An ftp software question

[SeeMoreDigital]

Apparently, as an NTL broadband customer (in the UK) I get 55MB of web space (http://www.ntlworld.com/data-feeds/editorial/microsites/webspace/)!

At the moment I store my Web Site on my own home PC (using Apache server), but the file download speeds are quite slow (only 128k) so I'm thinking of placing certain files on the NTL server.

My question is... are there any decent free ftp server applications?

Do I actually need 'special' ftp server software to upload files to the NTL server?

And... Are forum members, who don't use their web space, able to donate it to others... such as Doom9. Who I'm sure would find it most useful!

Cheers

[Kedirekin]

You don't need an FTP server to upload to your web space, just a client.

Windows has it's own built in client, but it uses a command line interface.

There are a pile of free and shareware FTP clients. Tucows (www.tucows.com) provides download for many of them, and rates them too. If you're not looking for anything fancy, WS_FTP is a popular, free, easy to use light weight client.


Correction - it used to be free. Now both the light and pro versions are shareware; go figure (guess it got too popular).

Still, several of the other clients listed at tucows remain freeware.

[mpucoder]

You can also upload with most browsers. Just navigate to the ftp directory, then drag and drop files from Windows Explorer onto the page.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by mpucoder
You can also upload with most browsers. Just navigate to the ftp directory, then drag and drop files from Windows Explorer onto the page. I thought that!

The only info you find on ntl's web site is as follows: -

Webspace - ftp details
Customer homepage URL format: homepage.ntlworld.com/user.name
FTP Server upload.ntlworld.com
User Name = your username
Password = your password

I tried the obvious... ftp://upload.ntlworld.com

...but I could not get to see an 'username' and 'password' box.

Any ideas?

[mpucoder]

You put the username and password into the URL like this:
ftp://username:password@upload.ntlworld.com

[Kedirekin]

I've never been able to get IE to work with anything except public FTP, either for upload or download. If there's a way to get IE to log in to an FTP server, I don't know what it is. Perhaps other browsers do it better.

Personally I prefer to use a dedicated FTP client in any case.


Guess that answers that question. I do feel vindicated though - that's certainly not obvious.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Doh!

I'm afraid that did not work. What a pisser!

Shame

[Tuesday]

Hey, i have some university provided web space that i use for hosting my site, the best piece of software ive come across to access it is SmartFTP, free from http://www.smartftp.com/

I think it does pretty much everything you need and i know it works with NTL as one of my mates uses its for his space there

[SeeMoreDigital]

I'm getting a bit closer!


Instead of typing: -
ftp://username:password@upload.ntlworld.com
I typed: -
ftp://@upload.ntl.com
At least now I get a 'Log On As' box. The only thing is when I enter my 'username' and 'password' It comes back as being incorrect!

Even so, I can't believe that ntl don't know their own upload address!

Cheers

[Neo Neko]

filezilla @ sourceforge.net is superb. Not to mention free and opensource. If you used or liked bullet proof FTP then you should like filezilla. As an ISP subscriber you may be entitled to free web space. But you may still have to sign up for it. As someone who is a customer to the uber company "AOL"/Time Warner(The AOL part is now silent) I get a whopping 5Mb of space with absolutely no CGI or server side scripting. So for me it is a truly useless service no matter how you look at it. In order to use it though I have to sign up for it separatly. It does not cost extra though.

I would have thought by now someone would have told Time Warner HD space is cheap.

[bit-wise]

@SeeMoreDigital

Your ISP may have several FTP servers mapped to different domains, only one of which your username/password will be valid on. So despite getting prompted for user credentials, you probably still want to verify with them that you are attaching to the correct server.

I've seen some suggestions of using the built in capabilities of IE, I believe it can not handle PASSV connection mode. (PASSV is required with certain firewalls). So, when you finally log on, if it appears that your FTP client is hanging when it attempts the first directory list, switch it to Passive mode.

Neo suggested filezilla. It's a very easy to use client and free.

[DDogg]

You can also go to My Network Places, select Add a network Place in the left panel. A wizard comes up - then choose "Choose another network location". After you are finished, you will have a shortcut in My Network Places. It works well for me but I do think it is slower, for some reason I don't understand, than using something like Bulletproof FTP.

[bit-wise]

I saw your post today about still not being able to log onto your ISP's account (in the compression thread). I tried from a command line, connected, and then instantly got disconnected.

From the windows command line type: ftp upload.ntlworld.com

My guess is that their FTP server is only accepting connections from known IP addresses (read: customers). I would try connecting from your PC, and if you experience the same connection/disconnection, as a prize, you get to experience the wonderful world of customer support offered by people who know nothing about technology.

I can tell you right now that this is *not* a firewall issue, because I am handshaking with the FTP server. Don't let them tell you otherwise. After all, its never their problem... :-)

[JaTeMaTec]

After reading this all i can only say that even Yahoo and AngelFire are far more easier to use with IE-uploading and no need to fight with ftp-clients and ISP's well known 'super know-how's'...

I use ws_ftp with my isp (Sonera Finland) and it's just like dragging and dropping files when making the web-site structure there just to remember that i have XP + FrontPage and they have Unix & Apache - just a bit different file / directory structures and must always be strict of upper and lower case chars + special / reserved chars and words...

But : 20 megs of free web-space and now all is being ok!

Peace!

[MaXiMuS]

good ftp client is leechFTP (developement is stoped but i am using it for many years now without any probs)

download LeechFTP (http://stud.fh-heilbronn.de/~jdebis/leechftp/downloads.html) :)

[SeeMoreDigital]

Thanks bit-wise,

I tried what you recommended. All seemed to work well. I obtained a message saying "Welcome to upload.ntlworld.com" together with another message saying -

upload.ntlworld.com FTP server ready
User (upload.ntlworld.com:(none)):

I type in my user name. I then receive another message, inviting me to enter my Password:

But when I try typing in the letters and numbers the cursor does not move!

So it's another no go I'm afraid.

Yesterday I tried phoning NTL but gave up after being on hold for over 30mins, listening to adverts about upgrading my service etc

It's a shame nobody else on the forum is an ntl customer!


>Everybody,

Thanks for all your advice so far guys. It's quite good fun trying all these different methods and ftp applications

[Nic]

Im on NTL too, so I might try it, and see how far I get. Also I'd recommend using something like smartftp.com to do it rather than IE.

-Nic

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by Nic
Im on NTL too, so I might try it, and see how far I get. Also I'd recommend using something like smartftp.com to do it rather than IE.

-Nic Thanks very much Nic.

In eager anticipation of your success, I have just installed Smartftp (v1.0980.3)....

I've already thought of the first web page item - 'How to... Get access to the NTL server'

Joking apart... if there are more members who don't use their 55MB of NTL web space maybe it could be used to store Doom9 stuff.

Cheers and good luck

[bit-wise]

Actually, the fact you are not seeing your characters being typed is just a security feature. Many FTP servers and SSH servers will not even echo a "*" back to the user when a character is typed. It is so no one can know the length of your password.

You did try and type it anyway and hit enter? (Despite the fact you are not seeing anything on the screen.)

If it takes the password but then gets hung on the initial directory list, its a PASSV issue and something we can easily solve.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Hi bit-wise,

Just tried that idea. When I type in my password and hit enter, the following message appears: -

Password:
Connection closed by remote host

Bummer!

[Tri]

Please allow me throw in a question :)
Does anyone know a lightwheight ftp server that supports unicode filenames?

[bit-wise]

Interesting. Seeing that they are implementing enough security to verify the source IP address, my guess is that they may only allow one password try before disconnecting you.

Which means they either gave you the wrong password, or it has been locked, due to a certain number of invalid attempts. Either way, I believe customer service needs to get involved.

After spending endless hours in the hold cue at NTT:Verio, I ended up getting a speaker phone that also had a cordless headset. That way your shoulder does not fall off after a half hour of cradling the phone. And you can do other things, like re-encode your favorite movie again, or play a few rounds of Diablo...

[SeeMoreDigital]

OK I am happy to report that my NTL problem is solved!

After spending 30mins on hold I finally got thru' to a really helpful guy who established it was an fault at their end.

It would seem when I changed some details (I added a couple more email addresses) in March 2003, something somehow, somewhere did not work as it should have done.

Anyway it's solved now and I confirm it is possible to gain access to NTL's ftp server (without any ftp software) using the following method: -

ftp://<username>:<password>@upload.ntlworld.com

Once a connection has been established you can just drag and drop files to and from your own PC to their PC.

Cheers

[smok3]

another vote for filezila. (althought for single file upload i usually just use the ftp-client built into 'total commander')

[bit-wise]

Congrats. I think a trip to the pub is in order...