I am looking for an FTP site where I can upload and download files for clients and I can give them access as needed. Are there any economical solutions? I do not have my own web server.
thanks for your help
https://www.rapidshare.com is a service I've used in the past. More recently, I've started to take advantage of a similar capability provided with my eFax service.
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Ladd Nelson
Not FTP, but a bit more up to date - Dropbox would be my recommendation.
My tech friend recommends www.hostgator.com - they are cheap, secure and would likely suit your needs.
He also said that www.dropbox.com might be a good fit.
As part of its cloud computing attempts Microsoft offer a free "sky drive" service
You do need a microsoft passport or windows live account to access it
It is clunky, only seems to work properly witn windows7 and I definately would not recommend it.
But it is free - you get what you pay for
> I am looking for an FTP site where I can upload and download files for clients and I can give them access as needed. Are there any economical solutions? I do not have my own web server.
>
> thanks for your help
Hi Dane -
Over the years we have tried using quite a few of the file-transfer services others mentioned above. They worked fine for most users but it was always just a matter of time before we found that one or another of our government customers was blocked from using that service. Usually the services were flagged as "pirate download" sites and blocked by the IT folks.
I have had such an FTP site on a Linux computer going for the last seven or eight years and found it to be pretty simple.
The Hewlett-Packard Learning Center has a series of free beginner Linux courses including one that covers system-administration tasks such as setting up an FTP server and a web server.
Any Pentium 3 computer should work fine, but since you can get a usable P4 computer for well under $100 that will work even better. You or a family member probably already has such a computer sitting unused right now so chances are good the equipment will be free for all practical purposes.
MOST IMPORTANT THING - NEVER EVER NEVER set up an FTP server so an outside user (either anonymous or password protected) can upload files to and download files from the same directory. Failing to obey this critical rule can turn your server into a drop box/transfer point for all kinds of nasty and criminal p0rn and the like that could easily land your rear in the slammer for many years. Your clients should never have read or execute privileges in the directory (folder) into which they upload files; the upload directory is only for uploading to the server. Similarly, your clients should never have write or execute privileges in the directories from which they can download files.
Two things I learned very quickly (and you will probably run into this as well) are -
1. Most folks are clueless about FTP, do not know how to use it, and do not really want to learn how to use it. This is probably more true with each passing year. Slim chance of them having an FTP-client program on their computer. It is possible to do FTP via most web browsers, but it gets iffy and sometimes real frustrating for casual users.
and
2. Many organizations with proactive IT staff (especially government agencies) will not allow their employees to use FTP-client software or access FTP sites.
The download-to-clients workaround is to use a symbolic link that "mirrors" the files and subdirectories in an FTP directory over to a HTTP directory (in a web server running on the same computer as the FTP server) that can be viewed with a web browser, then your clients can use their web browser to download files.
The upload-from-clients workaround is a web-based file uploader. The client uses their web browser to go to the site, then the uploader provides a browse box that the client uses to select the file to be uploaded, and away it goes. The one I got to work is PS Upload which is priced right (free) and works well, it can be configured to send you an e-mail when a file arrives.
It may be that this is the sort of thing you would use only a few times a month, so there is no need for it to be on all the time. Just boot the computer when there is a specific need. If you have only one internet line you could use the router's port-forwarding capabilities to send incoming requests for IP ports 20, 21, and 80 to the "server" computer.
If you do not have a static IP address from your ISP the dynamic-DNS services such as DynDNS Free will do the job. A words-and-letters.com name is much easier than trying to tell the client your IP address, many security-conscious organizations will not allow their employees to go to a numbers-only address anyway.
GB
Check out http://filezilla-project.org/ , a completely free FTP solution. I have used both the server and the client for a few years I have not found it lacking in anything I've wanted to do with it.
Setting up the server is a little bit of work, but once you have it going it is very easy to use, in fact if you set it up to automatically start with Windows then you won't even know it's there. You can specify folders on the computer where you have the server software installed that will be shared with groups of users, the permissions for each group (read/write/delete etc), set speed limits, and even block IP addresses from accessing your server. Simply move files into the shared directories to make them available to your groups of users. Different groups could have access to different folders, it's quite nice.
One thing to keep in mind, definitely make sure you require passwords for users, it is possible to not require a password, and that is dangerous, IMHO.
Jacob
jacob
Do you have to have a computer"server" connected to the internet and running all the time for the filserver to work,filezilla that is?
jacob
Yes, the computer that is acting as the server is required to be online for the setup to work, which could be seen as a good or a bad thing depending...
