How do I connect to an FTP server?

I would like to write a program where I can upload and download files from an FTP server.

I have used the ftp client program that comes with Fedora Core 2, but it's a big hassle to use. It doesn't automatically detect my FTP servers. Is there any other way to connect to a FTP server easily?

What is the best way to download files from an FTP server? I understand there are many different ways to do it. But which is the easiest and the most convenient? I will be using Fedora Core 2 and I am familiar with that system.

How do I create an FTP file listing on a webserver? I installed "FileZilla" on an Apache webserver and I want to use this application to make a listing of files (or folders). Files should be made accessible through a ftp website, as in "FILE-LISTVIEW.TXT". How can I do this?
How do I install an FTP Client? I'm trying to view an ftp connection from outside my local network so that users on different networks can get a web based ftp connection for the purpose of upload and download. Does anyone know where I can get some information about how to go about this?

What can a FTP server do?

What features can be configured? The number one reason people buy, use or migrate to an FTP server is to allow their users to access their websites, images, documents, audio/video files, and databases from any location. We take a look at the key features of an FTP server as well as a comprehensive comparison of these servers against each other. FTP Servers Vs. FTPServers : The differences between a FTP Server and an FTPServer are simply that they're different ports of the same software. A FTP Server is just an FTP client (like Filezilla) whereas an FTPServer is a secure FTP client (like Filezilla Secure).

FTP Server features. FTP Clients (Windows & Linux) : Windows based FTP clients allow you to transfer files across your network directly from your local drive, to another local drive or FTP server. For example, your server needs to have a directory in which it stores a certain file; once you've downloaded this file, you then need to copy it from your local drive to another location on the network, often an FTP server. To do this, you'll need to open up your FTP client, find where the directory is, go into that directory, select the file you want to copy, and then drag and drop the file onto the FTP server. FTP clients also make it really easy to send files or folders over your network by dragging and dropping.

Your FTP client allows you to do things like browse remote directories, change directories, delete files, create new files, and manage directories in the way you want. You also have a great deal of control over how the connection with your server works, so you can set up specific protocols such as NFS (exports), SFTP (server based) and SSH (secure shell) to work with any server.

In terms of security, you can choose whether or not to permit any uploads, block any IP addresses or set up a user-based login system. You can also choose between logging files to your computer and to the FTP server, log files that don't log but only include the file transfer, or log everything with the full details of the file, directory or connection used to download the file.

What is the difference between FTP and FTP server?

FTP means File Transfer Protocol.

This is the protocol that we use to transfer files from one computer to another. It is a basic protocol that allows us to transfer files and directories from one computer to another.

FTP Servers are computers that run FTP software to handle all of the file transfers for us. FTP Servers are different from FTP Clients. We use the term Client to refer to the computer we're running on, and Server to refer to the computer we want to transfer files to.

You can transfer files to any FTP Server by using any FTP Client. In simple words : FTP is the way to transfer files from one computer to another. FTP server is the machine that stores the files for you.