WinSock FTP Server

By Chris Tse

Once you have complied a respectable collection of sharewares and graphics files, you might want to make them available to your friends for downloading. With the Winsock-compliant FTP (file transfer protocol) Daemon (WSFTPD), you can easily set up your computer as an FTP server, and your friends will be able log on to your hard drive and download the files. WSFTPD gained its wide acceptance from the Net community due of its ability to allow multiple users to log on simultaneously. Previous generations of FTP server programs such as NCSA Telnet for DOS require the computer's full attention even when no users are logged in. In other words, no other applications can be carried out while the computer is in server mode. WSFTPD make use MS Window's ability of task switching. Therefore, your computer can be patiently awaiting log ins or expediently transferring files while you are finishing up your research paper on a word processor.

One of the important considerations of setting up a computer as an FTP server is that you are giving outside users access to your hard drive. This raises the question of security. There might be close friends of yours that you might want to grant full access to (which means that person can read from or write to your hard drive), and some not-so-close friends "limited access" (usually read-only access) to your computer. You can configure WSFTPD to store and recognize the access levels for each individual users by setting up an individual accounts for them. Under the File menu, there is an option called Security where the configuration screen is located. To set up a full access account, a log in name and a password should be chosen and filled in for that user. Next time that user log in to your computer, he will be able to retrieve files from any directory from your computer. However, if you want to restrict a user to a certain directory structure, you can do so by filling in the name of his "home" directory and enable the Restrict To home option. There is a common and welcomed practice of setting up a directory called "\pub" where the public retrievable files are stored. There is particularly important if you chose to have make your machine available to "anonymous" users, which are users who do not have a local account and password. WSFTP grants all anonymous user read and write access, and should therefore be restricted to the "\pub" directory mentioned above. Remember, since any Internet users with FTP can log on and download from your computer (if anonymous access is enabled), it is important not to place any copyrighted applications or images in the "\pub" directory to avoid violating copyright laws. One of the great conveniences of making your computer an FTP site, is the ability to access your own hard drive from a remote location. For example, by setting up a full access account for yourself, you can easily retrieve documents for laser printing at the AcIS computer labs. This method effectively eliminates the need for a transfer disk and the trouble of dealing with disk quotas or the CUNIX accounts. I highly recommend this program for building a safe and effective FTP server.


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