FTP

Here at Parkland, we have a bunch of remote computers we use for web pages (you remember what a remote computer is, right?... If not, go back and start over from the beginning. Now.). These computers each have a name. The names of these computers can be found by clicking here. On these computers, there is a friendly little folder named public_html. This is the folder that people surfing the web can see. If your web page files are in the public_html folder on the remote computer, other people will be able to see them.

I know... I know... You're screaming "But how do I get my files onto the remote computer and put them in that nice little public_html file?" as you bang your head on the keyboard in frustration. Stop banging your head on the keyboard. I'm going to make you pay for it if you break it...

The answer, of course, is that you must FTP them!

First of all... go download and install a program called WinSCP. You can get it by clicking here. Go ahead... I'll wait.

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All done? Good. Now go and find this icon, and double-click on it.

If you did it correctly, you should see a window similar to this:

Click on "New"... Go ahead. It won't bite. Your window should look like this:

Remember how I told you that all of Parkland's remote computers (i.e. servers) have their own names? Well, this is where those names become important. Pick one of those names... just copy and paste it into the text box labelled "Host name". Personally, I like mercury.csit.parkland.edu the best. I don't know why. Mercury is just a really hella-cool name for a computer. But you can pick whichever one you like the best. I don't care. Really... pick one. Any one you like...

You picked Mercury, didn't you? I told you it was a hella-cool name.

Alright, now that you've picked your remote computer, type in your username and password in the appropriate text boxes. It's probably the same as what you use for your Parkland e-mail login. Make sure that "SFTP (allow SCP fallback)" is selected. Now if you're at home and you don't want to mess with setting all this up again, you can go ahead and click Save. If you're in a computer lab at Parkland... don't. If you save it, then anyone who uses that computer after you can get in and mess with your account.

Got all that done? Well then, click on Login. You'll probably get an annoying little pop-up about a "host key". Just click "Yes". You should see something that vaguely resembles this:

On the left side is a list of the files on your local computer. On the right side is a list of the files on the remote computer. Easy to remember... left is local, right is remote. I just love alliteration, don't you?

Now look over on the right side... there's our friend public_html! You remember why we like public_html, don't you? That's right... public_html is the folder that people surfing the web can see, and thus, it is where we need to put our web page files. So double click on it. Now you are inside the folder named public_html on the remote computer.

"Well that's all fine and dandy," I know you're saying, "but now what the heck do I do?". Geez... impatient, aren't you. Look over on the left side. That's your local computer, remember. It should be easy enough to figure out where you saved your web page files on your local computer, so do it now.

Found them? Ok, let's move on.

Let's say I want to put a file on my local computer called index.html onto the remote computer so that everyone can see it. That's simple enough. Click on that file, and drag it from the left side over to the right side, and let WinSCP do it's thing. And after a few moments... tadaa! An exact duplicate of your local file on the remote computer:

And that's all there is to it. When you're done, just click that little button labeled "Quit", and it will log you off from the remote computer.

Finding your newly-FTPed page on the internet

So now you have you have copied your web page files from your local computer to a remote computer and put them in a folder that people surfing the web can see. But how do you tell them how to get there? To see your web page on the internet, people will need to know it's URL.

"Oh god," you're thinking, "Not another acronym!". Well, get used to it... you'll be seeing a lot more in the days ahead, believe me. They will haunt your dreams. They will consume your every waking moment. Eventually, you will begin to speak only in acronyms... They will tell you how to live your life. They will control you... they will possess you! Get out... get out while you're still sane!!!

Still here? Wow... you're brave.

A URL is just another path. You remember our discussion about pathes, right? Here at Parkland, your webpage's URL will inevitably start out with http://www.csit.parkland.edu/. That's just the way it is. Deal with it.

Go to you favorite browser (like Internet Explorer, or Netscape, or FireFox... though why anyone in their right mind would use Internet Explorer when FireFox is 9 million times better than IE could ever hope to be is beyond me...) and type that in.

After that, just tack on a tilde (that funny little wavy thing up in the left hand corner of your keyboard) and your username, like so: http://www.csit.parkland.edu/~nblight

If there is a file named index.html in your public_html folder, then that page will be displayed in your browser. If you don't have an index.html file, well then, you clearly haven't been paying attention, because I distinctly remember showing you how to FTP a file named index.html. It's not my fault if you don't listen. But in the event that for some ungodly reason you don't have a file named index.html in your public_html folder yet, fear not. Your browser will simply display a list of everything you do have in your public_html folder instead.

Let's look at my web page. Click on the URL: http://www.csit.parkland.edu/~nblight

Isn't it pretty?