"anon ftp" -- just how does this work, anyway?

[Earl H. Kinmonth]

In article <3920 at polyslo.CalPoly.EDU> steve at polyslo.UUCP (Steve DeJarnett) writes:
>In article <329 at uncle.UUCP> jbm at uncle.UUCP (John B. Milton) writes:
>>In article <317 at flatline.UUCP> erict at flatline.UUCP (j eric townsend) writes:

>>lucky shit

>That's all there is to it.  The only problem you may come across is a site that
>doesn't allow anonymous ftp, in which case it will send you some kind of error
>message saying that the username wasn't found (or some such thing like that).

In my experience, it's NOT that simple.  Some installations are
so overloaded (or annonymous ftp logins are at such a low
priority) that you will get timed-out just waiting for the login
process to complete.  

At times using ftp can be like trying to type immersed in a pool
of molasses using a terminal that may or may not echo what you've
typed.

Wild card expansion is NOT consistent over ftp installations.
Few who promise anonymous ftp logins tell you what the host
system is.  This leaves you without a clue to file name syntax.

The meaning of the "binary" switch seems inconsistent.  Between
UC machines, this must be on to transfer non-ascii files.
Turning the switch on with the Columbia Kermit server produces
mangled transfers.