1ncftp(1)                    General Commands Manual                   ncftp(1)
2
3
4

NAME

6       ncftp - Browser program for the File Transfer Protocol
7

SYNOPSIS

9       ncftp [host]
10
11       ncftp [ftp://host.name/directory/]
12

DESCRIPTION

14       The purpose of ncftp is to provide a powerful and flexible interface to
15       the Internet standard  File  Transfer  Protocol.   It  is  intended  to
16       replace the stock ftp program that comes with the system.
17
18       Although  the  program  appears  to be rather spartan, you'll find that
19       ncftp has a wealth of valuable performance  and  usage  features.   The
20       program was designed with an emphasis on usability, and it does as much
21       as it can for you automatically so you can do what  you  expect  to  do
22       with  a  file  transfer  program,  which  is transfer files between two
23       interconnected systems.
24
25       Some of the cooler features include progress meters,  filename  comple‐
26       tion,  command-line  editing,  background processing, auto-resume down‐
27       loads, bookmarking, cached directory listings, host redialing,  working
28       with  firewalls  and proxies, downloading entire directory trees, etc.,
29       etc.
30
31       The  ncftp  distribution  comes  with  the  useful   utility   programs
32       ncftpget(1) and ncftpput(1) which were designed to do command-line FTP.
33       In particular, they are very handy for shell scripts.  This version  of
34       ncftp  no longer does command-line FTP, since the main ncftp program is
35       more of a browser-type program.
36
37   OPTIONS
38       The program allows you to specify a host or directory URL on  the  com‐
39       mand line.  This is a synonym for running ncftp and then using the open
40       command.  A few command-line flags are allowed with this mode:
41
42       -u XX   Use username XX instead of anonymous.
43
44       -p XX   Use password XX with the username.
45
46       -j XX   Use account XX in supplement to the username and password (dep‐
47               recated).
48
49       -P XX   Use  port  number  XX  instead  of the default FTP service port
50               (21).
51
52   INTRODUCTION TO THE COMMAND SHELL
53       Upon running the program you are presented a command prompt  where  you
54       type  commands to the program's shell.  Usually you will want to open a
55       remote filesystem to transfer files to and from  your  local  machine's
56       filesystem.   To  do  that,  you  need to know the symbolic name of the
57       remote system, or its Internet Protocol (IP) address.  For  example,  a
58       symbolic name might be ``typhoon.unl.edu,'' and its IP address could be
59       ``129.93.33.24.''  To open a connection to that  system,  you  use  the
60       program's open command:
61
62            open typhoon.unl.edu
63            open 129.93.33.24
64
65       Both  of these try to open the machine called typhoon at the University
66       of Nebraska.  Using the symbolic name is the preferred way, because  IP
67       addresses  may  change without notice, while the symbolic names usually
68       stay the same.
69
70       When you open a remote filesystem, you need to  have  permission.   The
71       FTP Protocol's authentication system is very similar to that of logging
72       in to your account.  You have to give an account name, and its password
73       for  access to that account's files.  However, most remote systems that
74       have anything you might be interested in don't require an account  name
75       for use.  You can often get anonymous access to a remote filesystem and
76       exchange files that have been made publicly  accessible.   The  program
77       attempts  to  get  anonymous  permission to a remote system by default.
78       What actually happens is that the program tries to use ``anonymous'' as
79       the  account  name,  and when prompted for a password, uses your E-mail
80       address as a courtesy to the remote system's maintainer.  You can  have
81       the program try to use a specific account also.  That will be explained
82       later.
83
84       After the open command completes successfully, you are connected to the
85       remote  system  and  logged  in.  You should now see the command prompt
86       change to reflect the name of the current  remote  directory.   To  see
87       what's  in  the  current remote directory, you can use the program's ls
88       and dir commands.  The former is terse, preferring more remote files in
89       less  screen  space,  and  the  latter is more verbose, giving detailed
90       information about each item in the directory.
91
92       You can use the program's cd command to move to  other  directories  on
93       the  remote  system.  The cd command behaves very much like the command
94       of the same name in the Bourne and Korn shell.
95
96       The purpose of the program is to exchange data with other systems.  You
97       can use the program's get command to copy a file from the remote system
98       to your local system:
99
100            get README.txt
101
102       The program will display the progress of the transfer on the screen, so
103       you  can  tell  how much needs to be done before the transfer finishes.
104       When the transfer does finish, then you can enter more commands to  the
105       program's command shell.
106
107       You  can  use the program's put command to copy a file from your system
108       to the remote system:
109
110            put something.tar
111
112       When you are finished using the remote system, you can open another one
113       or use the quit
114
115       Before  quitting,  you  may want to save the current FTP session's set‐
116       tings for later.  You can use the bookmark command  to  save  an  entry
117       into  your $HOME/.ncftp/bookmarks file.  When you use the bookmark com‐
118       mand, you also specify a bookmark name, so the  next  time  instead  of
119       opening  the  full  hostname  you  can use the name of the bookmark.  A
120       bookmark acts just like one for your  web  browser,  so  it  saves  the
121       remote  directory  you  were  in,  the account name you used, etc., and
122       other information it learned so that the next time you use the bookmark
123       it should require as little effort from you as possible.
124
125   COMMAND REFERENCE
126       help   The first command to know is help.  If you just type
127
128                   help
129
130              from  the  command shell, the program prints the names of all of
131              the supported commands.  From there, you can get  specific  help
132              for a command by typing the command after, for example:
133
134                   help open
135
136              prints information about the open command.
137
138       ascii  This command sets the transfer type to ASCII text.  This is use‐
139              ful for text-only transfers because the concept  of  text  files
140              differs  between operating systems.  For example on UNIX, a text
141              file denotes line breaks with the linefeed character,  while  on
142              MS-DOS a line break is denoted by both a carriage return charac‐
143              ter and a line feed character.  Therefore,  for  data  transfers
144              that  you  consider the data as text you can use ascii to ensure
145              that both the remote system and local system  translate  accord‐
146              ingly.   The default transfer type that ncftp uses is not ASCII,
147              but straight binary.
148
149       bgget and bgput
150              These commands correspond to the get and put commands  explained
151              below,  except that they do the job in the background.  Normally
152              when you do a get then the program  does  the  download  immedi‐
153              ately,  and  does  not  return control to you until the download
154              completes.  The background transfers are nice  because  you  can
155              continue browsing the remote filesystem and even open other sys‐
156              tems.  In fact, they are done by a daemon process,  so  even  if
157              you  log  off  your  UNIX  host  the daemon should still do your
158              transfers.  The daemon will also automatically continue to retry
159              the  transfers  until they finish.  To tell when background jobs
160              have finished, you have to  examine  the  $HOME/.ncftp/spool/log
161              file, or run the jobs command from within NcFTP.
162
163              Both  the bgget and bgput commands allow you to schedule when to
164              do the transfers.  They take a ``-@'' parameter, whose  argument
165              is  a  date  of the form YYYYMMDDhhmmss (four digit year, month,
166              day, hour, minute, second).  For example, to schedule a download
167              at 3 AM on November 6, you could try:
168
169                   bgget -@ 19971106030000 /pub/idstuff/quake/q2_100.zip
170
171       bgstart
172              This  command  tells  ncftp  to immediately start the background
173              transfers you've requested, which simply  runs  a  copy  of  the
174              ncftpbatch program which is responsible for the background jobs.
175              Normally the program will start the background job  as  soon  as
176              you  close  the  current site, open a new site, or quit the pro‐
177              gram.  The reason for this is because since so many users  still
178              use  slow  dialup  links  that starting the transfers would slow
179              things to a crawl, making it difficult to browse the remote sys‐
180              tem.   An  added  bonus  of starting the background job when you
181              close the site is that ncftp can pass off that  open  connection
182              to the ncftpbatch program.  That is nice when the site is always
183              busy, so that the background job doesn't have to  wait  and  get
184              re-logged on to do its job.
185
186       binary Sets  the transfer type to raw binary, so that no translation is
187              done on the data transferred.  This is the default anyway, since
188              most files are in binary.
189
190       bookmark
191              Saves  the current session settings for later use.  This is use‐
192              ful to save the remote system and remote  working  directory  so
193              you  can quickly resume where you left off some other time.  The
194              bookmark data is stored in your $HOME/.ncftp/bookmarks file.
195
196       bookmarks
197              Lists the contents of  your  $HOME/.ncftp/bookmarks  file  in  a
198              human-readable  format.   You can use this command to recall the
199              bookmark name of a previously saved bookmark, so  that  you  can
200              use the open command with it.
201
202       cat    Acts  like the ``/bin/cat'' UNIX command, only for remote files.
203              This downloads the file you specify and dumps it directly to the
204              screen.   You  will  probably find the page command more useful,
205              since that lets you view the file one screen at a  time  instead
206              of printing the entire file at once.
207
208       cd     Changes the working directory on the remote host.  Use this com‐
209              mand to move to different areas on the remote  server.   If  you
210              just  opened  a  new  site,  you might be in the root directory.
211              Perhaps      there      was       a       directory       called
212              ``/pub/news/comp.sources.d''  that someone told you about.  From
213              the root directory, you could:
214
215                   cd pub
216                   cd news
217                   cd comp.sources.d
218
219              or, more concisely,
220
221                   cd /pub/news/comp.sources.d
222
223              Then, commands such as get, put, and ls could be used  to  refer
224              to items in that directory.
225
226              Some shells in the UNIX environment have a feature I like, which
227              is switching to the previous directory.  Like those shells,  you
228              can do:
229
230                   cd -
231
232              to change to the last directory you were in.
233
234       chmod  Acts  like  the  ``/bin/chmod''  UNIX  command,  only for remote
235              files.  However, this is not a standard command, so  remote  FTP
236              servers may not support it.
237
238       close  Disconnects  you  from the remote server.  The program does this
239              for you automatically when needed, so you can simply open  other
240              sites  or  quit  the  program without worrying about closing the
241              connection by hand.
242
243       debug  This command is mostly for internal testing.  You could type
244
245                   debug 1
246
247              to turn debugging mode on.  Then  you  could  see  all  messages
248              between  the  program and the remote server, and things that are
249              only printed in debugging mode.  However,  this  information  is
250              also  available in the $HOME/.ncftp/trace file, which is created
251              each time you run ncftp.  If you need to report a  bug,  send  a
252              trace file if you can.
253
254       dir    Prints  a  detailed  directory listing.  It tries to behave like
255              UNIX's ``/bin/ls -l'' command.  If the remote server seems to be
256              a  UNIX host, you can also use the same flags you would with ls,
257              for instance
258
259                   dir -rt
260
261              would try to act like
262
263                   /bin/ls -lrt
264
265              would on UNIX.
266
267       edit   Downloads into a temporary file for editing on the  local  host,
268              then uploads the changed file back to the remote host.
269
270       get    Copies  files  from  the current working directory on the remote
271              host to your machine's current working directory.   To  place  a
272              copy  of  ``README'' and ``README.too'' in your local directory,
273              you could try:
274
275                   get README README.too
276
277              You could also accomplish that by using a  wildcard  expression,
278              such as:
279
280                   get README*
281
282              This  command  is similar to the behavior of other FTP programs'
283              mget command.  To retrieve a remote file but give it a different
284              name  on  your  host, you can use the ``-z'' flag.  This example
285              shows how to download a  file  called  ReadMe.txt  but  name  it
286              locally as README:
287
288                   get -z ReadMe.txt README
289
290              The  program  tries  to  ``resume''  downloads by default.  This
291              means that if the remote FTP server lost the connection and  was
292              only  able  to  send  490  kilobytes of a 500 kilobyte file, you
293              could reconnect to the FTP server and do another get on the same
294              file  name  and  it  would get the last 10 kilobytes, instead of
295              retrieving the entire file  again.   There  are  some  occasions
296              where  you  may  not want that behavior.  To turn it off you can
297              use the ``-f'' flag.
298
299              There are also times where you want to  append  to  an  existing
300              file.  You can do this by using the ``-A'' flag, for example
301
302                   get -A log.11
303
304              would append to a file named ``log.11'' if it existed locally.
305
306              Another thing you can do is delete a remote file after you down‐
307              load it.  This can be useful when a remote host expects  a  file
308              to  be  removed  when  it  has been retrieved.  Use the double-D
309              flag, such as ``get -DD'' to do this.
310
311              The get command lets you retrieve entire directory  trees,  too.
312              Although  it  may not work with some remote systems, you can try
313              ``get -R'' with a directory to download the  directory  and  its
314              contents.
315
316              When  using the ``-R'' flag, you can also use the ``-T'' flag to
317              disable automatic on-the-fly  TAR  mode  for  downloading  whole
318              directory  trees.   The program uses TAR whenever possible since
319              this usually preserves symbolic links and file permissions.  TAR
320              mode  can  also  result in faster transfers for directories con‐
321              taining many small files, since a single data connection can  be
322              used rather than an FTP data connection for each small file. The
323              downside to using TAR is that it forces downloading of the whole
324              directory, even if you had previously downloaded a portion of it
325              earlier, so you may want to use  this  option  if  you  want  to
326              resume downloading of a directory.
327
328       jobs   Views  the  list  of currently executing NcFTP background tasks.
329              This actually just runs ncftpbatch -l for you.
330
331       lcd    The lcd command is the first of a few ``l'' commands  that  work
332              with the local host.  This changes the current working directory
333              on the local host.  If you want to download files into a differ‐
334              ent  local directory, you could use lcd to change to that direc‐
335              tory and then do your downloads.
336
337       lchmod Runs ``/bin/chmod'' on the local host.
338
339       lls    Another local command that comes in handy is  the  lls  command,
340              which  runs  ``/bin/ls''  on  the  local  host  and displays the
341              results in the program's window.  You can  use  the  same  flags
342              with  lls  as  you  would  in  your command shell, so you can do
343              things like:
344
345                   lcd ~/doc
346                   lls -lrt p*.txt
347
348       lmkdir Runs ``/bin/mkdir'' on the local host.
349
350       lookup The program also has a built-in interface to  the  name  service
351              via  the  lookup command.  This means you can lookup entries for
352              remote hosts, like:
353
354                   lookup cse.unl.edu ftp.cs.unl.edu sphygmomanometer.unl.edu
355
356              prints:
357
358                   cse.unl.edu               129.93.33.1
359                   typhoon.unl.edu           129.93.33.24
360                   sphygmomanometer.unl.edu  129.93.33.126
361
362              There is also a more detailed option, enabled with ``-v,'' i.e.:
363
364                   lookup -v cse.unl.edu ftp.cs.unl.edu
365
366              prints:
367
368                   cse.unl.edu:
369                       Name:     cse.unl.edu
370                       Address:  129.93.33.1
371
372                   ftp.cs.unl.edu:
373                       Name:     typhoon.unl.edu
374                       Alias:    ftp.cs.unl.edu
375                       Address:  129.93.33.24
376
377              You can also give IP addresses, so this would work too:
378
379                   lookup 129.93.33.24
380
381              prints:
382
383                   typhoon.unl.edu           129.93.33.24
384
385       lpage  Views a local file one page  at  a  time,  with  your  preferred
386              $PAGER program.
387
388       lpwd   Prints  the  current local directory.  Use this command when you
389              forget where you are on your local machine.
390
391       lrename
392              Runs ``/bin/mv'' on the local host.
393
394       lrm    Runs ``/bin/rm'' on the local host.
395
396       lrmdir Runs ``/bin/rmdir'' on the local host.
397
398       ls     Prints a directory listing from the remote system.  It tries  to
399              behave  like  UNIX's  ``/bin/ls -CF''  command.   If  the remote
400              server seems to be a UNIX host, you can also use the same  flags
401              you would with ls, for instance
402
403                   ls -rt
404
405              would try to act like
406
407                   /bin/ls -CFrt
408
409              would on UNIX.
410
411              ncftp  has a powerful built-in system for dealing with directory
412              listings.  It tries to cache each one, so if you list  the  same
413              directory,  odds  are  it  will  display  instantly.  Behind the
414              scenes, ncftp always tries a long listing, and then reformats it
415              as  it  needs  to.  So even if your first listing of a directory
416              was a regular ``ls'' which displayed the files in columns,  your
417              next  listing could be ``ls -lrt'' and ncftp would still use the
418              cached directory listing to quickly display the information  for
419              you!
420
421       mkdir  Creates a new directory on the remote host.  For many public ar‐
422              chives, you won't have the proper access permissions to do that.
423
424       open   Establishes an FTP control connection  to  a  remote  host.   By
425              default,  ncftp logs in anonymously to the remote host.  You may
426              want to use a specific user account when you log in, so you  can
427              use  the  ``-u'' flag to specify which user.  This example shows
428              how to open the host ``bowser.nintendo.co.jp'' using  the  user‐
429              name ``mario:''
430
431                   open -u mario bowser.nintendo.co.jp
432
433              Here  is  a list of options available for use with the open com‐
434              mand:
435
436              -u XX Use username XX instead of anonymous.
437
438              -p XX Use password XX with the username.
439
440              -j XX Use account XX in supplement to the username and  password
441              (deprecated).
442
443              -P XX Use port number XX instead of the default FTP service port
444              (21).
445
446       page   Browses a remote file one page at a time, using your $PAGER pro‐
447              gram.   This  is  useful for reading README's on the remote host
448              without downloading them first.
449
450       pdir and pls
451              These commands are equivalent to dir and ls  respectively,  only
452              they feed their output to your pager.  These commands are useful
453              if the directory listing scrolls off your screen.
454
455       put    Copies files from the local host to the remote machine's current
456              working directory.  To place a copy of ``xx.zip'' and ``yy.zip''
457              in the remote directory, you could try:
458
459                   put xx.zip yy.zip
460
461              You could also accomplish that by using a  wildcard  expression,
462              such as:
463
464                   put *.zip
465
466              This  command  is similar to the behavior of other FTP programs'
467              mput command.  To send a remote file but  give  it  a  different
468              name  on  your  host, you can use the ``-z'' flag.  This example
469              shows how to upload a file  called  ``ncftpd-2.0.6.tar.gz''  but
470              name it remotely as ``NFTPD206.TGZ:''
471
472                   put -z ncftpd-2.0.6.tar.gz NFTPD206.TGZ
473
474              The  program  does not try to ``resume'' uploads by default.  If
475              you do want to resume an upload, use the ``-z'' flag.
476
477              There are also times where you want to  append  to  an  existing
478              remote  file.   You  can  do  this by using the ``-A'' flag, for
479              example
480
481                   put -A log11.txt
482
483              would append to a file named ``log11.txt'' if it existed on  the
484              remote server.
485
486              Another thing you can do is delete a local file after you upload
487              it.  Use the double-D flag, such as ``put -DD'' to do this.
488
489              The put command lets you send entire directory trees,  too.   It
490              should  work  on  all  remote systems, so you can try ``put -R''
491              with a directory to upload the directory and its contents.
492
493       pwd    Prints the current remote working directory.  A portion  of  the
494              pathname is also displayed in the shell's prompt.
495
496       quit   Of  course,  when you finish using the program, type quit to end
497              the program (You could also use bye, exit, or ^D).
498
499       quote  This can be used to send a direct FTP Protocol  command  to  the
500              remote  server.   Generally this isn't too useful to the average
501              user.
502
503       rename If you need to change the name of a remote file, you can use the
504              rename command, like:
505
506                   rename SPHYGMTR.TAR sphygmomanometer-2.3.1.tar
507
508       rhelp  Sends a help request to the remote server.  The list of FTP Pro‐
509              tocol commands is often printed, and sometimes some other infor‐
510              mation  that  is  actually  useful,  like  how to reach the site
511              administrator.
512
513              Depending on the remote server, you may be able to give a param‐
514              eter to the server also, like:
515
516                   rhelp NLST
517
518              One server responded:
519
520                   Syntax: NLST [ <sp> path-name ]
521
522       rm     If  you need to delete a remote file you can try the rm command.
523              Much of the time this won't work  because  you  won't  have  the
524              proper  access  permissions.   This  command  doesn't accept any
525              flags, so you can't nuke a whole tree  by  using  ``-rf''  flags
526              like you can on UNIX.
527
528       rmdir  Similarly,  the rmdir command removes a directory.  Depending on
529              the remote server, you may be able to remove a non-empty  direc‐
530              tory, so be careful.
531
532       set    This  lets you configure some program variables, which are saved
533              between runs in the $HOME/.ncftp/prefs file.  The  basic  syntax
534              is:
535
536                   set <option> <value>
537
538              For example, to change the value you use for the anonymous pass‐
539              word, you might do:
540
541                   set anon-password devnull@example.com
542
543              See the next section for a list of things you change.
544
545       show   This  lets  you  display  program   variables.    You   can   do
546              ``show all''  to display all of them, or give a variable name to
547              just display that one, such as:
548
549                   show anon-password
550
551       site   One obscure command you may have to use someday  is  site.   The
552              FTP  Protocol  allows  for  ``site  specific''  commands.  These
553              ``site'' commands vary of course, such as:
554
555                   site chmod 644 README
556
557              Actually, ncftp's chmod command really does the above.
558
559              Try doing one of these to see what the remote  server  supports,
560              if any:
561
562                   rhelp SITE
563                   site help
564
565       type   You  may  need  to  change transfer types during the course of a
566              session with a server.  You can use the type command to do this.
567              Try one of these:
568
569                   type ascii
570                   type binary
571                   type image
572
573              The  ascii  command  is equivalent to ``type a'', and the binary
574              command is equivalent to ``type i'' and ``type b''.
575
576       umask  Sets the process' umask on the remote server, if it has any con‐
577              cept of a umask, i.e.:
578
579                   umask 077
580
581              However,  this  is not a standard command, so remote FTP servers
582              may not support it.
583
584       version
585              This command dumps some information about the particular edition
586              of  the  program you are using, and how it was installed on your
587              system.
588
589   VARIABLE REFERENCE
590       anon-password
591              Specifies what to use for the password when  logging  in  anony‐
592              mously.  Internet convention has been to use your E-mail address
593              as a courtesy to the site administrator.  If you change this, be
594              aware that some sites require (i.e. they check for) valid E-mail
595              addresses.
596
597       auto-resume
598              NcFTP 3 now prompts the user by default when you try to download
599              a  file  that  already  exists  locally,  or  upload a file that
600              already exists remotely.  Older versions of the program automat‐
601              ically guessed whether to overwrite the existing file or attempt
602              to resume where it left off, but  sometimes  the  program  would
603              guess  wrong.  If you would prefer that the program always guess
604              which action to take, set this variable to yes, otherwise, leave
605              it set to no and the program will prompt you for which action to
606              take.
607
608       auto-ascii
609              If set to a list of pipe-character delimited  extensions,  files
610              with  these extensions will be sent in ASCII mode even if binary
611              mode is currently in effect.  This option allows you to transfer
612              most  files  in  binary,  with the exception of a few well-known
613              file types that should be sent in ASCII.  This option is enabled
614              by  default,  and set to a list of common extensions (e.g., .txt
615              and .html).
616
617       autosave-bookmark-changes
618              With the advent of version 3 of NcFTP, the program treats  book‐
619              marks  more  like  they would with your web browser, which means
620              that once you bookmark the site, the remote directory is static.
621              If you set this variable to yes, then the program will automati‐
622              cally update the bookmark's starting remote directory  with  the
623              directory  you  were in when you closed the site.  This behavior
624              would be more like that of NcFTP version 2.
625
626       confirm-close
627              By default the program will ask you  when  a  site  you  haven't
628              bookmarked  is about to be closed.  To turn this prompt off, you
629              can set this variable to no.
630
631       connect-timeout
632              Previous versions of the program used a single timeout value for
633              everything.   You  can  now  have different values for different
634              operations.  However, you probably do not need to  change  these
635              from the defaults unless you have special requirements.
636
637              The  connect-timeout variable controls how long to wait, in sec‐
638              onds, for a connection establishment to complete before  consid‐
639              ering  it  hopeless.  You can choose to not use a timeout at all
640              by setting this to -1.
641
642       control-timeout
643              This is the timer used when ncftp sends an FTP command over  the
644              control  connection  to the remote server.  If the server hasn't
645              replied in that many seconds, it considers the session lost.
646
647       logsize
648              This is controls how large the transfer  log  ($HOME/.ncftp/log)
649              can  grow  to,  in kilobytes.  The default is 200, for 200kB; if
650              you don't want a log, set this to 0.
651
652       pager  This is the external program to use to view a text file, and  is
653              more by default.
654
655       passive
656              This  controls ncftp's behavior for data connections, and can be
657              set to one of on, off, or the default, optional.   When  passive
658              mode  is  on,  ncftp uses the FTP command primitive PASV to have
659              the client  establish  data  connections  to  the  server.   The
660              default  FTP  protocol behavior is to use the FTP command primi‐
661              tive PORT which has the server establish data connections to the
662              client.  The default setting for this variable, optional, allows
663              ncftp to choose whichever method it deems necessary.
664
665       progress-meter
666              You can change how the program  reports  file  transfer  status.
667              Select from meter 2, 1, or 0.
668
669       redial-delay
670              When  a host is busy or unavailable, the program waits this num‐
671              ber of seconds before trying again.  The smallest  you  can  set
672              this is to 10 seconds -- so if you were planning on being incon‐
673              siderate, think again.
674
675       save-passwords
676              If you set this variable to yes, the program will save passwords
677              along  with the bookmarks you save.  While this makes non-anony‐
678              mous logins more convenient, this can be  very  dangerous  since
679              your    account    information    is    now   sitting   in   the
680              $HOME/.ncftp/bookmarks file.   The  passwords  aren't  in  clear
681              text, but it is still trivial to decode them if someone wants to
682              make a modest effort.
683
684       show-status-in-xterm-titlebar
685              If set to yes and operating from within  an  xterm  window,  the
686              program will change the window's titlebar accordingly.
687
688       so-bufsize
689              If your operating system supports TCP Large Windows, you can try
690              setting this variable to the number of bytes to set  the  TCP/IP
691              socket  buffer  to.  This option won't be of much use unless the
692              remote server also supports large window sizes and  is  pre-con‐
693              figured with them enabled.
694
695       xfer-timeout
696              This  timer  controls  how  long to wait for data blocks to com‐
697              plete.  Don't set this too low or else your transfers will time‐
698              out without completing.
699
700   FIREWALL AND PROXY CONFIGURATION
701       You  may  find  that  your  network administrator has placed a firewall
702       between your machine and the Internet, and that you cannot reach exter‐
703       nal hosts.
704
705       The  answer may be as simple as setting ncftp to use passive mode only,
706       which you can do from a ncftp command prompt like this:
707
708            set passive on
709
710       The reason for this is because many firewalls  do  not  allow  incoming
711       connections  to the site, but do allow users to establish outgoing con‐
712       nections.  A passive data connection is established by  the  client  to
713       the server, whereas the default is for the server to establish the con‐
714       nection to the client, which firewalls may object to.  Of  course,  you
715       now  may  have  problems  with sites whose primitive FTP servers do not
716       support passive mode.
717
718       Otherwise, if you know you need to have ncftp communicate directly with
719       a   firewall   or   proxy,   you   can   try   editing   the   separate
720       $HOME/.ncftp/firewall configuration file.  This file is  created  auto‐
721       matically  the  first  time  you  run the program, and contains all the
722       information you need to get the program to work in this setup.
723
724       The basics of this process are configuring a firewall (proxy)  host  to
725       go through, a user account and password for authentication on the fire‐
726       wall, and which type of firewall method to use.  You can also setup  an
727       exclusion  list,  so  that ncftp does not use the firewall for hosts on
728       the local network.
729

FILES

731       $HOME/.ncftp/bookmarks
732              Saves bookmark and host information.
733
734       $HOME/.ncftp/firewall
735              Firewall access configuration file.
736
737       $HOME/.ncftp/prefs
738              Program preferences.
739
740       $HOME/.ncftp/trace
741              Debugging output for entire program run.
742
743       $HOME/.ncftp/v3init
744              Used to tell if this version of the program has run before.
745
746       $HOME/.ncftp/spool/
747              Directory where background jobs are stored in the form of  spool
748              configuration files.
749
750       $HOME/.ncftp/spool/log
751              Information for background data transfer processes.
752

ENVIRONMENT

754       PATH   User's  search path, used to find the ncftpbatch program, pager,
755              and some other system utilities.
756
757       PAGER  Program to use to view text files one page at a time.
758
759       TERM   If the program was compiled with support  for  GNU  Readline  it
760              will  need  to know how to manipulate the terminal correctly for
761              line-editing, etc.  The pager program will also  take  advantage
762              of this setting.
763
764       HOME   By  default,  the  program  writes  its  configuration data in a
765              .ncftp subdirectory of the HOME directory.
766
767       NCFTPDIR
768              If  set,  the  program  will  use  this  directory  instead   of
769              $HOME/.ncftp.   This variable is optional except for those users
770              whose home directory is the root directory.
771
772       COLUMNS
773              Both the built-in ls command and the external  ls  command  need
774              this to determine how many screen columns the terminal has.
775

BUGS

777       There  are  no such sites named bowser.nintendo.co.jp or sphygmomanome‐
778       ter.unl.edu.
779
780       Auto-resume should check the file timestamps instead  of  relying  upon
781       just  the  file  sizes,  but it is difficult to do this reliably within
782       FTP.
783
784       Directory caching and recursive downloads depend on UNIX-like  behavior
785       of the remote host.
786

AUTHOR

788       Mike Gleason, NcFTP Software (http://www.ncftp.com).
789

SEE ALSO

791       ncftpput(1), ncftpget(1), ncftpbatch(1), ftp(1), rcp(1), tftp(1).
792
793       LibNcFTP (http://www.ncftp.com/libncftp).
794
795       NcFTPd (http://www.ncftp.com/ncftpd).
796

THANKS

798       Thanks  to  everyone who uses the program.  Your support is what drives
799       me to improve the program!
800
801       I thank Dale Botkin and Tim Russell at my former ISP, Probe Technology.
802
803       Ideas and some code contributed by my partner, Phil Dietz.
804
805       Thanks to Brad Mittelstedt and Chris Tjon, for driving and refining the
806       development of the backbone of this project, LibNcFTP.
807
808       I'd like to thank my former system administrators, most notably Charles
809       Daniel, for making testing on a variety of platforms possible,  letting
810       me have some extra disk space, and for maintaining the UNL FTP site.
811
812       For  testing  versions  1 and 2 above and beyond the call of duty, I am
813       especially grateful to: Phil Dietz, Kok Hon Yin, and  Andrey A. Chernov
814       (ache@astral.msk.su).
815
816       Thanks  to Tim MacKenzie (t.mackenzie@trl.oz.au) for the original file‐
817       name completion code for version 2.3.0 and 2.4.2.
818
819       Thanks to DaviD W. Sanderson (dws@ora.com), for helping me out with the
820       man page.
821
822       Thanks to those of you at UNL who appreciate my work.
823
824       Thanks  to  Red  Hat  Software for honoring my licensing agreement, but
825       more importantly, thanks for providing a solid and affordable  develop‐
826       ment platform.
827

APOLOGIES

829       To  the users, for not being able to respond personally to most of your
830       inquiries.
831
832       To Phil, for things not being the way they should be.
833
834
835
836ncftp                           NcFTP Software                        ncftp(1)
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