Anonymous FTP

InterNews  gives you easy access to files and remote host file directories available over the Internet using the ftp protocol. It does this by using an external ftp client program such as Fetch 2.1.1  or Anarchie 1.2  or later. The feature is available from the Windows menu item FTP Access.

There are four ways to use this feature:

1. You can open the FTP Access window at any time. Fill in the name of the file that you want to fetch or the directory that you want to access. Make sure to provide the entire path name such as "/pub/mac/sample". Then fill in the name of the ftp host such as "ftp.dartmouth.edu".

2. You can select the text of an article or a composing window that includes a URL (Uniform Resource Locator) description of a file available over ftp, then press cmd-U or choose FTP Access from the Windows menu. The general form of this kind of description is:

<ftp://host/filename>

An example is:

[<ftp://ftp.dartmouth.edu/pub/mac/InterNews_Dev/World/URL_Test.hqx>]<ftp://ftp.dartmouth.edu/pub/mac/InterNews_Dev/World/URL_Test.hqx>

The angle brackets are optional but recommended when specifying a URL in typed text.

If the text you select is in this form, InterNews  will fill in the file and host boxes of the FTP Access window for you. If the text is not in this form, all of the text will be inserted in the file box and you can edit it from there. You can therefore select the specification of a file or a host that is in some other format and rearrange it once the FTP Access window is opened.

3. You can option-click anywhere on a URL found in an article, help window, or composing window. The result will be the same as 2. above.

4. You can option-command-click anywhere on a URL found in an article, help window, or composing window. The helper application will be launched without any of the following steps. Do this if you are pretty sure that the URL is correctly formed.

Once the FTP Access window is presented, take these steps:

1. Choose the FTP client software from the popup menu. If you have a subscription file open, your choice will be remembered for next time.

2. You can click on the Launch button. This will launch the ftp client with a pointer to the file or directory to be accessed. (This feature is only available under System 7 or later.)

- or -

3. You can click on the Save Bookmark button to create a bookmark file on your disk. This file can be double-clicked at a later time to launch the ftp client program and get the file.

You can create bookmark files that point to directories as well as to individual files. For example, you can create a bookmark to the directory where the latest test release of InterNews is available by option-clicking on this text: 

[<ftp://ftp.dartmouth.edu/pub/mac/InterNews_Dev/World>
]<ftp://ftp.dartmouth.edu/pub/mac/InterNews_Dev/Dartmouth>

You can then double-click that bookmark file at any time to see what is currently available in that directory.

There is only one FTP Access window in InterNews, so clicking on a second URL will result in the replacement of the first URL information in the window.