How to Use Filezilla

FTP clients are a dime a dozen. And in that situation, I typically opt for the candidate that is cross-platform for two very good reasons:

1. I know I’ll be able to use the same, comfortably familiar client no matter what computer I happen to be on
2. Cross-platform programming is smart, fair, and lives up to the notion of technology actually improving quality of life rather than just getting in the way. So I like to support it whenever I can

Enter, Filezilla.

Filezilla does FTP and SFTP; so no matter what kind of webhost account you have, if you are trying to get files from your computer to your web server, Filezilla can do it. Here’s how:

1. First, if you’re on Mac or Windows, download filezilla from filezilla-project.orgIf you’re on Linux, you can most likely install Filezilla from your software repository! Easy, huh?
2. Next, launch Filezilla and take a good long look at it.
   

   Filezilla, by default cluttered

   What’s the first think you notice? Yes, that’s right. It’s ugly. It’s horribly ugly. Let’s fix that.

3. Go to the View menu and turn OFF the Remote and Local Directory trees, and the Message Log (you can always turn that back on if something is not working right and you need to see messages about the error).
   

   Filezilla simplified

4. Now that it’s less cluttered, let’s upload some files. First, enter your server name, your server username, and your server password. If you don’t know this information, you need to get it from your webhost provider; it’s info you should have, so get it and remember it!
   

   Logging into your server

   Usually it’s something like this:

   • Host: ftp.example.com
   • User: seth
   • Password: mysupersecretpassword
5. Once you’ve logged in, you need to locate where your files should go so that the world can see them. Usually this is in a folder named public_html or www
6. To upload files, drag them from the left (your “local” computer) pane and drop them into the appropriate folder on the right (the “remote” computer, aka, your webhost server).
   

   drag from the left panel to the right

   
   Watch the transfer queue at the bottom of the Filezilla window for information on progress.
7. That’s it. Easy, right? Now go home and practice!