CrushFTP Server
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article or section needs to be wikified to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please help improve this article with relevant internal links. (November 2007) |
 |
This article does not cite any references or sources. (February 2008) Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. |
| CrushFTP Server | |
|---|---|
| Image:CrushFTP-screenshot.png CrushFTP Server 4 |
|
| Developed by | Ben Spink |
| Latest release | 4.7 / April 1, 2008 |
| OS | Mac OS X Linux Unix Windows |
| Genre | FTP server HTTP server SFTP Server |
| License | Proprietary software |
| Website | CrushFTP Server |
CrushFTP is a FTP server that supports the following protocols: FTP, FTPS, SFTP, HTTP, HTTPS, WebDAV and WebDAV SSL. Additionally, although not a protocol, it has a web interface for end users to manage their files from a web browser. CrushFTP uses a GUI for administration, but also installs as a daemon on Mac OS X, Linux, Unix, and as a service in Windows. It supports multihoming, hot configuration changes, and has a GUI based user and group manager. The plugin architecture in CrushFTP allows for plugins to read users from SQL, LDAP, Active Directory, folders, and NetInfo. All settings are stored in XML files that can be edited directly, or with the CrushFTP GUI. If edited directly, CrushFTP will notice the modification date change and load the settings immediately without needing a server restart.
CrushFTP is shareware with a tiered pricing model. It is targeted at home users, on up to enterprise users.
Contents |
[edit] Features
- Event based actions to trigger emails.
- WebInterface allowing on the fly zipped uploads and downloads
- Drill down into folders on the WebInterface, delete, or rename all without page refreshes.
- Custom usage reports that can be run on demand, or scheduled.
- Live realtime GUI for monitoring active users, and their activity.
- Web server supports Server Side Includes, and virtual domains.
- Support for Adobe's PDF form posting/uploading.
- SQL integration to load users from SQL tables.
- LDAP integration to authenticate against LDAP.
- Ability to launch custom shell scripts passing in the last file uploaded.
- Detailed logging and log rolling.
- Download and Upload queueing.
- Custom web upload forms for collecting additional information with file uploads.
- Bandwidth limiters.
- Internal statistic gathering.
- User and group inheritance on a per setting level.
- Max login time, idle time.
- Max upload, download, and minimum download speed.
- Quotas and ratios.
- Max download amount per session, day, or month.
- Auto account expirations.
- Restricted IP ranges for connections.
- Custom events including running a plugin or sending an email.
- Can be customized or localized into various languages. (GUI and WebInterface)
- Supports various encodings including UTF-8.
- Can do Virtual File System (VFS) linking to merge several file systems together in one.
- Supports FTP's MODE Z for compressed transfers.
[edit] Plugins
- AutoUnzip allows automatic zip file expansion when a zip is uploaded to the server.
- CrushImagePreview is a shareware plugin that allows for automatic image thumb-nailing and live hover over previews for the WebInterface.
- CrushLDAP authenticates against an LDAP server including support for Active Directory notations.
- CrushNoIP keeps a www.no-ip.com account in synch without a need for a separate stand alone client.
- CrushSQL authenticates against a SQL table.
- HomeDirectory generates home folders for users when they login. Saves a step during account creation.
- LaunchProcess allows for custom scripts or applications to be launched passing in as arguments the last file uploaded.
- MagicDirectory allows creating users by just making a folder. Non administrator type personnel can create users easily.
- OSXNetInfo authenticates against Mac OS X 10.3 and 10.4 NetInfo databases.
- WebStatistics gives an AJAX powered web page displaying live stats from the server.
(Other plugins are available but their purpose may be specific to certain scenarios: PreferencesController, DuplicateBlocker, ContentBlocker, FilterCommand, DotBIN, DebugOptions.)
[edit] History of CrushFTP
CrushFTP was first published publicly around 1999. Initial versions were FTP only. Their were no connection restrictions in version 1.x. CrushFTP 2.x brought about virtual directories in a sense, while CrushFTP 3.x brought about a full virtual file system. It supported the ability to merge and mangle several file systems together regardless if they were from local folders, or another FTP site. It in a sense could even act as a proxy for other FTP servers. However the complications from all the potential issues that could go on from this was confusing. CrushFTP 3 also brought about tiered pricing and restricted the unregistered shareware version to just 5 users at a time.
CrushFTP 4 focused primarily on a cleaner interface and less confusing virtual file system. While it still seems to have some support for merging FTP sites with a local file system, the support seems limited. CrushFTP 4 has CrushFTP3's features, and a lot more. If you are familiar with CrushFTP3, CrushFTP4 won't be a steep learning curve. Recent updates include a full HTTP server as well as the other supported protocols. It continues with the tiered pricing model, with the unregistered shareware only allowing for 5 simultaneous users at a time. Recent updates however started recognizing web browsers as being different than FTP connections where four web browsers connections only count as one user against the limit of 5 (or whatever your license is.)
[edit] Development
Development has been performed by the sole developer Ben Spink. Updates have been frequent with version 4, almost weekly at times. The feature set of version 4 continues to expand as the initial release was missing much of the functionality the current releases have.
[edit] Authentication Options
- Built-in user database consisting of XML files describing the user and Virtual File System access.
- Active Directory
- LDAP
- SQL Tables
- HTTP Basic Authentication
- HTTP Form Based Authentication
[edit] Security
Encryption is supported for storing passwords in a non-reversible hash. SFTP uses SSH for encryption, and FTPS uses SSL/TLS for encryption. There have been no known, or published security vulnerabilities in CrushFTP 4. There have been no known, or published security vulnerabilities in CrushFTP 3. One published vulnerability was in CrushFTP 2.1.4 which had a patch released within a day.
