FTP Configuration Question

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Nelson - 26 Dec 2005 13:44 GMT

I want to make a CD in a drive (actually any CD in that drive)
available via FTP but that is the only thing I want to make available.
I can't figure out a way of doing this using the FTP and Users
preference panels. I can turn on FTP without a problem and set up a
user with Simple Finder privileges but when I insert the CD it doesn't
appear on the user's desktop. If I allow full finder, everything
appears on the desktop which is more than I want.

Can anyone help?

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Nelson

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Rodger Stamm - 26 Dec 2005 16:57 GMT

> I want to make a CD in a drive (actually any CD in that drive)
> available via FTP but that is the only thing I want to make available.
[quoted text clipped - 5 lines]
>
> Can anyone help?

Make a disk image of the CD and place the disk image on that user's
desktop.

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Rodger

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Nelson - 26 Dec 2005 22:16 GMT

>> I want to make a CD in a drive (actually any CD in that drive)
>> available via FTP but that is the only thing I want to make available.
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> Make a disk image of the CD and place the disk image on that user's
> desktop.

Thanks for the suggestion, Roger. I knew that would work, as would
copying all the files on the CD to the hard drive, but I was trying to
avoid using the hard drive at all so that I could just share off the CD
directly.

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Nelson

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Fred McKenzie - 27 Dec 2005 16:24 GMT

> Thanks for the suggestion, Roger. I knew that would work, as would
> copying all the files on the CD to the hard drive, but I was trying to
> avoid using the hard drive at all so that I could just share off the CD
> directly.

Nelson-

This doesn't exactly solve your problem. If you set up a folder on the
hard drive that can be accessed via ftp, you could place an alias of the
CD in that folder. After logging in, the ftp user would have access to
the CD, if an alias will work in that situation.

Fred

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Nelson - 28 Dec 2005 13:06 GMT

>> Thanks for the suggestion, Roger. I knew that would work, as would
>> copying all the files on the CD to the hard drive, but I was trying to
[quoted text clipped - 9 lines]
>
> Fred

Bzzzt! Tried that :-) The alias just acts as a simple file to the ftp
user, ie not as an true alias.

Thanks for the suggestion, however.

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Nelson

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Michael Vilain - 26 Dec 2005 23:54 GMT

> > I want to make a CD in a drive (actually any CD in that drive)
> > available via FTP but that is the only thing I want to make available.
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> Make a disk image of the CD and place the disk image on that user's
> desktop.

I'm not sure I'm completely understanding your goal here. You want to
setup the ftp server and create an account on your mac that only sees
the user's home directory and the CD-ROM volume that's mounted.

Reading the man page on ftpd, there are three types of accounts you can
create--full access, chrooted or restricted access, and anonymous. The
main difference between a restricted and anonymous account is that you
need a password to login to a restricted account, which is usually
associated with a specific user. The anonymous account has no password
and is associated with the "ftp" user. Neither accounts can see the
full filesystem.

You made no mention of a restricted user being allowed to login on the
main console of the system which is different from ftp-ing into the
system. I don't know if you can allow access to /Volumes/<CDTITLE> from
either a restricted or the anonymous account, especially if someone
isn't logged into the main console. I'm not sure the system will mount
a CD if no one's logged in.

So, I think you can create the restricted FTP account but the CD access
is questionable. The man pages have a discussion on setting up ftpd.

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Nelson - 28 Dec 2005 13:46 GMT

>>> I want to make a CD in a drive (actually any CD in that drive)
>>> available via FTP but that is the only thing I want to make available.
[quoted text clipped - 12 lines]
> setup the ftp server and create an account on your mac that only sees
> the user's home directory and the CD-ROM volume that's mounted.

Actually, I don't even want to create a "user"... anonymous FTP would
be fine. I want someone to be able to access a CD in a drive and
nothing else. I can't see any way of doing this with the standard
Apple OS X tools as there appears to be no such thing as an "FTP" user.
You have to create a shell account for them and then their permissions
are determined by the "new user setup dialog" which basically allows
them to see nothing or everything. Maybe I'm missing something.

Without going through the terminal and the Unix FTP commands, there
appears to be nothing you can do except create a shell user and enable
FTP access.

> Reading the man page on ftpd, there are three types of accounts you can
> create--full access, chrooted or restricted access, and anonymous. The
[quoted text clipped - 13 lines]
> So, I think you can create the restricted FTP account but the CD access
> is questionable. The man pages have a discussion on setting up ftpd.

I'll read up on the man page... looks like I'll have to use the
terminal to configure what I want.

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Nelson

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Michael Vilain - 28 Dec 2005 21:41 GMT

> >>> I want to make a CD in a drive (actually any CD in that drive)
> >>> available via FTP but that is the only thing I want to make available.
[quoted text clipped - 45 lines]
> I'll read up on the man page... looks like I'll have to use the
> terminal to configure what I want.

If access to the CD from an ftp-only account is your goal, don't think
it's doable from MacOS X. Sorry.

If you have a PC laying around, try installing Linux or one of the BSDs
on it and setting it up on that instead.

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Fred McKenzie - 30 Dec 2005 16:47 GMT

> If access to the CD from an ftp-only account is your goal, don't think
> it's doable from MacOS X. Sorry.
>
> If you have a PC laying around, try installing Linux or one of the BSDs
> on it and setting it up on that instead.

Michael-

How would you do it using BSD? Why wouldn't that work using the Mac's BSD?

Fred

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Michael Vilain - 30 Dec 2005 20:27 GMT

> > If access to the CD from an ftp-only account is your goal, don't think
> > it's doable from MacOS X. Sorry.
[quoted text clipped - 7 lines]
>
> Fred

No, but you could possibly purchase and setup Yellowdog Linux to do
this. On Solaris (and BSD), CDROMS mounted in the drive are visable as
a device. I'd setup that device file in the anonymous ftp's root
directory. That would allow ftpd to access the files on it.

Unfortunately, this won't work on MacOS X because the mount point
created by a mounted CD is the name of the CDROM volume. You could make
a hard link to that file in the ~ftp but I don't know if it would work.
Accessing the /dev/disk3s0 file didn't work which is why I suggest
another server for this function you're trying to achieve. I don't
think MacOS X will get you all the way there and you need to look at
another system entirely.

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Mac Forum / General / Networking / December 2005

FTP Configuration Question