I'm not sure of what you are asking? It sounds like you want to write a Perl script that interfaces with an ftp server, or that is an ftp server itself.

If you are doing the former, there are modules that will let you do this painlessly.

If you are doing the latter, I would suggest not. There are plenty of ftp servers out there, and there is no need to write one in Perl! (there probably already is one written in Perl!)

However you may be asking to transfer data between programs (perhaps both in perl). If this is the case then you perhaps would like some socket programming. Look at the man pages (available here or as part of your copy of perl). They give excellent examples of how to use IO::Socket .

As for tips or tricks with the latter method: If you are communicating to a remote machine, use INET sockets. If, instead, you are communicating to a local machine you can get a speed up by using UNIX sockets.

Cheers,
Gryn

p.s. It would bring me peace of mind if you registered an account name here if you have further questions. I like to know who it is I'm talking to! :) :)