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$ qrcp

Transfer files over Wi-Fi from your computer to a mobile device by scanning a QR code without leaving the terminal.

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Join the Telegram channel qrcp_dev or the @qrcp_dev Twitter account for news about the development.

How does it work?

Screenshot

qrcp binds a web server to the address of your Wi-Fi network interface on a random port and creates a handler for it. The default handler serves the content and exits the program when the transfer is complete. When used to receive files, qrcp serves an upload page and handles the transfer.

The tool prints a QR code that encodes the text:

http://{address}:{port}/{random_path}

Most QR apps can detect URLs in decoded text and act accordingly (i.e. open the decoded URL with the default browser), so when the QR code is scanned the content will begin downloading by the mobile browser.

Send files to mobile:

screenshot

Receive files from mobile:

Screenshot

Tutorials

Installation

Install the latest development version with Go

Note: it requires go 1.18

go install github.com/claudiodangelis/qrcp@latest

Linux

Download the latest Linux .tar.gz archive from the Releases page, extract it, move the binary to the proper directory, then set execution permissions.

# Extract the archive
tar xf qrcp_0.5.0_linux_x86_64.tar.gz
# Copy the binary
sudo mv qrcp /usr/local/bin
# Set execution permissions
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/qrcp

Raspberry Pi

The following ARM releases are available in the Releases page:

Using a package manager

ArchLinux

Packages available on AUR:

Deb packages (Ubuntu, Debian, etc)

Download the latest .deb package from the Releases page, then run dpkg:

sudo dpkg -i qrcp_0.5.0_linux_x86_64.deb
# Confirm it's working:
qrcp version

RPM packages (CentOS, Fedora, etc)

Download the latest .rpm package from the Releases page, then run rpm:

sudo rpm -i qrcp_0.5.0_linux_x86_64.rpm
# Confirm it's working:
qrcp --help

Windows

Download the latest Windows .tar.gz archive from the Releases page and extract the EXE file.

Scoop

If you use Scoop for package management on Windows, you can install qrcp with the following one-liner:

scoop install qrcp

Chocolatey

If you use Chocolatey for package management on Windows, you can install qrcp with the following one-liner:

choco install qrcp

MacOS

Download the latest macOS .tar.gz archive from the Releases page, extract it, move the binary to the proper directory, then set execution permissions.

# Extract the archive
tar xf qrcp_0.5.0_macOS_x86_64.tar.gz
# Copy the binary
sudo mv qrcp /usr/local/bin
# Set execution permissions
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/qrcp
# Confirm it's working:
qrcp --help

Homebrew

If you use Homebrew for package management on macOS, you can install qrcp with the following one-liner:

brew install qrcp

Usage

Send files

Send a file

qrcp MyDocument.pdf

Send multiple files at once

When sending multiple files at once, qrcp creates a zip archive of the files or folders you want to transfer, and deletes the zip archive once the transfer is complete.

# Multiple files
qrcp MyDocument.pdf IMG0001.jpg

# A whole folder
qrcp Documents/

Zip a file before transferring it

You can choose to zip a file before transferring it.

qrcp --zip LongVideo.avi

Receive files

When receiving files, qrcp serves an "upload page" through which you can choose files from your mobile.

Receive files to the current directory

qrcp receive

Receive files to a specific directory

# Note: the folder must exist
qrcp receive --output=/tmp/dir

Configuration

qrcp works without any prior configuration, however, you can choose to configure to use specific values.

To configure qrcp you can create a configuration file inside $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/qrcp.

Note: On Linux, the $XDG_CONFIG_HOME is .config under user home directory. So, for example, on Linux the configuration file will be $HOME/.config/qrcp/config.yml. On MacOS, it defaults to `$HOME/Library/Application Support/qrcp/config.yml``

Note: Starting from version 0.10.0, qrcp uses a YAML configuration file instead of the old JSON one. You can automatically migrate the legacy JSON format to the new YAML format by running qrcp config migrate.

KeyTypeNotes
interfaceStringThis value is automatically discovered during the first launch of qrcp, you can set it to override the default. You can use the any interface to bind the web server to 0.0.0.0.
bindStringThis value is used by qrcp to bind the web server to. Note: if this value is set, the interface parameter is ignored.
portIntegerWhen this value is not set, qrcp will pick a random port at any launch.
pathStringWhen this value is not set, qrcp will add a random string at the end of URL.
outputStringDefault directory to receive files to. If empty, the current working directory is used.
fqdnStringWhen this value is set, qrcp will use it to replace the IP address in the generated URL.
keepAliveBoolControls whether qrcp should quit after transferring the file. Defaults to false.
secureBoolControls whether qrcp should use HTTPS instead of HTTP. Defaults to false
tls-certStringPath to the TLS certificate. It's only used when secure: true.
tls-keyStringPath to the TLS key. It's only used when secure: true.
reversedBoolReverse QR code (black text on white background)?" true`.

All the configuration parameters can be controlled via environment variables prefixed with QRCP_, for example:

Config Wizard

The config command launches a wizard that lets you configure parameters like interface, port, fully-qualified domain name and keep alive.

qrcp config

Note: if some network interfaces are not showing up, use the --list-all-interfaces flag to suppress the interfaces' filter.

qrcp --list-all-interfaces config

Configuration File

The default configuration file is stored in $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/qrcp/config.yml, however, you can specify the location of the config file by passing the --config flag:

qrcp --config /tmp/qrcp.yml MyDocument.pdf

Port

By default qrcp listens on a random port. Set the QRCP_PORT environment variable or pass the --port (or -p) flag to choose a specific one:

export QRCP_PORT=8080
qrcp MyDocument

Or:

qrcp --port 8080 MyDocument.pdf

Network Interface

qrcp will try to automatically find the suitable network interface to use for the transfers. If more than one suitable interface is found, it asks you to choose one.

If you want to use a specific interface, pass the --interface (or -i) flag:

# The webserver will be visible by
# all computers on the tun0's interface network
qrcp -i tun0 MyDocument.dpf

You can also use a special interface name, any, which binds the web server to 0.0.0.0, making the web server visible by everyone on any network, even from an external network.

This is useful when you want to transfer files from your Amazon EC2, Digital Ocean Droplet, Google Cloud Platform Compute Instance or any other VPS.

qrcp -i any MyDocument.pdf

Bind

Alternatively to choosing the interface, you can directly specify the address you want qrcp to bind the webserver to.

qrcp --bind 10.20.30.40 MyDocument.pdf

URL

qrcp uses two patterns for the URLs:

A few options are available that override these patterns.

Pass the --path flag to use a specific path for URLs, for example:

# The resulting URL will be
# http://{ip address}:{port}/send/x
qrcp --path=x MyDocument.pdf

Pass the --fqdn (or -d) to use a fully qualified domain name instead of the IP. This is useful in combination with -i any you are using it from a remote location:

# The resulting URL will be
# http://example.com:8080/send/xYz9
qrcp --fqdn example.com -i any -p 8080 MyRemoteDocument.pdf

HTTPS

qrcp supports secure file transfers with HTTPS. To enable secure transfers you need a TLS certificate and the associated key.

You can choose the path to the TLS certificate and keys from the qrcp config wizard, or, if you want, you can pass the --tls-cert and --tls-key:

qrcp --tls-cert /path/to/cert.pem --tls-key /path/to/cert.key MyDocument

A --secure flag is available too, you can use it to override the default value.

Default output directory

Open in browser

If you need a QR to be printed outside your terminal, you can pass the --browser flag. With this flag, qrcp will still print the QR code to the terminal, but it will also open a new window of your default browser to show the QR code.

qrcp --browser MyDocument.pdf

Keep the server alive

It can be useful to keep the server alive after transferring the file, for example, when you want to transfer the same file to multiple devices. You can use the --keep-alive flag for that:

# The server will not shutdown automatically
# after the first transfer
qrcp --keep-alive MyDocument.pdf

Shell completion scripts

qrcp comes with a built-in completion command that generates shell completion scripts.

Bash:

$ source <(qrcp completion bash)

To load completions for each session, execute once:

Linux:

$ qrcp completion bash > /etc/bash_completion.d/qrcp

Note: if you don't want to install completion scripts system-wide, refer to Bash Completion FAQ.

MacOS:

$ qrcp completion bash > /usr/local/etc/bash_completion.d/qrcp

Zsh:

If shell completion is not already enabled in your environment you will need to enable it. You can execute the following once:

$ echo "autoload -U compinit; compinit" >> ~/.zshrc

To load completions for each session, execute once:

$ qrcp completion zsh > "${fpath[1]}/_qrcp"

You will need to start a new shell for this setup to take effect.

Fish:

$ qrcp completion fish | source

To load completions for each session, execute once:

$ qrcp completion fish > ~/.config/fish/completions/qrcp.fish

Authors

qrcp, originally called qr-filetransfer, started from an idea of Claudio d'Angelis (@claudiodangelis on Telegram), the current maintainer, and it's developed by the community.

Join us!

Credits

Logo is provided by @arasatasaygin as part of the openlogos initiative, a collection of free logos for open source projects.

Check out the rules to claim one: rules of openlogos.

Releases are handled with goreleaser.

Clones and Similar Projects

License

MIT. See LICENSE.