FTP GET changed from Win2K to WinXP?

[Virgil Green]

We encountered what I considered a rather odd circumstance. One of our
rather lengthy .bat scripts quit working when a user moved from a Win2K to
an WinXP machine. We finally tracked it down to what seems to be a change in
the way the FTP client works. On a Win2K machine, executing a GET in an FTP
script when the file to "get" doesn't exist on the server would just issue a
"file not found" message. When doing the same under WinXP, the named target
file is actually created as an empty file and the error message is issued.

So, can others confirm that the FTP GET client command has changed its
behavior between Win2K and WinXP, causing empty files to be created under
WinXP where they were not under Win2K?

Better yet, do you know of a patch or workaround to get the behavior changed
back to the Win2K behavior (if it has changed at all)?

 

[Jim]

We encountered what I considered a rather odd circumstance. One of our
rather lengthy .bat scripts quit working when a user moved from a Win2K to
an WinXP machine. We finally tracked it down to what seems to be a change in
the way the FTP client works. On a Win2K machine, executing a GET in an FTP
script when the file to "get" doesn't exist on the server would just issue a
"file not found" message. When doing the same under WinXP, the named target
file is actually created as an empty file and the error message is issued.

So, can others confirm that the FTP GET client command has changed its
behavior between Win2K and WinXP, causing empty files to be created under
WinXP where they were not under Win2K?

Better yet, do you know of a patch or workaround to get the behavior changed
back to the Win2K behavior (if it has changed at all)?

You should post this message to microsoft.public.windowsxp.network_web.
Jim

 

[Virgil Green]

You should post this message to
microsoft.public.windowsxp.network_web. Jim

Done. Thanks.

 

[Armin]

We encountered what I considered a rather odd circumstance. One of our
rather lengthy .bat scripts quit working when a user moved from a Win2K to
an WinXP machine. We finally tracked it down to what seems to be a change in
the way the FTP client works. On a Win2K machine, executing a GET in an FTP
script when the file to "get" doesn't exist on the server would just issue a
"file not found" message. When doing the same under WinXP, the named target
file is actually created as an empty file and the error message is issued.

So, can others confirm that the FTP GET client command has changed its
behavior between Win2K and WinXP, causing empty files to be created under
WinXP where they were not under Win2K?

Better yet, do you know of a patch or workaround to get the behavior changed
back to the Win2K behavior (if it has changed at all)?

Not for me. Running WinXP SP2. When I fire up ftp from the command
prompt and connect to an ftp server and then do a 'Get' on a
non-existing file I get a '550 filename: No such file or directory'
error. Are you sure there isn't a zero length file with that name
sitting on the ftp server?

Armin

 

[Virgil Green]

Not for me. Running WinXP SP2. When I fire up ftp from the command
prompt and connect to an ftp server and then do a 'Get' on a
non-existing file I get a '550 filename: No such file or directory'
error. Are you sure there isn't a zero length file with that name
sitting on the ftp server?

Armin

Yes, I'm certain. We get the "550 Unable to find file xxxxx" message under
both Win2K and WinXP. It's just that under WinXP it also creates a zero
length file in the target location. Note that the source directory exists,
only the source file does not exist. Also, on the "get" command, we name the
target file rather than using the source system's file name.

I just walked up to another XP machine and ran another test and confirmed
this behavior. My Win2K machine does not create the zero-length target file,
but an XP machine does.

 

[Stan Brown]

So, can others confirm that the FTP GET client command has changed its
behavior between Win2K and WinXP, causing empty files to be created under
WinXP where they were not under Win2K?

In my trial under WinXP Pro SP2 just now, it behaved correctly, not
as it did for you. In command-prompt FTP I just made a trial of GET
ZONKONTA and it returned an error 550. I then used the graphical
WS-FTP and verified that no file ZONKONTA had been created.

 

[Stan Brown]

So, can others confirm that the FTP GET client command has changed its
behavior between Win2K and WinXP, causing empty files to be created under
WinXP where they were not under Win2K?

Sorry, I misread your message. I thought you said it was creating an
empty file on the remote machine, but I see you actually said it was
creating an empty file on the local Win XP machine.

I can confirm that the same happens for me under Win XP Pro SP2. I
did not specify a target name, typing simply
bin
get zonkonta
and a zero-byte zonkonta file was created on my Win XP machine.

Sorry for the earlier red herring.

 

[Virgil Green]

Sorry, I misread your message. I thought you said it was creating an
empty file on the remote machine, but I see you actually said it was
creating an empty file on the local Win XP machine.

I can confirm that the same happens for me under Win XP Pro SP2. I
did not specify a target name, typing simply
bin
get zonkonta
and a zero-byte zonkonta file was created on my Win XP machine.

Sorry for the earlier red herring.

Thanks for the independent test. Now, if I can only find a fix for the
"change...".

 

[Colin Taylor]

Hi Virgil,

I too am having this problem having changed from Windows 98SE to Windows
XP. Did you ever find a way of stopping the creation of the zero length
files?

Regards,

Colin