Summary

FTP servers have historically been a very important part of the Internet, but today their function has been partially taken over by Web servers. Even so, FTP servers remain important in some situations, both as a means for authenticated file transfer (possibly in two directions) and as a means of anonymous file transfer (usually just from the server to the client). The two most popular FTP servers for Linux are WU-FTPD and ProFTPd. Both are powerful servers with many options, including support for both authenticated and anonymous transfers. Their configuration styles are very different, though. WU-FTPD uses its own system, and ProFTPd's configuration files are similar to those of Apache. Most distributions ship with FTP server configurations that work for authenticated access, and with little or no additional work, for anonymous access as well. Most of your FTP server configuration will probably involve making small changes to these default setups.