FTP Virtual or Web File Manager?

OverView

There are (at least) two options if you want to share/distribute files on on your web site at SWCP: a Virtual FTP Server, or Web File Manager software. Which is better? Well, that depends. Here is a rundown of the pro's and con's of each.

FTP Site

A Virtual FTP Site is old-school. The FTP protocol existed on the Internet long before there was a World Wide Web. You access it with an FTP program such as WS_FTP, FileZilla, SecureFX, etc. You can download files from an FTP site with a web browser, but most browsers have minimal support for uploading.

You may want to control access to the FTP site, for example to only allow certain people to download particular files. You can do this by adding user accounts. Each account can have different permissions, be restricted to a specific directory, be allowed (or denied) access to upload or download, etc.

Web File Manager

Southwest Cyberport has licensed a File Manager program which we can install on your web site. It's called "FileManager". You (the administrator of the site) use a web interface to add/remove users and set their permissions to your liking. As with FTP, you can allow different users to access particular directories, and individually control their ability to upload or download. Additionally you can assign "quotas" to each user, so they can only consume a certain amount of disk space. Or you can let them run free and consume as much as you have available.

Which is Better?

This depends on your specific requirements. Some of the factors are:

• How computer savvy are the end-users that will be doing the uploading/downloading?
• How computer savvy is the site admin who will be dealing with issues, adding/removing users, etc.?
• Does SSL matter?
• Do you need to support legacy software?
• Will there be automated processes which only understand FTP?
• Do you need to support batch transfers?

The following sections address several specific issues that might or might not be important in your particular situation. For each one we compare the FTP Server option to the FileManager option.

Tech-Savvy End Users?

FTP Site

If you need your end-users to upload files, or to download with specific accounts, they will almost certainly need to use a dedicated FTP program. These days, many users have never used an FTP program, so this step can present a significant barrier. FileZilla is a good FTP program available for free download and works on Windows, Macs, and Linux.

If just want the end-users to download files that are not password-protected, then you can give them an "ftp" URL, such as ftp://ftp.swcp.com/pub/1meg and they can download that with their web browser. But if you want them to log in, they'll need an FTP program.

Web File Manager

The only tool the user needs to access the files, with or without passwords, for both uploading and downloading, is their web browser.

Tech-Savvy Site Admin?

FTP Site

If the person responsible for administering the site is a computer person, an FTP site will be easy for them to deal with. For example, end-users who are behind a NAT firewall may have trouble accessing an FTP site unless they turn on the "PASV" option.

Web File Manager

If the site admin is not a computer geek, they may find the FTP site somewhat cryptic, and some of the problems that arise will be confusing and unexpected. If the mention of NAT and PASV above sounds like gibberish to you, you'll be more comfortable with the FileManager approach.

Secure Transfers?

FTP Site

It is possible to do encrypted file transfers to/from an FTP site using SFTP. This utilizes an SSL certificate, just like you would use to protect a web site with HTTPS. The downsides here are:

• The end-user needs software that supports SFTP instead of just FTP. Most modern FTP software does this, but many older programs do not.
• You will need an SSL certificate devoted to this process, which will cost about $95/yr.

Web File Manager

The FileManager is installed on your web site, so if you already have an SSL certificate for your site, then FileManager can make use of it. If you need to ensure that users only access the site with SSL, we can configure the web server to force all connections to the FileManager portion of your site to use SSL. If you don't already have an SSL certificate, you would have to add one, just like with an FTP site. However, the end user will not have to do anything special to access the site with SSL -- their web browser already supports it.