Starting/Stopping FTP server from commandline?

[michaelsanford]

For added security I prefer only to start my FTP server when I need to (that is, when I'm away from my computer and need to transfer large files).

How do I start and stop the FTP server from the command line? I've got the default one that comes with 10.1.5.

For that matter, what server does it use?

 

[gumse]

I'm not sure about 10.1.5 but 10.2.4 uses the xinetd daemon. So in the file /etc/xinetd.d/ftp

service ftp
{
disable = no
socket_type = stream
wait = no
user = root
server = /usr/libexec/ftpd
server_args = -l
groups = yes
flags = REUSE
}

You can set the disable flag, then you probably have to. kill -HUP `cat /var/run/xinetd.pid`
This (i think) can only be done as root or whith sudo.
There can very well be an easier way to do this that I don't know of.

 

[michaelsanford]

Cool you led me straight to the answer (which for 10.1.5 is a little different):

All of the services in 10.1.5 seem to be listed in /etc/inetd.conf with line items like

ftp     stream  tcp     nowait  root    /usr/libexec/tcpd               ftpd -l

So all I did is comment out (or uncomment, as the case may be) the ftp service, and then send a HUP signal to inetd.

I wonder why it seems so much simpler in inetd than xinetd for Jag (single file for all services instead of multiple files).

Also I noticed that 10.1.5 calls the tcpd access controller, and 10.2 calls the ftpd server directly (or perhaps it does call tcpd automatically)?

Anyways it works now.
Thanks!