Need A File Transfer Program... IF it exists!

[Netopia]

Let me begin by appologizing for posting this on several forums and also for being long winded... different people frequent different areas so I thought I could better tap into the AnandTech Collective Hive Mind better that way! 🙂

Now... my dillema. I work for a printing and publishing company and we have three main areas that constantly get files from customers: Electronic PrePress (Graphics), DataProcessing (Databases, Subscriber lists, etc) and "Instant" Printing (high end copiers that can do 180 or so pages per minute, make stapled books, bound books...etc.. these are usually PDF's or PostScript Files). Unfortunatly, getting customers to QUIT EMAILING files is next to impossible, but I continue to try... the problem is that I can find the single product to meet my needs.

In a perfect world, what I would have would be something akin to an FTP server. I would create an account with User Name and Password and provide a folder for them (3 actually, one per department) while restricting them from other's folders. That much almost ANY good FTP server can do... many for FREE!

Here's where it gets harder... I want a MANDATORY form to be filled out before they can transfer the file. It would include who is sending it, what it is, and other job info... this is to keep us from getting files and not having a clue what they go to. The next thing I want to happen is that they have to choose which department they want to send the file to and then they can transfer the file. When the transfer is complete, I want the package to send an email to one or more people with the information from the form, the time and date and name of the file.

There is a MAC product which can do most of this, but it only copies to one folder per acct and only mails the Administrator, who isn't the one who needs the file and has other work to do (i.e.... I don't have time to forward a hundred emails a day!) The MAC program also requires you to give the client a client-side program to load, since it isn't a pure FTP server.

Any ideas? I've called IPSwitch (WS_FTP) and others and they say "WOW... great idea... nope, ours doesn't do that...SORRY". I could maybe kludge something together if I had a way to generate emails whenever a new file appeared in a folder, but I've not found software for that either. 🙁

Thanks to all of you who have even read to this point, I realize that it's a long explanation. I appreciate any input you guys give me and I WILL dilligently look through anything you tell me as well as letting people know if/when I find anything. Thanks again,

Joe

 

[Breaker78]

I don't know if it'll do what you want or not, but I know one of the guys i work with in out IS department uses FTP Voyager because of it many features more than WS-FTP or Cute-FTP. Look it up, hope it helps.

 

[feb]

Try also Bullet-proof FTP

 

[Wizkid]

Sounds like you need do some work with a web scripting language like PHP... it would actually be quite easy to do. If you want to try this, let me know I will help you if you want...

 

[Netopia]

Thanks for the suggestions guys, but Bullet-proof FTP, FTP Voyager, WS-FTP Pro, Cute-FTP are all FTP clients... I'm looking for the server end of things. Appreciate it though.

Wizkid, most are saying what you are saying. I'm thankful for the offer of assistance. Once I come to a conclusion I'll let y'all know what came of it.

Joe

 

[Suki]

Procomm Plus can do mostly what you looking for but it's not free. Can send an email, check if there's a new file (checking the date stamp), ftp server but you still need to write a script to do some the work.

 

[BoberFett]

You can upload through HTTP. With some simple HTML and CGI, you could verify that they had filled out the form before allowing them to send the file. You just need to use an <input type=&quot;file&quot;> on the page. I don't know that this is a true HTML standard yet, I think it's still just a proposal, but I'd imagine that Netscape and IE both support it. You'd have to test to be sure.

 

[Netopia]

I think I may have found the software to do what I want. I've already talked to a sales person and I'll be talking to them more next week. It also runs on both MAC and NT and they will give us a very cheap site licence.

The name is BeHive.

The responses are great and greatly appreciated.

Joe

 

[ucdnam]

You should consider what BoberFett stated.. Which is to write some script to take care of it. I do ASP programming and I've made forms which do what you're talking bout.

Use javascript to confirm that the data is entered correctly, have it email whoever you want, etc. Best yet, this will save you the money for some software and you'll learn to program along the way.