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FTP4DOS – A dual-panel FTP client for MS-DOS

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Reply 60 of 71, by Projanglez

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FTP4DOS v0.9.5a released

Still enough time for a small maintenance update, before my plane takes off:
https://github.com/Projanglez/FTP4DOS/releases/tag/v0.9.5a

Changes

  • Downloading files with multi-dot / long names (e.g. apack-1.00.zip) no longer fails. The local target is now mapped to a valid DOS 8.3 name (e.g. APACK-1~1.ZIP) instead of failing to create the file. Applies to both the F5 single-file download and batch copy.
  • Ctrl+C now works as a shortcut for "compare panels" (the numpad + action).
  • Date and Time sorting merged into one "Date/Time" criterion.

Once again, thanks for using and testing FTP4DOS!

Reply 61 of 71, by Grzyb

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Projanglez wrote on 2026-06-26, 08:42:
Grzyb wrote on 2026-06-25, 20:25:

Oh, and I've found that "Compare directories" is under Gray+ , which is a serious discrepancy from other NC-alikes.
No shortcut in the original NC, but it's Ctrl-C in Volkov Commander.

Pretty sure it's numpad-+ also in original nc, but let me check that again.

Numpad+ a.k.a. Gray+ is for selecting files according to a mask.
It's been like this for 40 years - it's already there in the NC 1.00 from 1986, and it's there in pretty much every NC-clone.
It's very confusing to suddenly find under such an important key a completely different function...

In 2003, I voted in favour of joining the European Union. However, due to recent developments - especially the restrictions on cash usage - I'm hereby withdrawing my support. DOWN WITH THE EU!

Reply 62 of 71, by Grzyb

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Looks like FTP4DOS can overcome a poor-quality packet driver - Re: Quality of packet drivers: Intel

In 2003, I voted in favour of joining the European Union. However, due to recent developments - especially the restrictions on cash usage - I'm hereby withdrawing my support. DOWN WITH THE EU!

Reply 63 of 71, by ntalaec

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Grzyb wrote on 2026-06-27, 01:34:

Looks like FTP4DOS can overcome a poor-quality packet driver - Re: Quality of packet drivers: Intel

My case is the opposite. Using mFTP I'm able to download at 200 KB/s but with FTP4DOS my speed is 10 KB/s. Same FTP site, same file.
My network chip is an Atheros AR8132. It's possible to get more speed with FTP4DOS?

Reply 64 of 71, by Grzyb

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ntalaec wrote on 2026-06-27, 10:20:

My case is the opposite. Using mFTP I'm able to download at 200 KB/s but with FTP4DOS my speed is 10 KB/s. Same FTP site, same file.
My network chip is an Atheros AR8132. It's possible to get more speed with FTP4DOS?

Well, I would suggest replacing the PD with NDIS+DIS_PKT or ODI+ODIPKT, but for such a modern chip it may be impossible to find *any* good driver for DOS...

In 2003, I voted in favour of joining the European Union. However, due to recent developments - especially the restrictions on cash usage - I'm hereby withdrawing my support. DOWN WITH THE EU!

Reply 65 of 71, by ntalaec

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There is an ODI driver for my chip but it uses a lot of conventional memory, which makes it unusable.

Reply 66 of 71, by Grzyb

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ntalaec wrote on 2026-06-27, 10:20:

My case is the opposite. Using mFTP I'm able to download at 200 KB/s but with FTP4DOS my speed is 10 KB/s. Same FTP site, same file.
My network chip is an Atheros AR8132. It's possible to get more speed with FTP4DOS?

I can't help about FTP4DOS, but it may be possible to improve the speed in mTCP FTP client...
See the conclusions at the end of this thread - Quality of packet drivers: Intel

In 2003, I voted in favour of joining the European Union. However, due to recent developments - especially the restrictions on cash usage - I'm hereby withdrawing my support. DOWN WITH THE EU!

Reply 67 of 71, by fly_indiz

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It would be great if you could implement Unicode support for file names in FTP, converting them to the current DOS code page for correct display in panels and saving files to your computer non-latin filenames.
It would also be great if you could convert the current code page to Unicode when uploading files from your computer to FTP.
A similar open-source FTP2P program already has this functionality.

Reply 68 of 71, by mbbrutman

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Grzyb wrote on Yesterday, 19:45:
ntalaec wrote on 2026-06-27, 10:20:

My case is the opposite. Using mFTP I'm able to download at 200 KB/s but with FTP4DOS my speed is 10 KB/s. Same FTP site, same file.
My network chip is an Atheros AR8132. It's possible to get more speed with FTP4DOS?

I can't help about FTP4DOS, but it may be possible to improve the speed in mTCP FTP client...
See the conclusions at the end of this thread - Quality of packet drivers: Intel

For those of you who want the quick answer, the buffer sizes chosen for the TCP receive buffer and the file write buffer can have a much larger impact on faster machines. If you have a faster machine (Pentium or better) you might want to run some experiments to see if you can get faster performance by changing two values in the mTCP configuration file.

Reply 69 of 71, by mbbrutman

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@Projanglez

Instead of copying all of mTCP into your project, I've uploaded mTCP to github: https://github.com/mbbrutman/mTCP.git

It's probably better to reference that as a dependency or fork it and add your files to the fork. That way you can see when mTCP changes and update accordingly.

Reply 70 of 71, by ntalaec

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mbbrutman wrote on Yesterday, 20:50:

For those of you who want the quick answer, the buffer sizes chosen for the TCP receive buffer and the file write buffer can have a much larger impact on faster machines. If you have a faster machine (Pentium or better) you might want to run some experiments to see if you can get faster performance by changing two values in the mTCP configuration file.

I'm using the same configuration file for FTP4DOS, FTP utility from MTCP and Links web browser:
MTCP.CFG

DHCPVER DHCP Client version Jan 10 2025
TIMESTAMP ( 1760930237 ) Sun Oct 19 23:17:17 2025

# This is a sample mTCP configuration file. These lines are comments.
# Uncomment options that you want to turn use.
#
# Please read the PDF documentation for the full details on how to
# use this file.


# Settings for my machine
#
# Be sure to load your packet driver first. My packet driver lives
# at software interupt 0x60.
#
packetint 0x60


# Standard MTU is 576 and should be safe for any Ethernet.
# MTU for SLIP and PPP might be even smaller. 1500 is the max
# and works well for LANs and broadband access. Uncomment this
# if you can and get better performance.
#
mtu 1500


# Be sure to pick a good hostname!
hostname MyDOSMachine


# IRCjr options. The first three are required and the rest are optional.
#
ircjr_nick Zoidberg
ircjr_user JZoidberg
ircjr_name John F Zoidberg

#ircjr_pass secretGoesHere
#ircjr_connect_timeout 45
#ircjr_register_timeout 60
#ircjr_backscroll 300
#ircjr_backscroll_chat 75
#ircjr_backscroll_server 100
#ircjr_color_scheme cga_mono
#ircjr_timestamps on
#ircjr_logging_default on
#ircjr_log_dir e:\data\irclogs\
#ircjr_nick_updates server
#ircjr_quit_updates server


# FTP options to play with
#
ftp_connect_timeout 10
#
#Set these for even better performance
#
ftp_tcp_buffer 16384
ftp_file_buffer 32768
#
#
Show last 51 lines
#Set this if you are doing mget and mput with lots of files
#
#ftp_mlist_buffer 8192


# Telnet options
#
#telnet_virtbuffer_pages 8
#telnet_connect_timeout 20
#telnet_autowrap 1
#telnet_sendbsasdel 1
#telnet_termtype pcansi
#telnet_send_newline auto


# FTP Server parms
#
# Required parameters
#
#ftpsrv_password_file c:\ftppass.txt
#
#
# Optional parameters
#
#ftpsrv_log_file c:\ftpsrv.log
#ftpsrv_motd_file c:\ftpmotd.txt
#ftpsrv_session_timeout 120
#ftpsrv_ext_ipaddr some.ip.addr.here
#ftpsrv_control_port 21
#ftpsrv_pasv_base 2048
#ftpsrv_pasv_ports 1024
#ftpsrv_clients 10
#ftpsrv_filebuffer_size 16
#ftpsrv_tcpbuffer_size 16
#ftpsrv_packets_per_poll 2
#ftpsrv_exclude_drives AB



# DHCP generated settings will appear here. If you are using DHCP
# then these will be updated automatically by the DHCP client (dhcp.exe).
# You can use the same lines to do a STATIC network setup; just alter
# them and don't run the DHCP client
#
#LEASE_TIME 3600
IPADDR 192.168.1.102
NETMASK 255.255.255.0
GATEWAY 192.168.1.1
NAMESERVER 192.168.1.1
#LEASE_TIME 3600

My speeds are:
FTP4DOS 10 KB/s, FTP from MTCP 200 KB/s, Links web browser 40 KB/s. With Total Commander in Windows 3.1 and using Trumpet Winsock I get around 20 KB/s.
Maybe could be something CPU related? With FTP4DOS the CPU fan spins at max speed when I start downloading. With the FTP utility from MTCP the fan spins at normal speed during download.

My computer is an Intel Atom N280, 1 GB of RAM and Atheros AR8132. I'm using MS-DOS 6.22.

Reply 71 of 71, by Grzyb

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ntalaec wrote on Today, 10:20:

ftp_file_buffer 32768

Looks wrong to me - for my Pentium III 800, the optimal setting is:
FTP_FILE_BUFFER 2048

But you may need to do your own experiments to find the optimal values of FTP_TCP_BUFFER and FTP_FILE_BUFFER for your hardware.

In 2003, I voted in favour of joining the European Union. However, due to recent developments - especially the restrictions on cash usage - I'm hereby withdrawing my support. DOWN WITH THE EU!