SolarWinds Serv-U FTP Server

peter.kruty over 10 years ago 4 minute read time

I'm very happy to share with you that we have officially reached Release Candidate (RC) status for Serv-U FTP Server and MFT Server v15. The contents of this release contain exciting new features and improvements, namely,

File sharing in Serv-U MFT Server
New web client user interface
Rebranding of the user interface
FTP Voyager no longer requires an activation key

You can download the RC in the Release Candidate section of your Customer Portal. If you have any questions I encourage you to leverage the RC group on thwack. RC is the last step before general availability and is a chance for existing customers to get the newest functionality before it is available to everyone else.

File Sharing

All of us need to occasionally share a file with a partner, colleague or a customer (we call them Guests in File Sharing, or someone who does not have an account in Serv-U). File Sharing is a great new feature of Serv-U MFT Server which helps you to share small or large files without email limitations, temporary accounts or any administrative hassles. It allows you to have your own on premise file sharing service. File Sharing is meant as a temporary storage for simple web-based file sharing. Guests will simply receive an email with the link allowing them to download or upload files. If you wish you can also send links via IM, social networks or by other means.

First you need to enable File Sharing in the Serv-U Management Console. You can configure settings on the global level in the Server Limits and Settings section or per domain in Domain Limits and Settings.

On the screenshot below you can see the simple configuration settings for File Sharing. You can define a URL for the File Sharing, you set a folder where all shares will be stored and you can also define how long expired shares should last before Serv-U deletes them permanently. If you wish you can also define a template for emails received by Guest users, enable or disable usage of SSL and most importantly enable/disable the entire File Sharing feature.

After you enable File Sharing you can find the link to the File Sharing UI in the bottom of the management console next to the FTP Voyager JV and Web Client links.

As a regular user you can choose the File Sharing UI during login or click on the upper menu in the new Web Client UI.

In the home page of File Sharing you can see the last 5 shares for requested files and sent files with some basic information about each share like date share was created, name of the share, email address(es) of Guest(s), status of share, expiration date and so on.

If you wish to start with sharing files simply click on "Request Files" or "Send files" in the menu to create a share. Let's first send some files to a Guest. After clicking on Send Files, you are presented with a form with basic settings for the share. You need to define one or more email addresses. You can change the default Subject line of the email which will be sent by Serv-U.

Then you can briefly describe what data you are sending and change your email address if it's different from the default. Since a share is only a temporary storage, you have to define the expiration time which is up to 90 days. This is to prevent filling up your storage with shares.

You can also ask Serv-U to send you notification when the file is downloaded by a Guest so you know immediately and can follow-up. Additionally you can also protect shares with passwords. When you are done click "Next".

In the next step you simply choose files to upload, click Upload button and you are done. The share is created, notification email is sent to the Guest user(s) and you can close the confirmation screen by clicking on the Done button.

You can request files for upload in the same way by clicking on Request Files in the menu. After that a similar form is displayed as for sending files. You configure your share (when requesting files you can also limit individual size of files uploaded) and this time click on Send Request and your are done.

After you create a share, an email is sent and the Guest user can click on the link in the received email. If the share is password protected, then the Guest is asked for a password and after entering it, it's as simple as clicking on the Download All button or choosing files to upload.

New Web Client UI

With the new File Sharing feature, which as you noticed is using a new, cleaner UI, we also redesigned the Web Client UI. It is now cleaner, faster and behaves more like Windows Explorer.

FTP Voyager is now FREE!

FTP Voyager is a powerful FTP client with many great features like scheduler. We decided to make it a free product! We removed all references to purchase or any licensing constraints. Go, download FTP Voyager now from the customer portal and enjoy its rich functionality!

Download Serv-U v15 RC, which is availble in the Release Candidate section of your Customer Portal.

If you have any questions I encourage you to leverage the RC group on thwack.