Problems getting FTP_PROXY to work

[johnblue]

So there is a proxy that I am required to route traffic through. HTTP works without issue when updating the OS, for example.

Some of the env settings that are in play:

$ env
SSH_CLIENT=1.7.1.6 50655 22
LOGNAME=jblue
PAGER=more
MAIL=/var/mail/jblue
PATH=/sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/games:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/home/jblue/bin
EDITOR=vi
ENV=/home/jblue/.shrc
PWD=/usr/home/jblue
TERM=vt100
SSH_TTY=/dev/pts/0
HOME=/home/jblue
USER=jblue
SSH_CONNECTION=1.7.1.6 50655 1.5.4.8 22
SHELL=/bin/sh
BLOCKSIZE=K
ftp_proxy=http://proxy.dude.com:8080
http_proxy=http://proxy.dude.com:8080

FTP can see the proxy as an option:

$ ftp
ftp> set
anonpass        jblue@
ftp_proxy       http://proxy.dude.com:8080
http_proxy     http://proxy.dude.com:8080
no_proxy
pager           more
prompt          ftp>
rprompt

When I try to use FTP:

ftp> open
(to) ftp.freebsd.org
Trying 96.47.72.72:21 ...
^C

... tcpdump shows that the host does not even try to talk to the proxy:

jblue@hostname:~ # tcpdump -n -i vmx0 host 96.47.72.72
tcpdump: verbose output suppressed, use -v or -vv for full protocol decode
listening on vmx0, link-type EN10MB (Ethernet), capture size 65535 bytes
13:07:24.724866 IP 1.5.4.8.29449 > 96.47.72.72.21: Flags S
13:07:26.522761 IP 1.5.4.8.29013 > 96.47.72.72.21: Flags S
13:07:29.551817 IP 1.5.4.8.29013 > 96.47.72.72.21: Flags S

I have visited with the proxy admins and they indicated that port 8080 will accept FTP traffic. I feel like I am chasing my tail on this because of shotgunning different configs.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[windscape]

Hi johnblue,

Try using fetch instead of ftp. Its man page indicates that it uses the ftp_proxy environment variable.

 

[Murph]

I believe that ftp(1) only uses HTTP-type proxies for fetching URLs. I.e. you can't do traditional open->cd->get interactive style of FTP with it via a HTTP proxy. If you do something like ftp ftp://ftp.example.com/path/file, it should work with your proxy setup. For traditional interactive FTP, you need to be directly talking to the remote server or using the less common FTP proxy/gate functionality.