Re: The yearly FTP rant (Was: Re: Passive FTP and NAT/PAT with PIX and Serv-U)

[Mikael Olsson <mikael.olsson () clavister com>]

"Benjamin P. Grubin" wrote:
> I always thought (and was somewhat reinforced by the RFC history) that
> the logical separation of the protocol interpreter and data transfer
> process were necessary to implement under NCP, and were just dragged to
> TCP to remain compatible or for historical reasons.

That would be the main reason, yes, but on the other hand, they
DID fix telnet & co (thanks for that history lesson, Marcus).

I guess the reason for keeping FTP the way it is is that you can 
do server->server transfers. Or, as one of the FTP RFCs puts it 
(from $fuzzy_RAM): "since the IP address in the PORT command does 
not have to be that of the client, the client can request a transfer
from the FTP server directly to, for instance, a line printer."

Now, how many people there are still left in the world who
telnet to port 21 to transfer files, I'll leave as an 
exercise to the reader.

/Mike

-- 
Mikael Olsson, Clavister AB
Storgatan 12, Box 393, SE-891 28 ÖRNSKÖLDSVIK, Sweden
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Fax: +46 (0)660 122 50       WWW: http://www.clavister.com

"Senex semper diu dormit"
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