Configuring FileZilla

Open the servers interface by going through the START MENU
 >>START  >> Program Files >> FileZilla Server

This menu should pop up after the installation. Just hit okay to continue. Every computer technically has 2 IP addresses- whatever DHCP or statically assigned IP and also 127.0.0.1 which means itself or localhost.

Adding Users

Under the Edit->Users Menu is the following screen.

On the far right, is a button Add. Pick a username and keep groups to none for the time being. The chosen user name should now appear in the box to the right. Highlight the name as shown in the picture. It would be a good idea to check on password and to enter a password for the user. Voila. We have a user who can access the FTP now. But the user will not be able to do too much because by default he does not have access to any directories.

There is an addition add button in the center of the User dialogue. When this button is hit, the usual My Computer style directory tree is shown. Select the directory that is to be shared and hit ok. Highlighting the directory will allow access to the Files and Directories dialogue boxes.

Files

Read - Allows the users to read files in the directory. Without read enabled, users will not be allowed to download files.

Write* - Allows the user to write files to the directory

Delete* - Allows users to delete files from the directory

Append* - Allows the user to modify existing files in the directory. For example if an upload gets interrupted, files that can be appended to can continue on at the point where the transfer failed.

Directories

Create - Allows the user to create a new subdirectory

Delete - Allows the user to delete a directory

List - Allows an user to list the files in a directory

+Subdirs - Allows access to subdirectories with the same file permissions

A good rule of thumb is to allow the fewest permissions possible. For a FTP server used to distribute files it is recommended that only read, list and possibly +subdirs are enabled. It is a bad idea to allow write, delete, and append in directories with other files as a lot of files can be accidentally or maliciously destroyed. If file uploads are something that is needed, create a seperate directory specifically for that purpose to isolate it from important files that are not to be changed.

Testing

Now that a basic user is set up and the FTP server is running, it is time to test that everything works. Open up another command prompt window through Start->Run->command. Type in "ftp" (sans quotes). The prompt should change to ftp>. At this point type in "open localhost". If the server is running there should be a server message that is relayed back along with a prompt for a user name. Enter the username and password when prompted (remembering that they are case sensitive). If there is no prompt, the server is not running and it should be restarted by finding the FileZilla Program Files group and clicking on the Start FileZilla Server icon. If the username password is rejected, double check both the username, password and caps lock. Additional information can be found on the FileZilla Server Interface Window

The next step is to make sure that the contents of the directory can be accessed. This can be acheived by typing "ls" which lists the files in the current directory. If the contents look right then it is alright. Next step will be to actually get a file using the command "get " where filename is one of the files that was listed using the ls command. A Transfer OK denotes that it is working properly. If it works up to this point than the basic FTP server is working. The last thing to do would be to solicit the help of someone not on your computer to see if the ftp server can be accessed through the external IP that we got from What is My IP earlier. If that fails for some reason, it is a router issue and it is time to crack out that manual for the router again. Otherwise, buddy can be pulling files from the FTP server right away.

Advanced Features

Limiting the Number of Users

By default, FileZilla is set up to allow unlimited users. This might not be something that is desirable. There are also options to allow for timeout settings. This is important with a limited number of uesrs - if a connected user is not actively doing something it might be a good idea to have a short time out / transfer value to clear space for others.

Rate throttling is another great feature. Say you just discover a long lost Uncle Bob and he wants to catch up with the last 10 years of pictures. Well you can throttle Uncle Bob and his huge downloads by limiting the rate he can download pictures at so that dear Aunt Rita can get pictures from last week's birthday at a decent speed.