I have a pretty good basic understanding of computers and internet things. I don’t run the back end stuff for my blog, but I do all the cosmetic changes myself. I email daily with attachments. No problem. I manage facebook, twitter, and Google+. I’ve even re-installed an operating system on a computer and then re-installed all my software. I’m not a computer expert, but I’m computer literate. However FTP appears to live in its own little pocket of ignorance in my brain. Howard has taught it to me multiple times. He’s installed a client for me to use. I’ve used the thing a dozen times over the course of several years. I understand the theory of it, yet getting it to actually work must require some incantations of which I’m not aware. Something goes wrong every single time. I spent all day uploading a file to our book printer. Then I noticed that it would reach 100% uploaded and immediately state “connection dropped” and start over at around 80%. Email with the printer confirmed that the file was corrupted. They’ve deleted it. I’ll get to start over tonight at bedtime, when I won’t be tying up the internet for our whole family some of whom need the internet for homework. If I don’t wake up to find that FTP has worked. I’ll just FedEx a a disc instead.
The good news is that this whole thing is only mildly annoying to me. In the past, incidents like this would plunge me into terror that I’d done everything wrong, that all my book layout work was destroyed, that our business was therefore a complete bust and we were doomed forever. I would try to beat back those thoughts with a great big logic stick, but the battle was exhausting. I’m so very glad that I can scowl a little bit, shrug my shoulders, and just plan to mail things tomorrow if necessary. I’m really good at mailing things.
Having acceptable work arounds and second paths always make me feel stable and secure.
Agreed.
FTP is indeed a magical protocol, affected by the phase of the moon, solar flares and the alignment of the galactic core. And by badly written clients.
I’ve found the most usable and stable client is FileZilla. It’s an open source program for Windows, Mac and others and has a nice drag-and-drop interface. Give Howard some work from me if you aren’t already using it.
On the other hand, it could be a fault with the publisher’s FTP server.
Glad to know it is not just me. Yes I’m using FileZilla. I’m fairly certain that this particular trouble was with the publisher’s FTP server. I opted not to try to explain that to them through an intermediary and across a language barrier. Fed Ex hopefully solves the problem.