*UPDATED* FTP error 550 - The request is not supported

[comptechnut]

I have the most peculiar problem with the latest implementaiton of my FTP setup. I am running Server 2003, hosting an FTP site with a local home directory in inetpub/FTProot.

I set up two virtual directories located on a networked machine, both networked directores running as FAT32 in WIN 98. I know I cannot set permissions for these folders, but that's ok.

One of the virtual directories is a file access directory, limited to read-only access, and the other is an upload directory, with full access permited. My problem comes when I log in as the user I have given permission to access these resources.

It logs in fine, can access the home directory as I want it (meaning I can download and see a list of files in the home directory just fine), but when I try to access the virtual directories, downloading is not permitted, even though it lists the contents, and I receive the error "550 - The request is not supported". Oddly enough, the upload directory lets me list files, delete, and UPLOAD, but not DOWNLOAD. I have no idea why it may be doing this, but I have been working on the problem for serveral hours and haven't gotten myself anywhere.

To conclude, it seems that uploading, and listing are supported, but not downloading. Even in the directory that lets me upload and delete from it. I have checked all of the permissions, and everything checks out for the user permissions I created for the FTP site. Anyone have any ideas or questions for clarity?

P.S. When you click on the actual FTP site in quesiton, it says under the "status" column for each of the virtual directories, "Access is denied", even though access doesn't seem to be a problem and uploads are allowed in the "upload" virtual directory.

*2 NEW THINGS*

If this helps anybody: the networked machine in question is running on Windows 98 SE.

Also, I was playing with it a bit more today, and tried connecting to the FTP drives on the networked computer through the 2003 server FTP window using Internet Explorer. Same problems as when you connect through an FTP client outside of the network, you can get a list of the directories, you can upload and delete in the special uploads directory I have set aside, but you can not download from anything except the home directory which is located on the local machine (the 2003 server system). What you DO get when you try to download while accessing from the 2003 Server is a pop-up window that says, "Your current security settings do not allow you to download files from this location." I guess the question now becomes, how do I change the security settings it is referring to?




-Andrew

[gunderstone]

Is that the exact working of the error message? I have never seen that error before any when I did a search on it I could not find it.

Also, you stated that the issue is with a Win98SE system - do you have another Win98SE system that you could use to see if the issue repeats itself?

Do you have a different OS available (W2K or XP) to see if they are also experiencing the same types of issues?

[comptechnut]

You have some good suggestions. To answer your first question, YES that is the exact wording of the error. I did a search for it in the Microsoft Knowledge base and came across some Internet Explorer security settings pages, but nothing that referred to a networked resource. When I threw all of the IE Internet Zone security settings to the lowest possible, it didn't display the message anymore, but then would instead give me a denied access error when trying to download. I am going to try what you said about trying to access shared resources on a different OS (Windows XP) and then I'll get back to you.

[comptechnut]

I tried what you suggested by sharing a folder on a Windows XP system, and the FTP server worked fine, so I think it's safe to say that it's not an issue with accessing files over the network. The only other thing I can think it may be is sharing files with a Windows 98SE system. Do you know if there are any other special actions I need to take in order to share files through an FTP server from a networked Windows 98 hard drive?

I also tried accessing files from My Network Places and there are no sharing issues, meaning that I can access the shared folders over the network from the Server, copy files from the networked resource onto the desktop, write files to the folder if I have full access enabled on the Windows 98SE machine. It seems like it may be an issue with the FTP settings, but there aren't many settings to choose from (or make mistakes on). Do you think it may be because I cannot set permissions for a FAT 32 system? What kind of work arounds are there for this type of problem?

[gunderstone]

I think the main issue that you're having here (if I understand your configuration correctly) is an authentication one.

Windows 98 systems and Windows XP systems handle local and pass through authentication differently from one another.

The file system in use normally will not make a whole lot of difference where share resources are concerned although you're much more secured when using Windows XP and NTFS than with FAT32.

I would suggest trying to map a drive to the Windows 98 system first from the server (so that you're authenticated to the system by way of the drive mapping) and then try the FTP session again to see what the result of those actions are.