Most people see FTP as some great mystery thats complicated and hard to use. This could not be further from the truth. There are 2 methods to using FTP, the drag and drop method, this is done by logging in through your web browser and simply dragging and dropping files from your desktop into the various folders on your FTP server. This method is OK if you are just uploading images etc, but for certain objects such as php scripts this will not set the correct file permissions
The second and best way is to use an FTP client. For those of you who have never used an FTP client, don't panic, its easy. You can download a free ftp client (Ace-FTP) from Visicom media. Download and install to your computer.
Your FTP connection details can be found on the front page of your Web Hosting Control Panel, Launch Ace-FTP, click the new site icon and add a name for the site, the FTP server IP, FTP username and, FTP password. Click 'Next'. Set your local folder to your 'Desktop' and the remote folder to 'public_html'. Click finished.
Double click on your site name to open the connection to your FTP server. The pane on your left will be your computer desktop, the pane on the right will be your public_html folder on your server. You can navigate around by clicking on folders etc.
To upload, highlight the file/folder in the left panel and click the arrow in the middle pointing to the right.
To download, highlight the file/folder on the right and click the arrow in the middle pointing left.
In addition to the above, the following step is now required to use FTP on our hosting accounts:
Over the last year there has been a substantial increase in the number of sites on the internet that have been hacked due to viruses that steal FTP credentials from user's home computers. The hackers then use these credentials to insert hidden code within your website.
To reduce the significant threat from these viruses we have been working to come up with a solution that protects your website. The solution is to lock FTP when it's not in use, making it extremely difficult for the hackers to infect your site via this route.
To unlock FTP, customers will simply log into their hosting control panel and click one button to unlock FTP for a period of time. FTP will then automatically lock again after the time period has expired.
You will also be able to nominate an IP address that has permanent FTP access, customers FTPing from that IP address will not have to unlock. If you do not know your IP address you can find it at http://whatismyip.com/
These security measures will ensure that the majority of sites have FTP locked, greatly reducing the risk of having your websites infected.
This change will go live on the 15th February 2010.
