Implement FTP server on RHEL server without using FTP client

Linux and Unix-Like Red Hat
1

We have RHEL 5.8 in our environment, I had a query whether we can implement an FTP server using vsftpd package and Linux configurations like setsebool without using any external FTP clients like FileZilla etc. I am very confused on this. The FTP functionalities that should be present are download & upload of files. My observation is that the download of files is not an issue but the upload of files maybe requiring an FTP client.

I hope, my query is clear that can we implement an FTP server on RHEL server without using any external FTP client?

Please revert with the reply to my query as I am very confused on this.

Regards

2

It is important to note that FTP server will not service SFTP clients. These are handled by the sshd daemon. Similarly, the sshd daemon will not handle FTP clients.

The FTP server vsftp is available for RHEL. You may need to install it with yum, but it should do what you need. The manual pages are included in the install and there are plenty of options to consider, for instance do you want to allow your users to change directory etc. By default, ftp connections they are locked to their home directory. You can also enable server activity logging if that is useful to you.

It will have to be started up too. It is not by default, but a chkconfig can sort that out for you.

You will need a client to connect with, so that might be Filezilla on Windows or a plain FTP client on another unix host. There is a plain FTP client included on Windows that you can run from a DOS/Command prompt window or from the Start->Run prompt.

If you want RHEL to be the client, then you will need to install the ftp client tools with yum. Mine suggests that I would install ftp-0.17-51.1.el6_3.1.x86_64, but this is for RHEL 6.3

If you need it and /usr/bin/ftp does not exist, try:

# yum whatprovides /usr/bin/ftp

I hope that this helps
Robin
Liverpool/Blackburn
UK

3

if you are using a browser like Firefox to download files from your FTP server, you can install the FireFTP plugin and use it to upload files to your FTP server. You do not need to have a separate FTP client application.

4

Dear rbatte1,

Thanks for your answer. Part of your answer was helpful. Following up on this issue, I found that it is better to open the FTP link with Windows explorer and not with a browser. I was able to download files from the FTP location and I have also been able to upload files to the FTP server. It has not been smooth in that I am facing a problem that the file I have been uploading by logging in as 'FTP' user are not seen in the subsequent view of the FTP site. The relevant code in the vsftpd.conf file is

anon_uploads=yes
chown_uploads=yes
chown_username=daemon
anon_umask=077

--
Regards