Remote FTP functions - Is it possible to copy a folder over another remotely without SFTP/SSH access?

Question

When developing wordpress, I often have a staging folder and a live folder on the remote server. When ready to go live, I often find myself needing to copy the wp-content folder over to the live folder, doing a replace.

Ideally, I would just login to the shell and copy the folder.

However, as some clients don't have SFTP/SSH access to their servers, I have to copy the folder over with my FTP client (I am using Transmit on Mac).

However, it seems that Transmit copies the entire folder to my own computer which then has to upload it again to the new destination even though the source & destination are on the same server. As wp-content can grow very large with uploads and so on, this process can be painstakingly slow and time consuming.

Is there any better solution to something like this or am I missing something?

Answer 1

Yes, what you are after is an FXP client. This carries out an FTP connection between two servers without the data passing through the client originating the connection.

In your case, the two servers would be the same server, just two different folders on them.

Note that this needs to be supported on the server in question, and you need an FXP enabled client like http://www.crossftp.com/