XULTech Firelinks User's Guide

Introduction

Firelinks is a remote server management system that uses Firefox's XUL (XML User-interface Language), and Javascript to deliver a web based application that has the look and feel of a desktop application.

Like standard desktop applications, many aspects of Firelinks are customizable. For example, you can resize and rearrange individual columns in the file listing table by drag and drop. You can also show/hide a column by clicking on the column picker tool on the upper right hand corner of the table. Settings that you have changed for one session will be remembered by Firelinks.

Operating Firelinks

Most operation in Firelinks can be carried out by using one of the following methods:

  1. Selecting the action from the main menu bar in the upper left hand corner by using the mouse or via the keyboard.
  2. Selecting the action from a context menu, which can be invoked by right clicking on an item
  3. Clicking on the toolbar buttons. You can show/hide individual buttons via the context menu of the toolbar.
  4. Clicking on the directory or file shown in the file listing table. Different actions are invoked depending on whether it was a left button click, a middle button click, or a double click.
  5. Clicking on different links shown in the tabbed panels in the bottom half of the application. When you move the mouse over a link the link will be underlined to indicate that it can be clicked.
  6. Clicking on the toolbar buttons show in the upper right hand corner of a tabbed panel. Different buttons are displayed depending on the context.

Folder Panel

The folder panel shows the directories on your remote server. You can open up a folder by single clicking on it. Directory that have not been visited during this session will have a slightly lighter color. You can invoke the context menu by right clicking on a folder.

The folder panel can be hidden by clicking on the red close button on the upper right hand corner of the panel. To restore the panel, click on the red restore button that is beside the throbber/progress indicator (located above the upper right hand corner of the file listing table.) Alternatively, you can toggle the panel on/off via the main menu bar or the toolbar's context menu.

Navigation Toolbar

This backward and forward toolbar buttons can be used to navigate through the folders that you have visited during this session. The stop button can be used to stop remote operation that is taking a long time. The use of the reload, home, and folder up buttons should be obvious.

The filter on the top right hand corner can be used to filter the files that are shown in the directory listing table. You can select one of the predefined filters, or you can type your own filter such as *.jpg;*.doc; into the combo-box.

File Listing Table

You can resize and rearrange individual columns in the table by drag and drop. You can also show/hide a column by clicking on the column picker tool on the upper right hand corner of the table. Each column can be sorted by simply clicking on the column name.

The difference between the Size and Bytes columns is that Size shows the file size in the nearest Kilobytes, whereas Bytes shows the file size in bytes.

Depending on the remote file system, some of the columns can in fact be meaningless. The Owner, Group, Permission, and Mode columns are useful only on a Linux Server. The Access and Created columns are meaningful only on file systems that supports them (for example, Windows NTFS).

Please note that the File Type is determined purely on the basis of file extension.

See the note below about how to make use of the MD5 column

The file listing table can be shown/hidden by clicking on the throbber/progress indicator located above the upper right hand corner of the file listing table. Alternatively, you can toggle the table on/off via the main menu bar or the toolbar's context menu.

Properties Tab

This is the main tab for Firelinks. It will show the properties associated with the files selected in the file listing table above. You can delete, restore from the trash bin, edit, download, chmod (for Linux/Unix) or view the files by using the tool and buttons on the upper right hand corner.

By selecting more than one file at a time (by holding down either the control or the shift key while clicking on the file with the mouse) you can carry out operation on multiple files at once.

The tab panels can be hidden by clicking on the blue close button on the upper right hand corner of the panel. To restore the panel, click on the blue restore button that is beside the throbber/progress indicator (located above the upper right hand corner of the file listing table). Alternatively, you can toggle the panel on/off via the main menu bar or the toolbar's context menu.

Web View Tab

This tab can be used to preview how a file will look like when it is access by a visitor via his/her browser. To preview a file simply select the file in the file listing table. If no file is selected then a HTML listing of the files will be shown. You can then preview a file by clicking on the file name in the HTML listing. To go back to the HTML listing, click on the directory part of the URL shown at the top of the panel. This is useful for navigating around the directory when the main file listing table is hidden.

Text/Source Tab

This tab can be used to look at the source of the code that is used to generate your web page. For example, if you want to look at the content of .html, .css, .php, .jsp or .asp files then you select the Text/Source tab and then click on the file. This tab can also be used to preview graphic files (.jpg, .gif, etc) that are not normally accessible via the web because they are not under $DOCUMENT_ROOT.

Just like the Web View tab, if no file is selected then a HTML listing of the files will be shown. You can then preview a file by clicking on the file name in the HTML listing. To go back to the HTML listing, click on the directory part of the URL shown at the top of the panel. This is useful for navigating around the directory when the main file listing table is hidden.

Edit File Tab

Use this tab to edit text files on your remote server. Please note that no file will be loaded into the editor if the current content of the editor has been modified but not saved.

You can tell the editor to save your changes automatically by checking Auto Save on. You can set how often the file should be auto saved via (Options | Auto Save Time) in the main menu bar.

Use Discard to tell the editor to abandon the modifications you've made and go back to the last saved version.

If you are editing a file used to generate your web site (for example, a .html file), then you can use the Browser View button on the top right hand corner of the editor to preview your changes.

Command Shell Tab

Use this tab to execute any command line based program on your remote server. For example, you can use the dir command to get a listing of the currently selected directory. If you click on a file in the file listing table then the file name will be inserted into your command line at the cursor position.

You can save the command shell output by right clicking on the output frame to bring up the context menu and then select This Frame | Save Frame As...

Use the red Clear/Delete button on the upper right hand corner to clear your command shell history.

You can change the number of entries save in your command history combo-box via

File Upload Tab

Use this tab to upload files to your remote server. You can use the MD5 check-box to ensure that the file has been uploaded correctly.

Please note that under version 1.5 of Firefox for Windows you can not upload files with names that contains Unicode characters. You will have to rename the files, upload them, then rename the files back to their original names on the server.

Notes about MD5

MD5, which stands for Message Digest Five, is a way to compute the "signature" of a file. Two files that have the same MD5 signature are almost certainly the same.

You can use the MD5 value to check if a file has been uploaded or downloaded correctly. Using MD5 is much more reliable than simply checking the file date and size.

You can use the md5sum (you can download a Windows version from http://www.akeni.com/downloadprogram/tool/md5sum.exe) from the command line to compute the MD5 of a file on your local hardrive. Please note that under Windows you need to use the -b option.

Security Considerations

For security reasons it is best to run the application via SSL.

If SSL is not enabled on your server then it is best to only change the password when you are connected to your server inside a secured LAN.

Please note that your Firelinks password is never sent in the clear. A challenge/reponse system is used so that only the password digest is sent.