SolarWinds Serv-U FTP

The Release Candidate for Serv-U 15.1.0 is now ready! The new Serv-U version is packed with great new features and many improvements. RC is the last step before general availability, and it is a chance for existing customers to get the newest functionality before it is available to everyone else. You can download it from the LATEST DOWNLOADS FOR YOUR PRODUCTS section of the customer portal. Change filter to "Release Candidate" and click on download button next to Serv-U RC version.

The following are some of the highlights of the new version.

Redesigned Management Console

The new UI is probably the first thing you will notice in this release – and it's a huge change. We started with the redesign of the Web Client and the File Sharing UI in the previous version, and now we've updated the Management Console too. The new look is not only modern and simpler, but also faster. When you sign in as an administrator, you may also notice the new dashboard with heaps of useful statistics, notifications about new updates, and a What's New area featuring a few highlights of the latest release of Serv-U.

Automated File Management

Often you may want to move or delete files after a certain period of time to back up your data or to purge unnecessary files from your storage. In the Directories section of the global server settings or domain settings, you will find a new tab: File Management. As the following screenshot illustrates, you can simply define the file path, the action and the number of days after which you want to execute the given action.

Support for Multiple SSH/SFTP keys per user

Up until now you could only use a single key per user. Now you can use multiple keys per account if you want to rotate them or if you want to provide shared access to an account. You can find a new button, Manage Keys, in the user properties page.

After clicking Manage Keys..., you will see the UI to add, edit, delete or generate new keys.

Ability to Share Files That are Already on the Server

With the first version of file sharing you could only share files from your computer. However, users typically already have a Serv-U account, and also some files in their home folder. Now it is possible to share these files, and even combine them with files from your computer. You can simply create a new share, and when you're uploading files, you can browse to local files on your desktop (Files on my Computer option) or remote files in your Serv-U home folder (Files on Serv-U option). This will create a combined file share.

If you choose a file stored on Serv-U, the file will not be copied – the share will reference the file instead of duplicating it. This means that if you move or delete the file, it won't be available in the file share anymore. If you update the file via the Web Client or via FTP, the very same version will be available in the file share, and you won't need to update the share manually.

Domain Setup Wizard for File Sharing

The new wizard will make it much easier to configure a file sharing domain or a file transfer domain. It is intended to speed up the initial configuration and help to correctly set up a domain, especially if you are new to Serv-U. Click the '+' button below the Serv-U logo to start the new domain wizard.

After specifying the domain name and description, you can choose the type of domain you want to configure. You can always refine your decisions later, and further modify the configuration of the new domain.

File Sharing Administration Options

The new version of Serv-U provides you with the flexibility to define who can use file sharing and how. So far file sharing could be enabled for everyone or for no one, however, now you can configure its availability per domain, per group, and even per user with many detailed options available at all levels:

• Require a password for guest access
• Insert a password  within invitation emails
• Specify the maximum file size guests can upload (per file)
• Specify the time period before the guest link expires
• Duration before guest link expires
• Notify a user after a file is downloaded
• Notify a user after a file is uploaded
• Send the guest access link to the recipients
• Send the guest access link to the sender
• Allow user-defined contact information
• Specify the maximum number of files for "Sent" shares
• Specify the maximum number of files for "Requested" shares

The following screenshot provides an example setting for a password policy for shares.

Ability to Make Anonymous Shares

An anonymous share is simply a share where no recipients are defined and no emails are sent. You can share the link to the file share on forums, social networks, or instant messaging clients, or you can click Generate an email on the last screen of the file share wizard, and use your default email client to benefit from your address book and other features you are used to.

Ability to Search in File Shares

If you use file sharing extensively, you probably have dozens, maybe even hundreds of shares. They will eventually expire, but if you want to find a share you created week ago, now you can do it using the free text search. Simply type the name of the file, the email address or a key word from the email message. You can also limit the search to "Send Files" shares, "Requested Files" shares, or both.

Custom Branding for Guest UI of File Sharing

The new version makes it possible to use custom branding not only for the login page or the Web Client, but also for the file sharing guest UI. If you want to try it, you can find branding samples in C:\Program Files\Rhinosoft\Serv-U\Customer HTML Samples, and use them to change the style in Limits & Settings > Custom HTML. The following screenshot shows one of the available branding samples.

Other Improvements

This version also features several other improvements such as enhanced Active Directory and LDAP support for authentication, improved Web Client performance, especially when using it over Serv-U Gateway, links to file shares in the notification emails, and many bug fixes.

RC builds are made available to existing customers prior to the formal release. These are used to get customer feedback in production environments, and are fully supported.

You can download the RC from the LATEST DOWNLOADS FOR YOUR PRODUCTS section of the customer portal. Change filter to "Release Candidate" and click on download button next to Serv-U RC version.