Internet Explorer 4.x and above can be used to transfer file to a website using FTP (File Transfer Protocol). However only IE 5.5 and above support login prompting (username prompts).

To do so, enter the URL thus:

ftp://user:password@ftpserver/url-path

For example, let us assume a username of smith and a password of password and that we wish to open an FTP connection to ftp.myserver.com . Then the URL we would type into IE's address bar would be thus:-

ftp://smith:password@ftp.myserver.com

Note that I have not specified any path. This is because I might not know or care what the path is and I simply wish to login to the server to orient myself.

On successful login, the icon type changes from the IE blue webpage to the Windows style network-folder icon. Directories can then be browsed as usual, it is advisable however to use the "Up" arrow rather than back because the latter may log you out of the FTP site.

Right-clicking on a file may bring up a Properties box where permissions (Read-Write-Execute) can be set. This does not always work and the remote server may not allow you to set (or even change) permissions of files and directories.