What Is FTP?
FTP stands for 'File Transfer Protocol', it allows retrieval of files (documents, pieces of computer files, anything that can be stored in binary or ASCII form) from other computers on the net. FTP is one of the three basic Internet tools available prior to the World Wide Web (the other two being email and Telnet). If someone wanted to make a file available to other people then instead of emailing the file on request, the file could be made available in a public accesible area of the owner's host computer. People from other systems connecting to that machine via TCP/IP could then be provided with the facility to run a program that took advantage of the File Transfer Protocol (often called some variant of 'FTP' itself) and allowed them to access the public area on the machine to 'get' the file. This facility was known as 'anonymous FTP' because it was possible to use a guest account (usually 'anonymous') and password (often your email address) to access the public areas. Of course between two or more institutions FTP could be set up so that it could only be used by certain account holders, but it is the general, open facility that made FTP such a useful tool.File Transfer Protocol also allows you to 'put' files into directories of machines where you have some kind of account: this is particularly useful when you have created Web Pages and need to upload them onto the machine which contains the Web Server.
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