Setting up an FTP folder for access across the internet

[Anonymous]

Does anyone have experience setting up an FTP folder to have access to accross the internet. We have two offices and it would be great to set up a couple folders that we could drop files into from one office to the next. One folder could be a spool folder that you could drop .plt files into that the plotter would grab them from to plot automatically. And we might want another folder to be able to upload other files between offices. Actually it might be cool to able to just have the whole Projects Folder able to be accessed through FTP. I am not sure if I posted this in the correct area or not, if not I am sorry. I saw a tip somewhere, where this was possible without any additional software using Panther. I was just wondering if it was possible under Jaguar. Also on a side note, how do you change your password to log in to ArchiCAD Talk. Thanks in advance!!

[Anonymous]

What style of O/S are you using? If you are using windoze, there are several options available. Or you could simply register a domain (if you haven't allready), and then have FTP access through your web servers.
On another note. . .if you are simply wanting to plot through the internet, there are several options for that as well. A clean and effective one is to make use of one of the newer HP JetDirect box/cards. You can download a web-printing driver that will allow you to share your plotter to an external IP.
You could also set up a WAN; however to share two locations through an internet pipeline would involve a bit more cost. Mainly because you'd have to have manual external IP addresses for each location. . .and most ISPs charge a lot for those.
If you simply want to go the web page route, and ftp into a shared folder (this can be mapped to a drive in current versions of windoze eckspee), I'd suggest looking into http://www.amhosting.com

[Anonymous]

mikeadams wrote:
We have two offices and it would be great to set up a couple folders that we could drop files into from one office to the next.

As previously said, there are many solutions :
Do you want to host the ftp server yourself, or use an external service to store your files ?

Using your own server involves :
1a. setup the server, with rights management etc.
1b. setup ther router to forward the traffic on specific port (if you have a router)
2. publish your IP publicly : if your ISP gave you a fixed IP, you don't have to get a domain name : just use this IP address as the name of the server. If you have a changing IP adress you can then use a free solution to make the link between your current IP adress and a name (sur as http://www.no-ip.org) : the server will need a small utility that will regularly check the IP of the internet connection and send this info to the main name server of no-ip.org for exemple.
3. you'll probably be limited in your upload transfer rate : here in BE, the basic ADSL line can download at 300 Ko/s, but you can't upload at more than 10 Ko/s (some solution can be more efficient). As one of your server will use it's local directory but will be uploading for the other, the bottleneck will be the uploading transfer rate of the connection.
4. your server as to be up and running all the time...

Using an external service :
1. You can use a web server and upload you files there from net 1 and download from net 2 (be careful, as many ISP won't allow ftp access to their web server if it's done from within their domain -> check before trying this).
2. Once a file is uploaded, it will be downloaded at much higher transfer rate (depending on the ISP)

Based on FTP technology, you should also check file sync utilities that can synchronise one local directory to a ftp server.

You could also be interested in VPN : a way to connect 2 distant networks going through an internet connection. This tunnel can be secured, and you won't have to setup the FTP server (but setting up VPN won't probably be easier).

You could also have a look at WebDav web server : publishing files on this kind of server can be easier, depending on your OS...

PS : regarding Chad's post, the fixed IP isn't really a problem : I personnaly have used No-ip.org and dyndns service without any problem. The name you use then is, if using the free serviec : mymachine.no-ip.org

[Stig Bengtsson]

We have tested Teamwork over the internet using WebDav with the iDisk on Apple's server from a couple of Macs and it works - slooooow - but it works.

Trying to set up Teamwork using WebDav on a remote Windows server also worked but only from a PC. The Mac could not read the .adm file on the Windows server using WebDav. In the office we are Teamworking PC's and Mac's over the network with a Windows server.

Does anybody have any experience with this?

Stig Bengtsson