ftp and .netrc

Canis Polaris · 11-25-2008, 03:54 PM

I thought I understood the man page, but obviously I missed something. (Gosh, how could anyone NOT understand those man pages?)

The man page for ftp mentions a .netrc file. Sounds simple enough. So I created a .netrc in my home directory. It looks something like this, with the specifics changed for obvious reasons.

machine nn.nn.nn.nn
login theuserthatneedstologin
password theuserspassword

I then try to execute the ftp command with the line:

ftp nn.nn.nn.nn

and this is what I get.

[oracle@cos-ora11g ~]$ ftp nn.nn.nn.nn
Connected to nn.nn.nn.nn.
220 Microsoft FTP Service
500 'AUTH GSSAPI': command not understood
500 'AUTH KERBEROS_V4': command not understood
KERBEROS_V4 rejected as an authentication type
Error - .netrc file not correct mode.
Remove password or correct mode.
ftp>

I cannot find anything about correcting mode, and I want to connect without having to enter the password interactively.

What's up with this?

Thanks,
Gregory

P.S. OS = RH EL AS5

pdtpatrick · 11-25-2008, 04:06 PM

Is the FTP server on Linux or Windows?

You might want to build a secured server like vsftpd which is pretty straight forward especially on RHEL. Then you set your permissions and user ACL.

I dont think i answered your question but im also not really sure what you are asking.

Canis Polaris · 11-25-2008, 04:15 PM

Ya know, I think I'll never figure out these forum search tools. I searched for "ftp AND .netrc" and got everything including threads that happened to mention ftp somewhere but never said anything about .netrc. So I decided it was necessary to to post the question myself. And then it comes back and tells me about this post http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi....netrc-506377/ and what-a-ya-know, there's the answer. Why didn't the man page say anything about the owner having exclusive rights to read the .netrc file?

Solution:
As the owner of the file, in the owner's home directory, execute "chmod 600 .netrc"

Thank God for forums 'cause those man pages are about worthless.

Gregory

P.S. OK, now I understand the connection between

Quote:

Error - .netrc file not correct mode.

and

Quote:

chmod 600 .netrc

.
It's 'cause I'm a Newbie dontchya know.

colucix · 11-25-2008, 04:34 PM

An excerpt from ftp manual page:

Code:

password string
      Supply a password.  If this token is present, the auto-login process will supply the speci‐
      fied string if the remote server requires a password as part of the login process.  Note
      that if this token is present in the .netrc file for any user other than anonymous, ftp
      will abort the auto-login process if the .netrc is readable by anyone besides the user.

Some manual pages are extensive and it is difficult to catch all the subtleties!