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How to get permanent access to your FTP server

Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2015 11:06 am
by Fred
As techs, most of us have FTP servers or even websites we need to access quite often. So we may use well known FTP client applications such as FileZilla, WinSCP or TotalCommander.

In this post I'm going to tell about an FTP client that can give us permanent access to our FTP server, just as we can access our local hard drive. And most important: We don't have to download or install anything.

Yes, most of you already guessed, I'm talking about the Windows Explorer (or File Explorer, in Windows 8).

Just open the Windows explorer, type the address of your FTP server in the address bar and hit Enter.
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The first time you do this, you will be presented with a dialog box asking for your user name and password. Enter your credentials, and for permanent access, don't forget to check "Save password". Press "Log On".
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After successful log on, you have already configured the permanent access to your FTP server. To make things even easier, you can create a desktop shortcut pointing to any directory in your FTP server. Just browse to the desired directory and drag the address bar icon to your desktop.
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And that's all. You can now use the Windows explorer's interface you are familiar with to perform the common tasks in your FTP server, such as create, list, copy, or delete files and folders.

Hope this tutorial can be useful for those who were not aware of this method.

Re: How to get permanent access to your FTP server

Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2015 3:46 pm
by Brink
I've been using tcm so long (1997) that I was not even aware that windows had a built in ftp client now. lol

Thanks Fred.

Re: How to get permanent access to your FTP server

Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2015 4:03 pm
by Fred
You're welcome, Brink. I didn't know about it until recently either. I found it to be very useful. It like having the FTP server in the local HDD, just slower.

Re: How to get permanent access to your FTP server

Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2015 6:40 pm
by Charger440
Windows has actually had this ability for a while but most people don't know it exists.....
I am guilty of not using it because when it first came out it was, like most M$ products, buggy and I tended to stick with actual FTP clients.

Great tip Fred! I might loo into it again cause to be honest, it slipped my mind that it was there as well :D

Re: How to get permanent access to your FTP server

Posted: Thu Jun 11, 2015 1:27 am
by wmmiller
That’s good information. It is a bit slow and it would be great to be able to do that with the root. I did not know that existed. Thanks for the knowledge Fred. :)

Bill

Re: How to get permanent access to your FTP server

Posted: Thu Jun 11, 2015 1:45 am
by Charger440
If it is slow there may be a setting in the registry to boost that a little bit. That is a guess but there are tons of windows hacks so may be there is one for that too.

Re: How to get permanent access to your FTP server

Posted: Thu Jun 11, 2015 1:54 am
by wmmiller
It’s not a huge deal for me. I use FileZilla. It’s fast and works great. I use it for access to my server as well as my brother in-laws. I’m thinking this will work super for my wife. She doesn’t really understand the windows file structure and hates to try to navigate FileZilla so if she could just click a link and be in her folder she will love that. 8-)

Bill