File Transfer Protocol (FTP) from the Steacie Lab or Gauss Lab

This is a brief technical note to show you how to transfer files — most likely HTML files — to your York University web account. We assume you are doing this from your account in the Steacie lab (ACADLAB) or the Gauss lab (Yorkarts). Both of these accounts are “Novell” accounts; so the procedure is different than from your home computer. We also assume you have previously (at least 48 hours previously!) activated your web account using MAYA.

The basic idea is to transfer files using a file transfer protocol program (FTP) from a “local” computer to a “remote” computer.

The remote computer is a server located somewhere in York’s CCS department. There are only three things you need to know about the remote computer: it’s name (www.student.yorku.ca), your username, and your password. Your username is your login name (e.g., yu123456), and your password is whatever password you entered when you activated your web account using MAYA.

The local computer is the one you are sitting in front of, either in the Steacie lab or the Gauss lab. The files are being transferred from the local computer to the remote computer. You will also need to know where on the local computer your files are located. This will be either a floppy disk (A: drive) that you bring into the lab or your personal space within your account (F: drive).

OK, let’s begin.

First, you log in, just as you normally do. Then you launch the FTP program on the Novel server. To do this, click on the Start button, then select Program Files | Internet Applications | Rapid FTP. This launches Rapid FTP, which is the FTP program available on Novell systems. Two windows will open: “Rapid FTP” and “Open a Remote File System”. The latter window appears as follows:

This window allows you to connect to the remote computer. You only need to fill in three fields: Remote Host Name, Username, and Password (see above). Do this and click Open.

The FTP program churns a bit and then the Rapid FTP window looks similar to this:

The interface is similar to Explorer. The top half of the window lists files on the "local" machine, while the bottom half lists files on the "remote" machine — in this case the web server. It’s extremely important you understand the previous sentence. Please read it again!

Unfortunately, the top half of the Rapid FTP window does not yet display the file(s) you want to transfer. We need to change that.

Click once anywhere the top half of the Rapid FTP window. This “selects” the local machine. Click on File on the menu bar, and then select Change Directory:

Another window will open asking which directory to display.

Enter “F:/” (without the quotes) if you want to transfer files from your personal space in your Novell account. If your files are on a floppy disk, then put the floppy disk in the computer and enter “A:\”. (If the files are in a sub-directory on the floppy disk, you must enter the full pathname of the sub-directory.) Then click Change.

The top Rapid FTP window now displays the files you want to transfer (either on the F: drive or the A: drive).

The bottom Rapid FTP window automatically displays the contents of your web account directory.

To transfer a file, just single click on the filename in the top window and then click the Copy button along the right-hand side of the Rapid FTP window. Continue until all the files are transferred. As the files are transferred, they appear in the bottom half of the Rapid FTP window. They are in your web account and are ready to be accessed using a browser. Congratulations: You are now “published” on the World Wide Web.

To verify that your web page appears as expected, launch Netscape and enter the URL of your web account, for example

http://www.student.yorku.ca/~yu123456/MyResume.html

Good luck!