Windows XP Command Line FTP

Windows XP has a command line FTP client that is easy and fun to use.
FTP client is used to transfer files between your PC and a Server
or vice versa. Windows 7 FTP client steps are the same as outlined here.

Command Line FTP

• Select Start > Run and enter cmd in the Run dialog box. This brings up the command prompt window.
• Enter ftp and press the Enter key. You will get a ftp prompt (ftp>)
• Type help at the prompt. This will give you a listing of the commonly used ftp commands.
• Type open followed by the hostname to connect to the remote server. For example, open foo.com
• If the webserver requires authentication, enter the username and password. This will connect you to the FTP Server
• Anytime use ‘ls’ to get a listing of files in the remote directory and ‘cd’ to change directories.
• Use the ‘get’ command to get files from the local server and ‘send’ or ‘put’ command to upload files from your local PC to the remote server.
• Need to download or upload multiple files? Not an issue – Use ‘mget’ and ‘mput’ for this.
• How do you know when a file has been downloaded or uploaded? Use ‘Bell’ for this. At the ftp prompt type bell and press the key. On completion of upload or download you get a sound prompt.

Find Status

Are you in ASCII or Binary mode? Use ‘Status’ to find that

ftp> status
Connected to referpages.com.
Type: ascii; Verbose: On ; Bell: Off ; Prompting: On ; Globbing: On
Debugging: Off ; Hash mark printing: Off .

• In the above example, the transfer mode is ‘ascii’. To change the transfer mode to ‘binary’ enter the following at the ftp prompt:

ftp > binary on

• Once you are done, use ‘disconnect’ or ‘quit’ to close the ftp session

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