IFrame to FTP folder

Instead of going through the trouble of using an ASP upload component to let my client upload files to their site I added an IFRAME into one of the secure admin pages.

It works great, you can drag and drop files right into the site, delete them, rename them, etc.

The only problem is that while it works fine for me, it doesn't work for at least of the people in the client's company.

Anyone got any idea why? Firewalls, browser compatibility, something else? Thought someone else might have run into this too.

Code: Select all

<iframe src="ftp://username:password@ftp.thesite.com/images/photos" width="600" height="400" style="border:1px solid #cccccc;"></iframe>

Maybe some browsers won't take that? Are they all using the same browser?
If port 21 is blocked on firewalls, then it could be that... but that's fairly unlikely...

Also, are you sure that you do:
ftp://usernameassword@ftp.thesite.com/images/photos
and not
usernameassword@ftp.thesite.com/images/photos
? I'm not sure...? Could be wrong on that one!

Yeah, I did it like this as a last resort on a *nix server a couple of years ago and had no problems.

I am pretty sure that it did not work in Netscape, but was fine in IE. There is a chance that the firewall is not allowing port 21, or that the proxy (not to sure on this) is not configured properly or dont allow FTP.

Instead of using a browser, get them to use a dedicated FTP client, if that fails, it is a network config problem, if it connects, it is a browser problem. Possibly they are using an old version of IE. It's worth checking out.

HTH

Mat.

can you be more specific than "it doesnt work"?

Thanks

Removing the ftp:// just made it stop working (uh oh, there goes the shrine:wink

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="geneva, verdana, arial" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">can you be more specific than "it doesnt work"?<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

exactly what I said.

I'm waiting to hear back from them on what the exact problem is and what software they're using. The one guy I talked to was able to open the ftp location by typing it into IE and then drop files into it so I'm thinking it's not network related but we'll have to see.

a lot of people are using non-IE browsers so it may be helpful to just add a line of text asking them to open their FTP client or Internet Explorer to view the files? can't comment on the iframes part, I don't know what it is even about though im about to find out more :wink:

sounds like your iFrames are messing it up.. if thats the case thats going to bite.. umm.. did you by any chance use a table on the last one and load the two scripts into <div> tags??? thats the only thing I can think of.

Well, I haven't heard anything back from the client. They're "supposed" to all be using IE6, hence my choice to ignore compatibility problems but I'm guessing maybe some freak(:wink was using NS or something.

And since you ask Court Jester I think the IFRAME is in a table cell, but no DIVs used. Difficult for me to try to fix in general though as it works fine for me anyway. Thanks for the suggestions though, you never know they might call up saying it doesn't work again...

<font face="Tahoma"><font size="2"><font color="blue">
Hmmmmm....interesting mr BOND!

Rite, iframes do not work in NS 4x or below (and if anyones using anything lower - i mean - come on people, its the 21st Century!)

Right, what I do with iframes is have your general iframe tag:

<iframe name="content" src="MyPage.asp" topmargin="0" leftmargin="0" frameborder="0"></iframe>

In the NoIframes.htm file just have a customised error message saying - your browser doesn't support iframes - to use this system (or whatever) please update your browser - then supply a couple of links - IE and NS

Or have the contact details for the web admin - something like that.

But you know its going to be one user who has about as much web knowledge as a lump of blue tag.
</font id="blue"></font id="size2"></font id="Tahoma">

Catalyst said:
>It works great, you can drag and drop files right into the site, delete them, rename them, etc.

Sure, IE 6 on Win XP, "drag'n drop" as copy/upload works fine for us, too.
But not in IE6 on Win2000Pro.
I've only tested on our Windows-LAN, I'll try remotely through a proxy later.
Have tried to change some IE Options...Advanced-tab: no luck.
Have searched google...nothing better than this thread!

So, I believe its a client issue: Win OS and some obscure config-setting...
Any other progress on the subject by any of you out there?

By the way: File-reads works great, also in Netscape 7.1 and in Opera 7.2. Opera pops a login-box, even if the ftp-usrwd@host is included. I've even tried using url-encoding "%5c" for a "\" within the usr-name, which one may include as a workgroup/domain-specifier.

Catalyst.... did you get this working?

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No, I eventually found out that Win2000 doesn't support the feature that this uses - FTP support from IE.

hi all,
i am trying to accomplish the same thing: ftp in an iframe, does anyone have a solution to:
clicking on a folder in an iframe on the 1st page. the page that is loaded that displays the contents of the folder is displayed in the whole browser ie there is no iframe in a web page any longer. also on pressing the back button the contents of the iframe are not reloaded, a pg cannot be displayed is shown instead.
10x

Internet Explorer no longer supports url's which contain a username and password, I guess you are connecting to FTP like this:

ftp://usernameassword@ftpserver.com

That cant be done anymore, not without changing a setting in the registry anyway, which i guess you dont want to do.

If this isnt the problem your having, post some code and we'll try and modify it for you.

Actually, the usernameassword format still works I think there's just some special restrictions on it that shouldn't affect legitimate use of it.

It sounds like the iframe is working ok for you, it's just that browsing into subfolders is breaking out of the iframe for some reason.
What kind of server are you accessing, unix/win/etc?

i am using ftp://server/folder/ and i am allowing the user to use the windows login dialog.
site resides on a win 2000 server with an IIS virtual directory. i have disabled anonymous access from the ftp site.
Catalyst from what you are saying it seems that it should be normal that an iframe is retained even in the second page?
also if i use the back button on the 2000 server itself with ie 5 it reloads the ftp in the iframe alright, however if i do the same on another pc with 2000 pro and ie 6 it does not reload. i tried a bit of javascript to reload the page but to no avail.
10x.

It you look through the earlier posts in this thread you'll see that ftp in ie on win 2000 pro doesn't work correctly (on the client side).

Really the best solution, though it isn't as fast and simple to setup, is to use server side code to build a file and directory browser/manager. There's some out there already in ASP that could run on IIS, you'd just need to download one and set it up.

For example, there's a list of some at http://www.aspin.com/home/webapps/fileoper/harddriv

my problem was that i was not using ftp://loginassword@hostname but rather was using the windows logon to log in the ftp site. i opened the page with loginass hardcoded and all worked fine everywhere. so it is neither an ie problem and nor a windows problem. i must incorporate the frame in .net now to have it update dynamically.
10x a lot everyone.