NodeFTPD

NodeFTPD is an FTP server written for Node.js. It's currently under heavy development and should not be used in production.

This is a real FTP server, and I'm aiming to implement all standard FTP functionality. I have pretty much all of the basics implemented so far, and you can definitely install this locally and use it as an FTP server. It even supports TLS!

The project is a Node.js/JavaScript learning project, but I intend on making it into a feature complete FTP server that I can deploy on my own servers.

Installation

This software is in alpha. It's NOT ready for use in any type of production environment.

Latest Code

• The PAM dev package is required. On Ubuntu variants, install with sudo apt-get install libpam-dev. On CentOS variants, install with sudo yum install pam-devel. On Debian variants, install with sudo apt-get install libpam0g-dev.
• Clone this repository or download as a zip
• Run npm install to install dependencies
• Run npm start. It will auto detect your IP and run on port 21.

From NPM

• The PAM dev package is required. On Ubuntu variants, install with sudo apt-get install libpam-dev. On CentOS variants, install with sudo yum install pam-devel. On Debian variants, install with sudo apt-get install libpam0g-dev.
• Run npm install -g nodeftpd
• Run nodeftpd start. It will auto detect your IP and run on port 21.

Commands Line Interface

These instructions assume you've installed NodeFTPD via NPM or placed the NodeFTPD binary in your PATH variable.

Start NodeFTPD

$ nodeftpd start
Starting NodeFTPD.... Done

Stop NodeFTPD

$ nodeftpd stop
Stopping NodeFTPD.... Stopped

Restart NodeFTPD

$ nodeftpd restart
Stopping NodeFTPD.... Not running
Starting NodeFTPD.... Done

NodeFTPD status

$ nodeftpd status
NodeFTPD is NOT running.

Help

$ nodeftpd help

  Usage: nodeftpd [options] [command]

  Commands:

    help                   Show this help text
    status                 Display the status of NodeFTPD
    stop                   Stop NodeFTPD
    restart                Restart NodeFTPD
    *                      Start NodeFTPD

  Options:

    -h, --help       output usage information
    -V, --version    output the version number
    -D, --no-daemon  Don't run NodeFTPD as a daemon

Logs/PID File

Every FTP command and response is logged. By default, these logs are stored in /var/log/nodeftpd/access.log.

Error logs are stored in /var/log/nodeftpd/error.log.

The PID file (stores the process ID of the main process) is in /var/run/nodeftpd.pid.

You may override these values via the config file.

Configuration

The configuration file is /etc/nodeftpd.yml. It expects a YAML file. Example configuration below:

port: 10021
passive_port_range: 45000-55000
motd: 'NodeFTPD %pkg.version% Server (%os.hostname%)'

To see all possible configuration values, please look at config.yml (contains the default config).

TLS/SSL

Explicit TLS

This is not yet implemented

Implicit TLS

Warning: This feature is new and unstable

Add the following to your config file:

tls:
  enabled: true,
  key: /root/server-key.pem
  cert: /root/server-cert.pem
  port: 990

Listens on port 990 by default. Supports active and passive mode transfers.

Authentication Mechanisms

The system only supports Linux accounts via PAM at the moment. More drivers are coming soon!

Architecture

This FTP server uses a child process based design, where each connection is handled by it's own process. This is for security reasons, and to make the code easier to organize and maintain.

The parent process listens for new connections and passes them off to a process in the process pool. When this occurs, a new process is spawned to keep idle_workers processes free in the pool. When a connection is closed, that process is destroyed.

FTP Implementation Resources

• RFC 3659 - Extensions to FTP
• List of raw FTP commands
• FTP Commands
• FTP: File Transfer Protocol on cr.yp.to