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ID #1002

Learning how to FTP

Learning FTP
"FTP" stands for "File Transfer Protocol". FTP is simply a way to transfer files from one computer to another.
There are many programs that allow FTP and many of them are freeware. One such free FTP utility is "FTP Commander" (http://www.internet-soft.com/download.htm). The rest of this section of the tutorial will use FTP Commander as an example. (You can use Google.com to search for other FTP programs such as Ipswitch WS_FTP Professional.)
Once you launch FTP Commander, you will see a screen like the following. The first thing you need to do is define a connection to your web server. (You only need to do this the first time you run FTP Commander.)
Defining a New Server
Click on the "New Server" button on the right hand side of the screen (circled in red above). You should see the following dialog appear.
In the "Name" field enter a nickname for the server you are defining (i.e. "My Web Server"). In the "FTP Server", "User ID", and "Password" fields enter the corresponding values to your FTP account. (These are typically emailed to you.) Before pressing "Save", make sure that the other settings are the same as you see above.
Now you have defined a connection to a web server and your main screen in FTP Commander should look like the following:
The next time you launch FTP Commander, this is how your screen will look. Simply double-click on the web server connection you have created to connect to the web server. (In the example above, the "Easy Multimedia" connection is circled in red. Your connection may be named slightly differently. This is the icon you will double-click.)
The left hand side of the screen represents your local computer and the right-hand side is the web server. On the left-hand side of the screen, navigate to the location of the files you want to transfer and select them. (Single click on the file that you want to transfer to select it. If you want to select multiple files, use the "Ctrl" key to select multiple files. Use the "Shift+Ctrl" key to select a range of multiple files.)
On the right hand side of the screen, double-click the folder that corresponds to the location that you want to put the files. In other words, if you are trying to upload a photo called "Buffalo.jpg" to the "Alpha" photo album, select "Buffalo.jpg" on the left hand side of the screen. Then double-click on the "Alpha" folder on the right-hand side of the screen. Now you are ready to upload the multimedia file by pressing the upload icon, as shown in red below.
When you are done, you should see the new file appear on the web server, on the right hand side of the screen, as seen below.
Deleting a File on the Web Server
To remove a file from the web server simply select the file on the right-hand side of the screen and press the "Delete" button in the top right.