| File Transfer
Protocol (FTP)
The file transfer protocol is the
primary method of transferring files over the Internet at very high speed.
Transfer Modes
Two transfer modes are used in FTP.
ASCII and BINARY. ASCII mode is used for the transfer of files consisting of plain text
while the BINARY mode is used all types of files not consisting of plain text (such as
sound, video, executables, images etc.). ASCII is called type A (for ASCII) and binary is
called type I (for Image). Various character translations take place between computers to
make the file more readable in ASCII transfers. BINARY transfers do not make any changes
to any character of file.
Anonymous FTP
A virtue of FTP is that you do not
need to have a valid user account on the target domain. You can access the files on the
FTP site by using an anonymous user account if the domain allows you. You enter the user
name as anonymous and the password is your email address.
FTP clients
You can always type the command ftp
on your Windows 9x, Windows NT or UNIX machine to invoke a command oriented FTP client.
Below are some common GUI (Graphical User Interface) clients. To see a specific FTP
tutorial for one of these applications, please click on links below:
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