Tech Note: While FTP is still a widely used and accepted protocol it is deprecated due to the release of SFTP (Secure FTP) which is part of the SSH2 standard. SSH2 and SFTP provide for Secure transmission of authentication information and data from your office to your Hosting Account or Cloud Server. We strongly recommend that you adopt SFTP as the preferred method of transferring files due to the fact that FTP transmits the username and password as plain text. It is less then trivial to have your account information exposed and Windows programs are widely distributed to allow people with no technical knowledge the ability to hijack and abuse your account.
For Windows users we recommend a client such as WinSCP developed by Martin Přikryl. You should be able to download WinSCP here. Once you've downloaded and installed the program, return here so we can go through the process together.
NOTE FOR BEGINNERS
A word of advice for those who don't have any prior experience in downloading software: CREATE A TEMPORARY DIRECTORY (FOLDER) TO HOLD THE DOWNLOADED FILE (S).
- When you click on a file to be downloaded, a dialog box appears prompting you for action. Chose "save file".
- The next dialog box allows you to browse through your directory structure to choose a destination for your file (which should be the temporary directory/folder you just created).
- Now open up "Explorer/File Manager" and find the directory/folder where you stored your downloaded file.
- Double click the file. The computer will prompt you to begin extracting/installing the files.
Once you've installed your FTP software, you are ready to proceed to the Settings Window.
