What is the difference between FTP download and HTTP download?

There are many sites on the Internet that can download a variety of useful tools. When downloading files from these sites, do you feel overwhelmed by choosing "HTTP download" and "FTP download? What is the difference between the two?

When using a Web browser, the differences between the two Protocols almost do not affect the ease of use and download time. However, the two have their own structures.

HTTP is a protocol designed to send content from Web servers located in various parts of the world to unspecified users. That is to say, we can regard HTTP as a protocol designed to "issue" files to unspecified users.

HTTP is used to read Web page content from the server. The Web browser downloads HTML files and image files from the Web server, and temporarily stores them in the hard drive and memory of your PC for display.

The difference between using HTTP to download software and other content is that whether to save the content as shown in a Web browser or not. The structure is identical. Therefore, anyone can download the specified file.

On the other hand, FTP is a protocol developed to "transfer" files between specific hosts. Therefore, in the initial stage of FTP communication, you must run the authentication program that confirms the communication by user ID and password.

One of the differences between FTP download and HTTP download is that.

However, when accessing the download site and performing FTP download, there is usually no window for entering the user ID and password. This is because the Anonymous FTP structure is used.

The so-called Anonymous FTP refers to the method of registering the user name as "Anonymous" (Anonymous) and the password as the user's email address to the FTP server. The Web browser first enters Anonymous in the user name and the email address set in the password to access the FTP server.

On the FTP server of the download site, if the user name is Anonymous, anyone can access the site. Users can access the site without having to enter the user name and password one by one.