Isn't gFTP deprecated?

[Britt Selvitelle]

Hey guys,

On Wed, 2004-09-22 at 02:09 +0200, Daniel Borgmann wrote:
> > 2) gFTP presents a very 'relevant' UI for FTP, at least in my opinion.
> > It has things like CHMOD and similar just a menu away.
> 
> Ugh, that's exactly what I'm talking about. :) The user should never
> ever have to deal with terms like "chmod" in a modern GUI. After all
> this is nothing but our good old unix file permissions and gftp doesn't
> even care to explain this fact. It is unfortunate that Nautilus doesn't
> support changing of file permissions on FTP servers yet, but I also
> don't think that this is a required feature for the vast majority of
> users.

Agreed. I think this ideal perfectly follows the Gnome mantra.

> I'm not aware of any obvious user-visible differences between FTP
> locations and local locations, which would require a completely separate
> application, using a whole new metaphor for file managment.

Agreed here as well. There is a very nice trend developing in Gnome
applications right now ... Rhythmbox will soon do audio CD burning.
Nautilus will do data CD burning. Along these lines Nautilus should
handle generic file transfer as well. IMO FTP falls under this category.

The problem is that these features are not immediately discoverable,
because inferior operating systems handle this differently, and people
simply aren't used network specific file transfer in a file manager.

What we really need is some type of interactive application that walks
new users some of the coolest features of the desktop. Things like
double-middle-click in spatial nautilus, CD burning, the concept of
virtual-desktops, etc.

>  I have been
> using Nautilus as my exclusive FTP client since many months now, even
> though it completely sucked before 2.8 and couldn't handle
> authentication in a sane way. If this works for me as a web developer, I
> don't see why this shouldn't work for basic users.
> 
> > However, I do agree with many of your sentiments and I don't really
> > like gFTP because it is very clunky. However with a nice iconset it
> > would intergrate much better, IMO.
> 
> The icons certainly are the least of its problems. ;)

Recently I had to help a friend FTP some files via Windows. I went
through the process of explaining to him over the phone how to open a
terminal and use the (very broken) commandline ftp application. As you
can imagine, it was not fun :)

Now imagine having to explain to a new user how to use gFTP. A bit
better than commandline in windows, but not by much. They are still
presented with a GUI totally unfamiliar to anything else, and are asked
to comprehend alot of technical mumbo jumbo.

Finally, imagine telling them to use Nautilus to ftp. Ahhh. Much better.
Same thing as they do when copying files on their local machine, except
they have to enter the server, username, and password.

I think this is definitely one of those situations where we have to stop
thinking like developers for a sec, and imagine ourselves as Joe Blow
end users. (Remember, nothing prevents those who need something more
advanced from doing a simple sudo apt-get install gftp).

Britt