Right-click FTP?

**wibble99** · 31-03-04

Probably like many people here I run quite a few web sites. What I was wondering is if there is any easy way of FTPing files to my various sites without all the hassle of starting up my FTP client, scrolling through the list of web sites, logging on to it, stepping through the directories to find the file I want to transfer, stepping through the web site's directories to find the place I want it to go, transfering the file then closing down the client.

This is particularly annoying when I've made updates to several files for different many sites and have to log on to them all separately as it seems to take ages and is quite tedious!

What I would like is to be able to right click on the file (or files) in explorer, select the site I want it FTPed to and it just do it.

Now, looking at CuteFTP (which is what I'm using) I've found that it does actually integrate with explorer and you can almost do what I want - but not quite. I can get it so when I right-click the file I'm given all my web sites to choose from and then it quickly starts up CuteFTP in the background and transfers it to the correct site.

However, it only seems to allow you to FTP to one directory. E.g. if I had a directory for a certain website on my PC and a graphics directory within it, right-clicking on an item in the graphics directory and telling CuteFTP to transfer it will result in the file being FTPed to the root directory of the site and not the correct directory.

So what I really need is something where it will either know what directory to transfer files to based on their home directory, or else it allow me to select the upload directory.

Has anyone managed to find anything that would help, as I'm sure it'd be very useful?

**matbennett** · 01-04-04

Wouldn't it be easier to upload from your editor as soon as you make the changes?

**wibble99** · 01-04-04

I use Notepad, though!

**getvisible** · 01-04-04

why?

**matbennett** · 01-04-04

Originally posted by wibble99
I use Notepad, though!

There's your problem then !

Back in the day when I was doing design only I was regularly updating 200+ websites. All details were stored in dreamweaver, so it wasn't a problem.

**wibble99** · 01-04-04

I find Notepad very quick and easy to use and like to have full control over what HTML is produced, whereas other wysiwyg editors I tried before added lots of rubbish in. When designing a new site it's not great and an editor is better, but for just making minor amendments I much prefer it.

I might, for instance, have 10-20 sites where I've got to make a quick change to one of the files, e.g. changing the copyright message to 2004. I can open the files in Notepad and make the change in just a few seconds and whizz through all the files, but it takes far longer to upload them to all those sites and is quite tedious. I can live with it, I'm just interested to see if there's anything around to make it easier.

Also, it's not just HTML files. It's graphics I may have altered and also, far more frequently, Perl or PHP programs I've been writing/amending. If I've just amended a CGI program and already have Explorer up it'd be nice if I could just right click on the program and tell it to upload it to the correct site/directory, without having to fire up CuteFTP and go through all the steps involved with FTPing it.

The reason I asked was that CuteFTP *nearly* does what I want, as it will integrate with Explorer and allow you to rightclick on a file and tell it which site to upload to. So they have thought about this requirement. But I can't specify the directory. So I wondered if rather than spending ages searching, whether somebody either knew something that did it or else knew a way of getting CuteFTP to do it in case I missed something.

**jrisby** · 01-04-04

you *really* don't want to use notepad.

i know where you are coming from but trust me, go and buy ultraedit-32 from www.ultraedit.com and your life will never be the same again!

**Aquanuke** · 01-04-04

I find Notepad very quick and easy to use

If your happy in notepad then you would be just as at home in Pico. 90% of the time I just work in Pico and Putty SSH.

If your sites are on different servers then you can just SSH in and out of the same connection.

Why bother with FTP at all ?

**matbennett** · 01-04-04

Use includes. Change 1 file and they all change.

Agree with Pico suggested above, but loathe vi. On windows I use context over ultraedit.

**Aquanuke** · 01-04-04

Everyone swears by VI. But I just cant get along with her

**wibble99** · 01-04-04

I do use includes, so only need to change one file per site in that example. But if I have 20 sites they don't use the same include as the sites use different templates, so I have to make the change for each site. Though that was only one example and it would be useful even if it was just one file I was editing, it's just that it's more of a pain when making changes to lots of files on different sites.

I'll have a look at pico and Dreamweaver, though it's only a relatively small quibble with the FTPing so I don't intend to change the way I develop sites because of it. It just seems a pity that CuteFTP nearly does what I want, but not quite!