Which is the best way to upload files via FTP?

There are many different ways that you can upload files to a web server. These might be photographs you need a backup of or website files to market a business or personal website.

One of the most common ways to do this is by using FTP. FTP is a protocol, using port 21 and stands for File Transfer Protocol.

So, what options do we have for FTP clients?

One of the main, and probably most common interfaces is commercial products such as CuteFTP, SmartFTP, or FileZilla. On the market there is also a number of free clients which can be downloaded. A client that everybody has, and probably one that not many people know about is Windows Explorer.

I will firstly give an example of the Windows interface.

If you open any Windows Explorer window, such as My Computer, My Documents or even a folder, look for the address bar along the top. If this isn't enabled you can easily enable it by going into Tools > Folder Options Click View and make sure Display the full path in the address bar is checked.


Enabling the address bar in the Explorer interface.



Fig. 1 IMage showing the address bar.


In the address bar, highlighted in red above, we can type the FTP URL for the web server we use to store our files. This should begin with ftp:\\ then the name or IP address of your webserver.

Below, I have entered the domain name for my web server.


Fig. 2

Now, when I press enter, Windows will probably prompt that it cannot access the root folder of the web server. This is because there are no login details for the server to verify.


Fig. 3

Click OK to the above message and Right Click the white folder space and select Login As.


Fig. 4

This will give us a new window where we can enter our FTP login details. This will allow us to connect properly to the server and display the files and folders stored on the webserver.


Fig. 5

Enter your login details and press Enter. Providing you entered them correctly, you should get a structure containing all of your files and folders stored on the server.

There are two main folders that we use for making files publicly viewable on a webserver, that can be used mainly for storing websites and these are WWW and Public_html. Public_html is just a posh name for the WWW folder and in fact, I think the WWW contains a link/mirror to the public_html folder.


Fig. 6

Now we can upload all the files to the webserver by clicking and dragging from a separate window such as My Documents or a folder used to store files you want uploading to the server.



The second way we can upload files to a webserver is through a FTP Client.

For the purposes of this tutorial I am going to be using CuteFTP, but other interfaces will have a very similar layout and method of connection etc.


Open up CuteFTP and to begin with, we will need to set up a FTP site for the program to connect to. We can do this by going to File > New > FTP site.

This prompts us with a new window where we can begin to enter our FTP login information. The program will save the login details so next time you want to connect, it makes it a one click operation to connect to the webserver.


Fig. 7

Once we are logged in and have selected our Public_html folder, we are prompted with the following interface:


Fig. 8

The numbers on the image above correspond to the following.

1) This are the files that are stored on your computer. You can navigate through these in exactly the same way as you would with My Documents on the computer.

2) These are the files that are stored on the web server.

3) This panel gives us a overview of what files we are currently transferring between the computer and the webserver, or vice-versa. It shows estimated time remaining, speed and also the percentage of how much is completed.

We can transfer files to and from the web server by simply clicking, (or highlighting numerous files) and dragging them across to one of the panels, depending on which way you want to transfer them.


Fig. 9

Above you can see that we have transferred the document Car Maintenance.xls from my computer to the web server.

It really is that simple.



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