycle Bin and the server trash after a warning that it can't be undone.

Restoring files, step by step

Open the Trash window. It lists everything deleted, with its original location, its size and when it was deleted.

Find what you need. On a busy site the list can be long, so the dates help. If you deleted a whole batch by mistake, use the option to tick everything that was deleted at the same time, which picks out that one slip in a single click. Tick all and Untick all are there too.

Press Restore ticked. The items go back to their original locations. Refresh the server pane and check the page in a browser or in Live Preview.

Emptying the trash

A server trash takes space on your hosting account, so it's worth clearing out from time to time. In the Trash window, tick what you're sure you no longer need and choose Delete ticked permanently. You'll be asked to type the number of files first, so you can't do it by accident, and you can choose to download a backup before they go.

If you want to see what is using the space on your account, Disk shows a treemap of server space and the biggest files.

Habits that keep deletes safe

Use the plain Delete for everyday tidying and keep Delete Permanently for files you're certain about. Batch deletes on the server show a confirmation, and those confirmations can offer to download a backup first; that's cheap insurance before any large clean-up.

Some items are protected and can't be deleted at all from the app, including .htaccess, wp-config.php, .env, .well-known/, cgi-bin/ and the web root. They appear in batch confirmations as left out, so you can see they were skipped on purpose.

Local history versus the trash

They solve different problems. The trash covers files that were deleted. Local version history covers files that were overwritten: before a Put replaces a server file, or a Get or a save replaces a local one, FTP by Zaweba keeps the previous version on your PC, with Compare with current and Restore in the history window.

Between them, the two common accidents on a live site (deleting the wrong thing and uploading over the right thing) both have a way back.