ProFTPD is a very common FTP server for Linux. This guide is about how to install it on FreeBSD.

1 - Getting the files


NOTE: you should check if there is a newer version and use it instead.

2 - Installing ProFTPD

Installing ProFTPD is pretty easy:


3 - Custom configuration

To change ProFTPD's configuration, simply edit /usr/local/etc/proftpd.conf. My configuration is basic: disable anonymous logins and allow root logins:


NOTE: you may remove the "RootLogin" line if you don't want to allow root logins.

4 - Allowing root logins

To allow root logins, you need the "RootLogin on" line in proftpd.conf and you need to remove (or comment) the "root" line in /etc/ftpusers.

5 - Launching ProFTPD

To launch ProFTPD, simply run the following command:


If you get an error telling you that it can't resolve your hostname, edit your /etc/hosts file to add a line like this:


6 - Launching ProFTPD at boot

To start ProFTPD at boot, create the /usr/local/etc/rc.d/proftpstart.sh file, set its permission to 755 and put this line in it:


ProFTPD will start automatically at boot.

When setting up ProFTPD, use this configuration file for the best performance:

ServerName "ProFTPD Default Installation"
ServerType standalone
DefaultServer on
ScoreboardFile /var/run/proftpd.scoreboard

ExtendedLog /var/log/ProFTPd.read.log READ
ExtendedLog /var/log/ProFTPd.write.log WRITE

# Port 21 is the standard FTP port.
Port 21

# Umask 022 is a good standard umask to prevent new dirs and files
# from being group and world writable.
Umask 022

MaxInstances 60

# Fast connect
DeferWelcome on
IdentLookups off

UseGlobbing on
MultilineRFC2228 on
TimeoutLogin 1200
TimeoutIdle 1200
TimeoutNoTransfer 1200
TimeoutStalled 3600
TimeoutSession 28800
SocketOptions rcvbuf 8192
SocketOptions sndbuf 8192
CommandBufferSize 512
tcpBackLog 5
tcpNoDelay on
TransferRate APPE,STOR 12000
TransferRate RETR 12000

# Normally, we want files to be overwriteable.
AllowOverwrite on

# To enable root ftp login
RootLogin on

# To lock a user into a single directory
DefaultRoot /home/ui spi-ui