How To Create A FTP User Account

Give Your Website File Sharing Opportunities

Creating a FTP Account for a User (i.e. Customer. Member. Secretary) means creating a Private Upload & Download Folder (FTP Folder) for them, with a User Name & Password. FTP Folders are generally used for file sharing purposes. A secretary for example can upload important/urgent files to an FTP Folder (in London for example) for the boss (in Spain for example) to download later.

This is particularly better than sending the files by email because emails normally have a upload size limit. The FTP Folder is only limited by the size of your web space or by the Quota (size limit) you give it. Emails might also be stripped of content (i.e. picture files) whereas the uploaded important/urgent files will be inside the FTP Folder regardless.

To create a FTP User Account you first need to login to your web space Control Panel. Once logged in click on the FTP ACCOUNTS link (Fig 1.0) to open the FTP Accounts control panel (Fig 1.1).

Fig 1.0  Click on the FTP ACCOUNTS link to open the FTP Accounts control panel

When the FTP Accounts control panel opens (Fig 1.1) it displays any existing ftp accounts, some of which might have been set up by default, and also gives you the facility to create a new ftp account. One of the ftp accounts set up by default for example will be the ftp account, named after, and associated with your website account. In this example I have hidden the identity of my default website ftp account for obvious reasons.

Your, default (master) ftp account is meant for the administrator of the website (you). If you want an ftp account for your visitors, staff or whoever you need to create one for them - Never give out your default ftp account. In this example I will show you how to create an ftp account called ftpuser.

This control panel might look complex at first but do not worry! it is only a form you need to fill out. The other stuff is just information which you should read carefully and note down for future reference (i.e. actual FTP Account details). That way you will not need to keep logging in to your cpanel control panel in order to find/remember that information later.

Fig 1.1  .....the FTP Accounts control panel.

The first part of the form requires a User (LOGIN) Name, to go with a Domain Name from the DOMAIN NAME drop-down menu - If you only have one domain name the drop-down menu will be fixed on that domain name but if you have more than one domain name the drop-down menu will have those domain names selectable of course.

In the above example I typed ftpuser into the LOGIN edit box and did not need to touch the DOMAIN NAME drop-down menu because I only have one domain name I can use, the one already selected - websitecreationhelp.com. Therefore ftpuser@websitecreationhelp.com is my ftp account user (login) name.

The next part of the form requires a Password to be entered into the PASSWORD edit box, which then needs to be typed into the PASSWORD (AGAIN) edit box for confirmation purposes. The password here needs to be stronger than usual simply because you are allowing people to edit/delete folders/files from within your web space. In this example I used password: 2+2=4338.

The DIRECTORY edit box will automatically be filled in for you, when you enter a user (login) name into the LOGIN edit box, with the URL (path name) public_html and /user (login) name (i.e. ftpuser). This means your visitors, staff and so on will only be able to access this user (login) name folder, which is automatically created for you inside your public_html (website) folder, as opposed to accessing the whole of your public_html folder. If you do want them to have access to the whole of your public_html folder (its content) change the DIRECTORY edit box to public_html/ only.

The last edit box to fill in is the QUOTA edit box. It sets the MegaBytes storage limit for this ftp account folder (i.e. ftpuser). Rather than leave it set to unlimited I would strongly suggest setting it to 5, 10 or 20 MegaBytes maximum, if you do not want your visitors, staff, etc to use up the bulk of your web space with the unlimited option.

When you have filled in the above form click on the CREATE FTP ACCOUNT button to continue.

Fig 1.2  Confirmation that the FTP Account has been created - Click on GO BACK to continue

After clicking on the CREATE FTP ACCOUNT button you are shown the standard confirmation page (above) that confirms you have successfully created an FTP Account. Clicking on its GO BACK link reconfirms this because the Account Management section on the ftp, control panel, page displays the newly created ftp account. From here you can then edit the ftp account and so on.

Fig 1.3  ftpuser@websitecreationhelp.com has been created

To gain access (login) to the ftpuser folder, via a FTP Program for example, I would need to use the user (login) name ftpuser@websitecreationhelp.com and password I typed into the above form, together with the FTP Port number and FTP Server details (Fig 1.2 above).

Connect To A FTP Account Using Filezilla

To connect to a FTP Account using the FTP Client called FileZilla, regardless if it is an Administrator (website owner) Account or a User Account, simply follow the instructions below.

Fig 1.4  Click on the FILE menu and then on the SITE MANAGER menu-item




Fig 1.5  Click on the NEW SITE button to create a new FTP Connection/Profile




Fig 1.6  Rename the New Site, Enter your FTP Details and then click on the CONNECT button




Fig 1.7  Connection to the FTP Server was successful - You can now Upload Files and so on

The steps in Figures 1.4 and 1.6 are very straight forward. It is only the settings in Fig 1.6 that you need to be aware of and careful with. For example. Even if you have entered the correct ftp account details you still might get a connection error simply because you may have the wrong Server Type selected. In my case websitecreationhelp.com is on a secure server and therefore uses secure ftp setting such as Server Type: FTPES. This kind of thing you need to check with your Web Hosting Provider beforehand.

The FTP Account setting in Fig 1.6 match those FTP Account settings given to me in Fig 1.2. So in my case I entered those FTP Account settings into FileZilla's site manager as follows:

Once the FTP Account settings have been entered click on the CONNECT button to connect to the FTP Server. The user name and password etc will be checked and authorized whereby the USER (i.e. ftpuser) can then begin uploading files and so on to that restricted part of your website (ftp area).

One key important thing to note here is that each FTP Account you create installs its own folder within your public_html folder. Therefore if you need 100 USERs, do not create 100 separate ftp accounts (100 separate ftp folders). Use one or two ftp accounts for the 100 USERs instead.

Fig 1.8  Each FTP, USER, Account creates/uses a folder within your public_html (website) folder

Also Remember. If you are creating ftp members for your website, do not give them complete access to your web space. Create them a separate, USER, ftp account instead (as exampled above).