Who uses FTP and why?

igorveniigorveni
Posted:
in Mac Software edited January 2014
Ok, I am brand new. I see all this hip hop going on about FTP. I understand people share file and stuff I just don't get how and why?

OK, I downloaded TRANSMIT, since it seems to be the favorite, I open it and he asks me SERVER? i don't know man,

Say my interest is in movies, music video, clips of all sorts or music. I use Lime wire or Acquisition, how can FTP help me?

If I understand well, I need to know where I am going in order to get something, unlike P2P. Right?

Would anyone shade some light and show me how it's done?



Thanks.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 6
    zapchudzapchud Posts: 844member
    I'm using FTP to upload (to) web sites.



    If you're asking for help regarding pirated movies, music, you won't get far here. AppleInsider is against piracy, and any attempt to post information that can be useful for finding such wares will result in an immediate lock of this thread at best, or a ban of any members that promotes piracy in any way, at worst.



    Or something like that. There's a FAQ here.



  • Reply 2 of 6
    faust9faust9 Posts: 1,335member
    I'd say the most prevalent use of FTP is for web site management. You develop your site on your local drive and once complete you use FTP to transfer all of the content for your site to a host server. FTP isn't a service designed to allow one to search and download music or software like P2P software. Ftp (File Transfer Protocol) is a framework for passing data from one computer to another and that's about it. FTP allows one to navigate through the file tree on a remote server but there is no integrated multi-server search feature. Basically it allows one to pass data from a client to a server or vice versa but, and here's the crux, you need to know the location of the server, and have login access to said server.



    The big difference between FTP is FTP works on a client-server model while P2P is a distributed model. P2P allows one to comb multiple host computers without having to log into each computer individually.



    Hope this helped.
  • Reply 3 of 6
    johnqjohnq Posts: 2,763member
    Put Transmit in the trash for another half a year or so and stick to Limewire/Acquisition etc.



    If you ever learn about making websites, you can always re-download it. It's worthless to you at the moment.



    Most FTP servers that are free and open with software of interest are usually web-browser-accessible now anyway.



    Everything you see on the web, pictures, html pages, Flash/Quicktime movies are usually uploaded to the website's server via FTP.



    As a user (you) it is next to useless.



    Were you to host pirated files on an FTP server, you might as well just walk down to the police station and tun yourself in (i.e. it'd be stupid)...unless you were some super-saavy hacker using an offshore server, which you aren't (nor am I).
  • Reply 4 of 6
    r3dx0rr3dx0r Posts: 201member
    i only use ftp to access my universities network when i'm at home (go cyberduck go).

    some companies use ftp to distribute software updates (id software for example),

    but other than that i guess you'd have to people who

    know people (...) who have access to some elite 0day ftp server.



    btw. igorveni, there's another thread about ftp clients here. but that's more about which client to choose...
  • Reply 5 of 6
    igorveniigorveni Posts: 24member
    Thank you all for a much more clear explanation. I can see I have no use for FTP.

    Thanks again.
  • Reply 6 of 6
    ionyzionyz Posts: 491member
    Why use FTP, good question. Why use it when there is SFTP.
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