Why does curl allow use of the file URL scheme, but not wget

Question

This question refers to curl 7.21.4 and GNU Wget 1.13.4, I don't know if the answer is version specific. Using the file URI scheme I can get local file using `curl` as such ``` $ curl file://localhost/Users/dave/.vimrc contents of .vimrc ``` However if I try the same using `wget` I receive an error: ``` $ wget file://localhost/Users/dave/.vimrc file://localhost/Users/dave/.vimrc: Unsupported scheme `file' ``` Does anyone know why this is the case?

Accepted Answer

Because Wget has not been written to support file:// URLs. (It's front web page clearly states "GNU Wget is a free software package for retrieving files using HTTP, HTTPS and FTP")

Allow me to point to a little curl vs wget comparison.

Why does curl allow use of the file URL scheme, but not wget

Solution

Problem