Starting an FTP Session

To use FTP, enter the following command from a UNIX prompt:

ftp ftp.rpi.edu

Specifying the host name on the FTP command line, as shown above, makes FTP immediately attempt to establish a connection to an FTP server on the host.

As an alternative, you could enter the following command from a UNIX prompt:

ftp

FTP displays the prompt ftp> and waits for further commands from you. For example, to establish the connection to the remote FTP server, you could enter the following command at the ftp> prompt, where ftp.rpi.edu refers to the name of the specific Internet host:

open ftp.rpi.edu

You may find this method especially handy when you want to use FTP to more than one host during your session, in that when you finish with transfers to one host, you can issue the FTP close command and begin a session to another host with the open command, without leaving FTP and beginning again.

To quit FTP, enter the following command at the ftp> prompt:

quit