FTPing: transferring files from Hercules to your PC

Once you have placed files on Hercules, that is, you have established your Web server, you will need to add files and update files. New files created on your PC are transferred to Hercules using the process described in the previous section. Also, when you want to change an existing file, you can simply replace the original file on Hercules by transferring the changed version of the file from your PC to Hercules. Again, this is the process described in the previous section on transferring files from your PC to Hercules.

In contrast, this document describes the reverse process where you decide to transfer a file from Hercules back to your PC. Initial reaction to this might be "what on earth would make you do this?". To change an HTML file or GIF file, why not simply make your changes on your PC and transfer the version to Hercules? I can think of two reasons to use this reverse process:

1. File on the PC is lost: If you accidentally deleted the file from your PC, then you still have the copy on Hercules. In a sense, your Hercules files provide a backup to your PC files.
2. Multiple PC usage: I happen to create HTML files and GIF files on a home computer and on different computers in my offices at the university and the Software Technology Centre. Instead of carrying my files around on diskettes, I always transfer files from my Web site ("Hercules" for everyone in the class) to the PC that I'm currently using. Then I change the files on the PC and transfer the changes back.

Steps to follow in transferring files from Hercules to your PC:

Replace the default entry for User ID by your username on Hercules.

Replace the default entry for Password by your password on Hercules.

The Remote Host directory may be set to the directory on your Hercules account that you want to use. In this image, it is set to the directory "public_html" which is where your HTML files reside on Hercules. The Local PC directory must be set to the directory where you want to place the files on the PC. This example specifies that these files will be placed on a floppy diskette on drive A, in a directory named "myhtml".

ASCII versus Binary transfers:

Always use the ASCII settings for transferring your HTML files. Always use the Binary settings for transferring your GIF files. In this example, I wish to get an HTML file named "ftp03.html" from my "public_html" directory, transferring the file to the directory "myhtml" which I have created on a diskette placed in drive A.

The settings on the left side of the FTP screen reflect the directories and files on your PC. This example assumes we are transferring to drive A from "public_html" on Hercules. The information preceding "public_html" will be different for your account.

Select the file "ftp03.html" and make sure that the ASCII setting is used.

Finally, click on the left oriented arrow button to cause the file transfer to happen. Notice that when transferring a "HTML" file with a four character extension ".html" from Hercules to your PC, the "l" will be removed, leaving the ".htm" extension. HTML files in the Hercules world and, more generally, on the Internet, have a four letter extension of "HTML" while in the Windows world the extension is limited to three characters.

For GIF files, the process is identical except that you need to ensure that you use the Binary mode instead of ASCII.