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|
<!-- FSP FAQ Page --><!-- Modifications - Andy J. Doherty - 1996 -->
<html>
<head>
<title>Frequently Asked Questions about FSP</title>
</head>
<body>
<hr>
<center>
<h2>File Service Protocol (FSP)<br>
Frequently Asked Questions</h2>
<font size="2">
<p>(Last Updated: 25th June 1996)</font> </center> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>These are the answers to some of the frequently asked
questions about FSP. Posted twice monthly to alt.comp.fsp,
alt.answers and news.answers. </p>
<p>This information is mostly compiled from the alt.comp.fsp
newsgroup, although many other people and information sources
also contribute. It is edited and prepared by Andy Doherty<br>
(<a href="mailto:A.J.Doherty@reading.ac.uk">A.J.Doherty@reading.ac.uk</a>)
- who is also the current maintainer of the FSP software. </p>
<p>This FAQ may be found in the <a href="news:alt.comp.fsp">alt.comp.fsp</a>
newsgroup and from the news archives at rtfm.mit.edu . However,
the most recent version will always be found at its WWW home of <a
href="http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/misc/fsp/faq/faq.htm">
http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/misc/fsp/faq/faq.htm </a> </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h3><a name="NEWS">News:</a></h3>
<ul>
<li>The Beta 3 release of 2.8.1 will go to a full release at
the end of July. At this time it will be distributed to
distribution sites and will replace the 2.7.1 release.
See <a href="http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/misc/fsp/FSP281.htm">http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/misc/fsp/FSP281.htm</a>
for more details. If you know of any problems with this
release then please report them now.<br>
<br>
</li>
<li>The Beta 4 release of an FSP server for
Windows-95/Windows-NT is now available. See <a
href="http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~glau/fspd/">http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~glau/fspd/</a>
for more information, or section <a href="#1.2">1.2</a>
of this document. </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h3><a name="RECENTADDITIONS">Recent Additions:</a> <i>(Latest
First)</i></h3>
<ul>
<li><a href="#4.3">Email Address Updates [4.3]</a> </li>
<li><a href="#1.2">New Windows-95/Windows-NT FSP
server [1.2]</a> </li>
<li><a href="#2.5">What about FSP Software Updates ?
[2.5]</a> </li>
<li><a href="#2.2.4">Updates to Macintosh FSP client
information [2.2.4]</a> </li>
<li><a href="#6.1">Italian translation of FAQ
available [6.1]</a> </li>
<li><a href="#1.2">Updates to Macintosh FSP server
information [1.2]</a> </li>
</ul>
<hr size="3">
<center>
<h2><a name="CONTENTS">Contents</a></h2>
</center>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><h3>1: <a href="#1">Introduction and Help</a></h3>
<ul>
<li>1.1 <a href="#1.1">What's alt.comp.fsp?
What's FSP?</a> </li>
<li>1.2 <a href="#1.2">Where can I get FSP?</a>
</li>
<li>1.3 <a href="#1.3">Help! I don't
understand how to use FSP!</a> </li>
<li>1.4 <a href="#1.4">What are those funny
"R" and "I" characters?</a> </li>
<li>1.5 <a href="#1.5">Why should I, as a site
admin, run an FSP daemon?</a> </li>
<li>1.6 <a href="#1.6">Why do FSP clients
appear to hang sometimes ?</a> </li>
</ul>
<br>
</li>
<li><h3>2: <a href="#2">FSP software and resources</a></h3>
<ul>
<li>2.1 <a href="#2.1">Where can I get an
FTP-like interface for FSP?</a> </li>
<li>2.2 <a href="#2.2">Where can I get a
graphical interface for FSP?</a> <ul>
<li>2.2.1 <a href="#2.2.1">UNIX
(X-Windows)</a> </li>
<li>2.2.2 <a href="#2.2.2">MS-Windows</a>
</li>
<li>2.2.3 <a href="#2.2.3">OS/2</a> </li>
<li>2.2.4 <a href="#2.2.4">Macintosh</a>
</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>2.3 <a href="#2.3">Where can I get hold of
a list of sites?</a> </li>
<li>2.4 <a href="#2.4">Where can I get
pictures of naked women in compromising positions
and a copy of SuperRoboTermiSonicBuster IV ?</a> </li>
<li>2.5 <a href="#2.5">What about FSP Software
Updates ?</a> </li>
</ul>
<br>
</li>
<li><h3>3: <a href="#3">Technical Issues</a></h3>
<ul>
<li>3.1 <a href="#3.1">What are the main
differences between FSP and FTP? How does FSP
work?</a> </li>
<li>3.2 <a href="#3.2">How secure/anonymous is
FSP?</a> </li>
<li>3.3 <a href="#3.3">Why not add passwords
to FSP?</a> </li>
<li>3.4 <a href="#3.4">So what *does* FSP
stand for?</a> </li>
</ul>
<br>
</li>
<li><h3>4: <a href="#4">Who's who in FSP?</a></h3>
<ul>
<li>4.1 <a href="#4.1">Who writes and
maintains FSP software?</a> </li>
<li>4.2 <a href="#4.2">Who writes and
maintains FSP client software?</a> </li>
<li>4.3 <a href="#4.3">Who helped put this FAQ
together?</a> </li>
</ul>
<br>
</li>
<li><h3>5: <a href="#5">Site Information</a></h3>
<ul>
<li>5.1 <a href="#5.1">What FSPable sites
exist ?</a> </li>
</ul>
<br>
</li>
<li><h3>6: <a href="#6">FAQ Translations</a></h3>
<ul>
<li>6.1 <a href="#6.1">Italian</a> </li>
</ul>
<br>
</li>
<li><h4><a href="#DISCLAIMER">Notes and Disclaimer</a></h4>
<br>
</li>
</ul>
<hr size="3">
<h3><a name="1">Section 1: Introduction and Help</a></h3>
<h4><a name="1.1">Q.1.1 What's alt.comp.fsp? What's fsp?</a></h4>
<p>Alt.comp.fsp is a Usenet newsgroup for discussing the FSP file
transmission protocol. It was created on Tuesday 4th May 1993 by
Wen-King Su (wen-king@cs.caltech.edu) after there was no
objection on alt.config. Before the newsgroup, there was a
mailing list (fsp-discussion) for talking about FSP software
internals. This newsgroup is for discussion of both writing and
using the software. </p>
<p>FSP is a protocol, a bit like FTP (but see below), for moving
files around. It's designed for anonymous archives, and has
protection against server and network overloading. It doesn't use
connections, so it can survive things falling over. </p>
<p><i>Quote: `FSP is what anonymous FTP *should* be'.</i> </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="1.2">Q.1.2 Where can I get FSP from?</a></h4>
<p>The `official' place for FSP distributions is
ftp.germany.eu.net </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp">ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp</a>
</li>
<li>fsp://ftp.germany.eu.net:2001/pub/networking/inet/fsp </li>
</ul>
<p>It is available both by FTP and FSP: the FSP server is on port
2001. </p>
<p>The latest release versions for each platform are: </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li>Unix : Version 2.7.1 <ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fsp.271.tar.gz">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fsp.271.tar.gz
</a> </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
</li>
<li>Windows-95/NT: Version 1.0 beta 4 - based upon the
v.2.7.1 Unix release <ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://glau.student.harvard.edu/fsp/ofspdb04.zip">
ftp://glau.student.harvard.edu/fsp/ofspdb04.zip </a>
</li>
<li>fsp://glau.student.harvard.edu/fsp/ofspdb04.zip </li>
<li><a href="http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~glau/fspd/">
http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~glau/fspd/ </a> </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
</li>
<li>OS/2: Version 1.0 - based upon the v.2.7.1 Unix release <ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/os2fsp21.zip">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/os2fsp21.zip
</a> </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
</li>
<li>Macintosh: FSP Server 2.7.1a2 An Alpha release based upon
UNIX v.2.7.1 <ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.mii.lu.lv/users/guest/pub/Mac/FSP/FSPServer2.7.1a2.sea.hqx">
ftp://ftp.mii.lu.lv/pub/Mac/FSP/FSPServer2.7.1a2.sea.hqx
</a> </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
</li>
<li>VMS : Version 2.7.1 <ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fsp.271.tar.gz">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fsp.271.tar.gz
</a> </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
</li>
<li>MS-DOS: PC FSP Version 1.05 - based upon the v.2.6.5 Unix
release <ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/pcfsp105.zip">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/pcfsp105.zip
</a> </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
</li>
</ul>
<p>The Unix version is the `original', and was originally written
by Wen-King Su: Joseph Traub took over for a while, followed by
Phil Richards and Pete Bevin, Andrew Doherty maintains it
currently. The same distribution contains patches by Sven Pechler
to make it run on VMS. Larkin Lowrey wrote the OS/2 version,
Lindsey Smith wrote the MS-DOS version and Garrick Lau wrote the
Windows-95/NT version. Email addresses are in <a href="#4">Section
4</a>. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="1.3">Q.1.3 Help! I don't understand how to use FSP!</a></h4>
<p>If you're already familiar with FTP, you might want to use one
of the FTP-like clients instead, or even a graphical interface.
See the answers to questions <a href="#2.1">2.1</a> and <a
href="#2.2">2.2</a> below for details of how to get them. </p>
<p>The following tutorial is adapted from an article in
alt.comp.fsp by David DeSimone (fox@netcom.com). </p>
<p>The original FSP seems to have been designed for use with csh
aliases, so if you use csh, try these aliases in your .cshrc: </p>
<pre> # FSP aliases:
alias fcat '(set noglob; exec fcatcmd \!*)'
alias fcd 'setenv FSP_DIR `(set noglob; exec fcdcmd \!*)`'
alias fget '(set noglob; exec fgetcmd \!*)'
alias fgrab '(set noglob; exec fgrabcmd \!*)'
alias fls '(set noglob; exec flscmd -F \!*)'
alias fll '(set noglob; exec flscmd -l \!*)'
alias fpro '(set noglob; exec fprocmd \!*)'
alias fpwd 'echo "$FSP_HOST ($FSP_PORT): $FSP_DIR"'
alias frm '(set noglob; exec frmcmd \!*)'
alias frmdir '(set noglob; exec frmdircmd \!*)'
alias fhost 'set fsp_host=(\!*); source ~/bin/fhost; unset fsp_host'
</pre>
<p>The last alias, "fhost", is my own invention, and
the ~/bin/fhost file looks like this: </p>
<pre> #!/bin/csh
#
# Since this script sets environment variables, it really needs
# to be source'd rather than executed. Thus the following alias
# should be used:
#
# alias fhost 'set fsp_host=(\!*); source ~/.bin/fhost; unset fsp_host'
#
if ( $#fsp_host > 0 ) then
setenv FSP_HOST $fsp_host[1]
if ( $#fsp_host > 1 ) then
setenv FSP_PORT $fsp_host[2]
else
setenv FSP_PORT 21
endif
if ( $#fsp_host > 2 ) then
setenv FSP_DIR $fsp_host[3]
else
setenv FSP_DIR /
endif
endif
if ( $?FSP_HOST ) then
echo "$FSP_HOST ($FSP_PORT): $FSP_DIR"
endif
</pre>
<p>This alias lets you "connect" to a host quickly and
easily. For instance, to start out I give the following command: </p>
<pre> <kbd>% fhost wuarchive.wustl.edu</kbd>
<samp>wuarchive.wustl.edu (21):</samp>
</pre>
<p>The "fhost" command tells me where I'm connected, on
what port, and in what directory. </p>
<p>Since all "fhost" does is set up some environment
variables, we aren't REALLY connected. To find out if the site is
responding, just do a quick "fls": </p>
<pre> <kbd>% fls</kbd>
<samp>README etc/ mirrors2/ pub/
README.NFS graphics/ mirrors3/ systems/
edu/ mirrors/ private/</samp>
</pre>
<p>Looks like we're up and running! Navigating with FSP is now
just like using the local filesystem, except the commands have
"f" in front of them. For instance: </p>
<pre> <kbd>% fcd /systems/amiga/incoming</kbd>
<samp>directory mode: (owner: some other machine)(delete: NO)(create: NO)</samp>
<kbd>% fls</kbd>
<samp>AT3D-Demo.bad devel/ utils/
AT3D-Demo.readme fish/ wb30/
comm/ programming/ demos/
text/</samp>
</pre>
<p>Other nice commands like "fcat filename" let me see
what's out there, or for larger files, "fcat filename |
less" is very effective. </p>
<p>Once I see a nice file that I want copied to my local system,
I just give the "fget filename" command and away it
goes. Usually I type "fget filename &" which throws
the transfer request into the background. Then I can immediately
go off and "fcd" to some other directory and look for
more files to grab, "fcat"-ing the README files and
such. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="1.4">Q.1.4 What are those funny "R" and
"I" characters?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>When FSP doesn't get any response from the server, it keeps on
sending requests. The first time it retries, it prints an
"R", (meaning "Retry"), and the second,
third, and subsequent times, it prints an "I". You
might also see an "E", which means "error":
FSP got a packet, but it was corrupted for some reason. </p>
<p>Fspclient does it slightly differently: it starts by printing
"r" and "R" characters, and then uses
"-\|/" characters to draw a spinning bar. As Phil
Richards (the author) says, `I quite often see spinning bars, but
usually only after the fifth pint'. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="1.5">Q.1.5 Why should I, as a site admin, run an FSP
daemon?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>Because it's one more way people can access your site, and it
won't cost you much extra load on the machine. The FSP daemon
never forks, so it won't increase your load average by more than
one. FSP doesn't add much to the network load either, and you can
limit the amount of data the daemon will send out per second. </p>
<p>FSP allows comprehensive logging, running off inetd, README
files per directory, banning on per-host or per-network basis,
reverse naming and read-only sites. The only thing anonymous FTP
gives that FSP doesn't is having the user type in an email
address, and of course, this can easily be faked. FSP logs give
the user's hostname, which is harder to fake. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="1.6">Q.1.6 Why do FSP clients appear to hang
sometimes ?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>When unable to get a response to it's last request an FSP
client use a non-linear algorithm to increase the delay until
they re-try. Effectively this means that during a transfer a
client may appear to be sitting their doing nothing for periods
of time, as the timeout in use increases to high values, to
paraphrase Wen-King Su - "the algorithm is brain
damaged". This problem has been addressed in the next
release of FSP (in beta testing). </p>
<p> </p>
<hr size="3">
<h3><a name="2">Section 2: FSP software and resources</a></h3>
<h4><a name="2.1">Q.2.1 Where can I get an FTP-like interface for
FSP?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>Phil Richards' (pgr@sst.icl.co.uk) fspclient. The latest
version (still pre-alpha, but more reliable than your average
beta release) is fspclient.0.0-h. You can get it by FTP from </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspclient.0.0-h+.tar.z">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspclient.0.0-h+.tar.z
</a> </li>
<li>fsp://ftp.germany.eu.net:2001/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspclient.0.0-h+.tar.z
</li>
</ul>
<p>Another interface to use is Nicolai Langfeldt's 'fspcli'. It
has a ftp like interface and more. It has been posted on
alt.sources. Another nice thing about it is that it's a
small(ish) perl script rather than a large compiled executable,
and it's not alpha OR beta. Presently the latest version is 1.2.1
and is available at </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspcli-1.2.1.tar.gz">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspcli-1.2.1.tar.gz
</a> </li>
<li>fsp://ftp.germany.eu.net:2001/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspcli-1.2.1.tar.gz
</li>
</ul>
<p>Ove Ruben R Olsen (Ruben@uib.no) has written a client quite
similar to Nicolai's, but even smaller. It is available at </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspsh113.tar.gz">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspsh113.tar.gz
</a> </li>
<li>fsp://ftp.germany.eu.net:2001/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fspsh113.tar.gz
</li>
</ul>
<p>Note that if you want to use either of the last two clients,
you'll have to have the Perl language installed. You can get the
latest version by FTP from prep.ai.mit.edu in /pub/gnu/perl*, or
from most sites which mirror GNU, such as ftp.germany.eu.net . </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="2.2">Q.2.2 Where can I get a graphical interface for
FSP?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<dl>
<dt><b><a name="2.2.1">2.2.1 For Unix (X-Windows) ...</a></b>
</dt>
<dd><p>The interface I use is FSPtool (not suprising really
:-) ) by myself [Andy Doherty
(A.J.Doherty@reading.ac.uk)]. It is an XView based client
for the X Window System. Available from: </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fsptool-1.6.1.tar.gz">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fsptool-1.6.1.tar.gz
</a> </li>
<li>fsp://ftp.germany.eu.net:2001/pub/networking/inet/fsp/fsptool-1.6.1.tar.gz
</li>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/applications/fsptool-1.6.1.tar.gz">
ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/applications/fsptool-1.6.1.tar.gz
</a> </li>
</ul>
<p>Like fspcli and fspshell, it acts as an interface to
the standard FSP shell commands, rather than rewriting
them itself. </p>
<p>Note that to use this package, you will need the XView
libraries, if you're using a Sun workstation, or the
standard MIT X11R5/R6 distribution you should be you're
OK: otherwise, you might have to get and compile them
yourself. </p>
<p> </p>
</dd>
<dt><b><a name="2.2.2">2.2.2 For MS-Windows ...</a></b> </dt>
<dd><p>winfsp12.zip by Ian Heath (ih@ecs.soton.ac.uk) is a
MSW client using WINSOCK.DLL . It's available from </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li> <a
href="ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/systems/ibmpc/win3/winsock/winfsp12.zip">
ftp://wuarchive.wustl.edu/systems/ibmpc/win3/winsock/winfsp12.zip
</a> </li>
<li> <a
href="ftp://ftp.winsite.com/pub/pc/win3/winsock/winfsp12.zip">
ftp://ftp.winsite.com/pub/pc/win3/winsock/winfsp12.zip
</a> </li>
<li> <a
href="ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/winfsp12.zip">
ftp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/winfsp12.zip
</a> </li>
<li>fsp://ftp.germany.eu.net/pub/networking/inet/fsp/winfsp12.zip
</li>
</ul>
<p>fsp4win.zip by Ben Youngdahl (youngdah@cs.umn.edu) is
another MSW client using WINSOCK.DLL . Still in Beta
release it's available from </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li> <a
href="ftp://ftp.sunet.se/pub/pc/windows/winsock-indstate/fsp/fsp4win.zip">
ftp://ftp.sunet.se/pub/pc/windows/winsock-indstate/fsp/fsp4win.zip
</a> </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
</dd>
<dt><b><a name="2.2.3">2.2.3 For OS/2 ...</a></b> </dt>
<dd><p>If you're an OS/2 user, you can use the OS/2 client by
Albert Crosby (acrosby@uafhp.uark.edu). It wraps around
the OS/2 FSP software (see <a href="#1.2">1.2</a>),
and also requires RexxMenu and RxU. It can read a list of
files in the standard FSP host listing format, and uses
RexxMenu's point-and-click interface. </p>
<p>Alternatively Larkin Lowrey (llowrey@ucsd.edu) has an
OS/2 FSP client (version 1.0). This can be found at
ftp.cdrom.com as <a
href="ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/network/tcpip/fsp2_10a.zip">
ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/network/tcpip/fsp2_10a.zip </a>
</p>
<p>This version includes clients for IBM's TCP/IP 1.2.1
and TCP/IP 2.0. Both are 32-bit and fully handle
longfilenames. </p>
<p> </p>
</dd>
<dt><b><a name="2.2.4">2.2.4 For the Macintosh ...</a></b> </dt>
<dd><p>Jim Browne (jbrowne@jbrowne.com) is working on a
version for the Macintosh. If you're interested you can
ask to be put on a mailing list by mailing him at
jbrowne@jbrowne.com. The latest version is available at <a
href="http://www.jbrowne.com/Projects/MacFSP.html">
http://www.jbrowne.com/Projects/MacFSP.html</a>. Older
versions are available from the following places: </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://mirror.aol.com/pub/info-mac/comm/tcp/">
ftp://mirror.aol.com/pub/info-mac/comm/tcp/ </a> </li>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.tidbits.com/pub/tidbits/tisk/tcp/">
ftp://ftp.tidbits.com/pub/tidbits/tisk/tcp/ </a> </li>
<li><a
href="ftp://src.doc.ic.ac.uk/computing/systems/mac/sumex/Communication/tcp/mac-fsp-10b13.hqx">
ftp://src.doc.ic.ac.uk/computing/systems/mac/sumex/Communication/tcp/mac-fsp-10b13.hqx
</a> </li>
</ul>
<p>Alternatively another beta client - Modris Berzonis'
(imara@mii.lu.lv), "FSP Client for Macintosh
2.7.1b9" - is available from: </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.mii.lu.lv/users/guest/pub/Mac/FSP/FSPClient2.7.1b10.sea.hqx">
ftp://ftp.mii.lu.lv/pub/Mac/FSP/FSPClient2.7.1b10.sea.hqx</a>
</li>
</ul>
<p>Last but not least is Tim Endres' (time@ice.com)
"FSPMac 1.1" available from: </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><a
href="ftp://ftp.msen.com/pub/vendor/ice/FSPMac-1.1.hqx">
ftp://ftp.msen.com/pub/vendor/ice/FSPMac-1.1.hqx</a>
</li>
</ul>
<p>All email enquires about FSPMac should be sent to
(macfsp@ice.com). </p>
<p> </p>
</dd>
</dl>
<hr>
<h4><a name="2.3">Q.2.3 Where can I get hold of a list of sites?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>Dan Charrois's provides both a "finger" based
read-only service and a WWW based service. </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li><kbd>finger charro@bode.ee.ualberta.ca</kbd> </li>
<li><a href="http://nyquist.ee.ualberta.ca/~charro/fsp">
http://nyquist.ee.ualberta.ca/~charro/fsp </a> </li>
</ul>
<p>Interruptions have been experienced with the
"finger" service at Dan's site, in case of difficulty
use the WWW service instead. </p>
<p>He is also happy to accept new site information and updates
via direct email (charro@ee.ualberta.ca), this information would
then be available via the finger and WWW services. </p>
<p>A second WWW based FSP list service can also be found at: </p>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/misc/fsp/sitelist/">
http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/misc/fsp/sitelist/ </a> </li>
<li><a href="http://www.cybernet.it/fsp/">
http://www.cybernet.it/fsp/ </a> (Italian language
Version) </li>
</ul>
<p> This site is based upon the server originally maintained by
Roy Svendsen and now re-hosted to these locations. It allows list
additions to be made direct from forms supporting browsers. </p>
<p>A small list of sites can be found in <a href="#5">Section
5</a>. </p>
<p>You are encouraged to make use of these site information
services or to post site information to alt.comp.fsp . If you
post in the format below, most people will be able to slurp your
list straight into their front-end programs. </p>
<p>The standard for the format is: </p>
<pre> hostname port alias root-directory # comment
</pre>
<p>for example: </p>
<pre> ftp.germany.eu.net 2001 germany / # big German archive (FSP)
</pre>
<p>Hostnames should be actual names rather than IP addresses
wherever possible. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="2.4">Q.2.4 Where can I get pictures of naked women
in compromising positions and a copy of SuperRoboTermiSonicBuster
II ?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>Seriously, FSP has a reputation of being for "crooks and
perverts". If you know any sites carrying illegal material,
then do them a favour and keep them to yourself. Posting them
won't make you any friends. </p>
<p>If someone posts a list of sites, and you didn't want them to,
please don't publicly flame them. It doesn't endear you to
anyone. If you must put them right, send email. Thank you. </p>
<p>PS: Don't ask me either. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="2.5">Q.2.5 What about FSP Software Updates ?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>The revision of the FSP protocol to version 3.0 is currently
on going. Forums for discussion are the alt.comp.fsp newsgroup
and the fsp-discussion@germany.eu.net mailing list. </p>
<p>Current work in progress includes an FSP RFC (Request For
Comments) - basically an internet specification of the protocol;
alterations to improve security facilities; a programmers API and
miscellanous extra features & facilities. </p>
<p>In the meantime a new release (v.2.8.1 Beta 1) was released to
Beta testing in January 1996, superseding the previous 2.8.0 Beta
series. It fixes a number of portability issues, known bugs and
documentation errors. It also provides scope for backwards
compatibility with revisions to the FSP protocol which are
scheduled for FSP 2.9.0 and beyond. </p>
<p>The next scheduled release is v.2.9.0. This is intended to act
as a migratory step to 3.0. Some alternations will be made to the
client and server functionality in 2.9.0, but this release is
mainly intended to greatly simplify and tidy the code base,
bringing it up to date with ANSI C/C++ and the POSIX standards.
This release is also intended to provide a foundation for much
easier porting of the software between platforms, including
Win32/Winsock 2.0 support scheduled for inclusion in 3.0. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr size="3">
<h3><a name="3">Section 3: Technical Issues</a></h3>
<h4><a name="3.1">Q.3.1 What are the main differences between FSP
and FTP? How does FSP work?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>From the user's point of view, the differences are not that
great, except that some of the more annoying features of FTP are
gone. Here are the main differences. </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li>The protocol can stand things going down: if the server
or the network falls over in the middle of a transfer,
you can just wait until it comes back up. You don't have
to reconnect, and even better, if the server went down
90% through grabbing a file, you can continue from where
you left off. <p> </p>
</li>
<li>The protocol doesn't need a username or password. You
just throw packets at the server. You don't have to
identify yourself (though you're not completely anonymous
-- see below). <p> </p>
</li>
<li>It's harder to kill off a site with an FSP server than
with an FTP server. The FSP daemon is designed to be as
lightweight as possible: it doesn't fork off any
sub-processes, and it takes steps to limit the amount of
traffic it handles. <p> </p>
</li>
<li>The user interface is completely different. The interface
that comes with the package consists of eleven commands
that you can call from the shell. In effect, your shell
is providing all the nice functions like command line
editing. This makes the interface much more versatile
than FTP's. (See below for how to get an FTP-like
interface, though). <p> </p>
</li>
<li>FSP is a bit slower than FTP. This is a feature, not a
bug. The point is to keep the communication lightweight,
and not to flood the net. </li>
</ul>
<p>From the programmer's point of view, fsp is a complete
rewrite. </p>
<ul>
<li>Instead of TCP sockets, it uses datagrams to communicate,
so that the connection doesn't break on a flaky line. <p>
</p>
</li>
<li>FTP works by opening a port, and then asking the server
to send a file to it. FSP uses the same port all the time
for communication, and asks for segments of a file. So
you can start off a transfer half way through a file, if
you really want to. <p> </p>
</li>
<li>The server tries to make sure you don't ask for packets
too quickly. Each packet it sends out has a random
identification number, which the client must return on
the next request. (If the client loses the number, it
must wait a few seconds before the server accepts another
packet from it). Therefore, the client has to wait for an
answer to each request before it sends out the next one. </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="3.2">Q.3.2 How secure/anonymous is FSP?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>By default, the FSP daemon keeps logs of transactions, along
with their site names. An FSP administrator could use this to
find out who you are, with a reasonable degree of certainty. </p>
<p>In short, FSP gives you no more privacy than anonymous FTP.
Anyone who tells you different has a less devious mind than most
FSP admins I know. </p>
<p>Why not make FSP more anonymous? Well, it's impossible to make
a protocol with complete anonymity, since at some point, the
remote site will have to send a file back to you, and it needs at
least an address to send it to. </p>
<p>If you really need privacy, you can encrypt any files you make
available, and only give out the decryption password to a select
few. But of course, you have to trust them to keep the password
safe. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="3.3">Q.3.3 Why not add passwords to FSP?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p><i>Thanks to Joseph Traub for the material for this section)</i>
</p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li>They don't add much security. If you use one password for
the whole site, then you might just as well set up the
site and only tell a few people its port number. That's
no more or less secure than using a password. Besides,
it's easier just to set up the server only to respond to
certain hosts. <p> </p>
</li>
<li>Any other password system is likely to be a big loss on
efficiency, since you'll have to check every single
packet. <p> </p>
</li>
<li>The main use of server passwords appears to be so that
people can move pirated software around, and the authors
don't want to add code to support that. <p> </p>
</li>
<li>This capability does NOT belong in FSP because it gets
away from the concept of lightweight simple file
transfers. </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="3.4">Q.3.4 So what *does* FSP stand for?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>As of 12th August 1993, FSP stands for `File Service
Protocol'. Thanks to Michael Grubb (mg@ac.duke.edu) for the
words, and Wen-King for the initials. </p>
<p>Other suggestions were: </p>
<p> </p>
<ul>
<li>File Slurping Protocol </li>
<li>Flaky Stream Protocol </li>
<li>FTP's Sexier Partner </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
<hr size="3">
<h3><a name="4">Section 4: Who's Who?</a></h3>
<h4><a name="4.1">Q.4.1 Who writes and maintains FSP software?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<dl>
<dt><b>Unix Versions:</b> </dt>
<dd>The current maintainer (as of March 1994) is Andy Doherty
(A.J.Doherty@reading.ac.uk), who also maintains the
alt.comp.fsp FAQ and wrote and maintains FSPtool an
X-Windows FSP client. <p>The previous maintainers were
Phil Richards (pgr@sst.icl.co.uk) and Pete Bevin
(pete@bestiary.demon.co.uk) from July 1993 to March 1994.
Phil is also the maintainer of fspclient, an FTP-like
interface for FSP. </p>
<p>Joseph Traub (jtraub@dragoncat.net) was maintainer
from Dec 1992 to July 1993 (versions 2.6.5 to 2.7.1). </p>
<p>Wen-King Su (wen-king@cs.caltech.edu) wrote the
original Unix version (versions 1.0 to 2.6.4). </p>
<p> </p>
</dd>
<dt><b>Windows-95 / Windows-NT:</b> </dt>
<dd>Garrick Lau (glau@husc.harvard.edu) wrote and maintains a
Windows-95/ Windows-NT server. <p> </p>
</dd>
<dt><b>VMS:</b> </dt>
<dd>Sven Pechler (S.A.Pechler@bdk.tue.nl) wrote and maintains
a VMS version. <p> </p>
</dd>
<dt><b>OS/2:</b> </dt>
<dd>OS/2 is handled by Larkin Lowrey (llowrey@ucsd.edu). <p> </p>
</dd>
<dt><b>MS-DOS:</b> </dt>
<dd>Lindsey Smith, of the MS-DOS rewrite is
lsmith@symantec.com <p> </p>
</dd>
</dl>
<hr>
<h4><a name="4.2">Q.4.2 Who writes and maintains FSP Client
Software?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>Jim Browne (jbrowne@jbrowne.com) and Modris Berzonis
(imara@mii.lu.lv) are both writing (soon to be released?)
Macintosh clients. See <a href="#2.2.3">Section 2.2.3</a>.
</p>
<p>Andy Doherty (A.J.Doherty@rdg.ac.uk) wrote and maintains <a
href="#2.2.1">'FSPtool'</a> an X-Windows based Unix
client. Also the FSP and alt.comp.fsp FAQ maintainer. </p>
<p>Ian Heath (ih@ecs.soton.ac.uk) wrote <a href="#2.2.2">'winfsp'</a>
an MS-Windows based client. </p>
<p>Nicolai Langfeldt's (janl@ifi.uio.no) wrote and maintains <a
href="#2.1">'fspcli'</a> a Perl based client. </p>
<p>Ove Ruben R Olsen (Ruben@uib.no) wrote and maintains <a
href="#2.1">'fspsh'</a>, another Perl based client. </p>
<p>Phil Richards' (pgr@sst.icl.co.uk) wrote and maintains <a
href="#2.1">'fspclient'</a>. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr>
<h4><a name="4.3">Q.4.3 Who helped put this FAQ together?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>The following people have contributed to the FAQ. Thanks very
much to all of them. </p>
<ul>
<li>Pete Bevin (pete@bestiary.demon.co.uk) </li>
<li>Tony Brannigan (tbrann@ox.ac.uk) </li>
<li>Jim Browne (jbrowne@jbrowne.com) </li>
<li>Nello Castiglione (anicas@cybernet.it) </li>
<li>Dan Charrois (charro@ee.ualberta.ca) </li>
<li>Wilson Cheung (wcheung@netcom.com) </li>
<li>Maurizio Codogno (mau@beatles.cselt.stet.it) </li>
<li>David DeSimone (fox@netcom.com) </li>
<li>Ian Dickinson (vato@violet.csv.warwick.ac.uk) </li>
<li>Andy Doherty (A.J.Doherty@reading.ac.uk) </li>
<li>Ian Heath (ih@ecs.soton.ac.uk) </li>
<li>Jan Nicolai Langfeldt (janl@ifi.uio.no) </li>
<li>Garrick V. Lau (glua@husc.harvard.edu) </li>
<li>Larkin Lowrey (llowrey@ucsd.edu) </li>
<li>Ove Ruben R Olsen (buboo@uib.no) </li>
<li>Jerome Pier (jp@edu.unl.unlinfo) </li>
<li>Lutz Prechelt (prechelt@ira.uka.de) </li>
<li>Phil Richards (pgr@sst.icl.co.uk) </li>
<li>Lindsey Smith (lsmith@symantec.com) </li>
<li>Wen-King Su (wen-king@cs.caltech.edu) </li>
<li>Roy Svendsen (r.e.svendsen@jus.uio.no) </li>
<li>Joseph Traub (jtraub@dragoncat.net) </li>
</ul>
<p> </p>
<hr size="3">
<h3><a name="5">Section 5: Site Information</a></h3>
<h4><a name="5.1">Q.5.1 What FSPable sites exist ?</a></h4>
<p> </p>
<p>The following is a small list of the some sites which are
available through the FSP protocol. This list should be
reasonably up to date but comes with no warranty. It is in the
unofficial "taxus" format. ftp.germany.eu.net is the
official home for FSP, the FSP software distributions and other
related packages can be found there. </p>
<pre>
genie.lut.ac.uk 21 genie / # small UK site
ftp.germany.eu.net 2001 germany / # big German archive (FSP)
fsp.luth.se 6969 luth / # Top of Europe
src.doc.ic.ac.uk 21 src / # SUNsite Northern Europe
terra.stack.urc.tue.nl 21 terra / # big Netherlands site
ftp.wustl.edu 21 wu / # lots of mirrors ...
</pre>
<p>For more site information sources see <a href="#2.3">Q.2.3</a>
</p>
<hr size="3">
<h3><a name="6">Section 6: FAQ Translations</a></h3>
<p>At least one non-english language translation of the FAQ is
now available, so this section details it, and any others that
may come along over time. </p>
<p>Bear in mind that changes to the main FAQ may take a while to
filter down through translations. Keep an eye on the date at the
top of this copy and see if it matches up to the FAQ source at <a
href="http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/misc/fsp/faq/faq.htm">http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/misc/fsp/faq/faq.htm</a>.
</p>
<h4><a name="6.1">6.1. Italian</a></h4>
<p>Nello Castiglione (anicas@cybernet.it) has translated the FAQ
into Italian, many thanks to him for the time and effort spent.
This translation is available from: </p>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://www.cybernet.it/fsp/faq.html">http://www.cybernet.it/fsp/faq.html</a>
</li>
</ul>
<hr size="3">
<font size="2"><a name="DISCLAIMER">
<p>Comments</a> and suggestions should be sent to <a
href="mailto:A.J.Doherty@rdg.ac.uk">A.J.Doherty@rdg.ac.uk</a>.
The information in this FAQ is in no way associated with the <a
href="http://www.rdg.ac.uk/">University of Reading</a> or its <a
href="http://itu.rdg.ac.uk/">Information Technology Unit</a>.
This FAQ represents the efforts of many people to help
consolidate information about FSP. There is no guarantee that the
information in this FAQ is correct, nor can anyone contributing
to this FAQ be held responsible for the information they provide.
</p>
<p>Addresses in () after the answer are the email addresses of
people who have contributed. Please let me know if you don't wish
to be identified when you contribute. </font> </p>
<hr size="3">
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