PDF files on ftp.freepascal.org

[Mark92630]

Are these files usable? When I try to open one, I get an error message (see attachment).

Mark

P.S. I was just able to download a tar file from SourceForge.

[marcov]

Opens fine here. Maybe you transfered it using ASCII mode instead of binary?

The user.pdf file should be 774.725 bytes.

[Mark92630]

I was able to get everything from SourceForge. Of course that is http, not ftp.

What I need to know is what ftp client software works on macOS for these files. When I use Finder, I don't see an option to specify ASCII or binary transfer.

TIA,

Mark

[marcov]

I don't know OS X very well, but probably ftp in a terminal? 

[rvk]

What I need to know is what ftp client software works on macOS for these files.

FileZilla?
https://filezilla-project.org/download.php?platform=osx

Works fine for me with transfer type set to auto (which is default) on Windows.
(should be the same on Mac)

[MarkMLl]

Trying to get the PDFs via https://www.freepascal.org/docs.html quite simply doesn't work using Firefox with no error dialog(u)e.

I've been complaining about this for months, and it increases the load on the FPC servers by forcing us to use the online docs.

MarkMLl

[Mark92630]

@rvk: I was able to get FileZilla to work as you describe. Thanks for the link. (Note: The Mac App Store offers only FileZilla Pro, so I wasn't aware of the free alternative until I read your post.)

Mark

[MarkMLl]

I think the issue is probably related to the major browsers dropping FTP support.

https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/21/firefox_ends_ftp_support/

The FTP protocol itself has been disabled by default since version 88 and now the time has come to end an era and discontinue the support for this outdated and insecure protocol — Firefox 90 will no longer support the FTP protocol.

If you are a Firefox user, you don’t have to do anything to benefit from this security advancement. As soon as your Firefox auto-updates to version 90, any attempt to launch an attack relying on the insecure FTP protocol will be rendered useless, because Firefox does not support FTP anymore.

https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2021/07/20/stopping-ftp-support-in-firefox-90/

MarkMLl

[Mark92630]

@MarkMLl - Then the question is, should this site convert to SFTP?

[rvk]

@MarkMLl - Then the question is, should this site convert to SFTP?

I don't think Chrome can/will do SFTP either.

The point is that on https://www.freepascal.org/docs.html the links are to a ftp site.
When clicking it, Chrome does give a prompt to open it in another program, but it's better to just host those files on the https variant.
(or removing those ftp-links as actual link because they don't work anymore)

[MarkMLl]

@MarkMLl - Then the question is, should this site convert to SFTP?

I don't think Chrome can/will do SFTP either.

The point is that on https://www.freepascal.org/docs.html the links are to a ftp site.
When clicking it, Chrome does give a prompt to open it in another program, but it's better to just host those files on the https variant.
(or removing those ftp-links as actual link because they don't work anymore)

I agree. Frankly I don't think /anything/ other than developers' tools supports SFTP: the documents should be presented via (s)http and preferably marked with a disposition header ** that encourages a browser to ask whether they should be saved rather than blithely opening them.

** I presume that HTTP has something like this available, I know that email does.

Later: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/Content-Disposition

MarkMLl

[dsiders]

@MarkMLl - Then the question is, should this site convert to SFTP?

I don't think Chrome can/will do SFTP either.

The point is that on https://www.freepascal.org/docs.html the links are to a ftp site.
When clicking it, Chrome does give a prompt to open it in another program, but it's better to just host those files on the https variant.
(or removing those ftp-links as actual link because they don't work anymore)

The files are available in an archive file on SourceForge at https://sourceforge.net/projects/freepascal/files/Documentation/3.2.2/.

Doesn't solve the original issue, but...