Having issues connecting to ftp on Linux

Hey guys, i currently have Slackware 13 installed on my system. As you all know it is a linux based operating system. My problem is that i can't connect to any ftp server on Slackware 13. I have tried active mode most of the times for it. But since that wasn't working for it i tried the offline mode as well to see if it makes any difference. I am wondering whether something is wrong with my libraries. I always get the connection timed out error when trying to connect to an ftp from Firefox. I have a nonSMP kernel and i had installed all the libraries in the package selection dialog. Any advice to fix this is appreciated.

Well you should check whether any firewall you have is blocking the port needed for ftp server access. The connection timed out error is coming because your system is not able to initiate a connection with the particular ftp server you are trying to access. It is waiting till eventually the connection gets timed out. Also try checking out if the ftp server you are trying to access is up or not. Trying pinging it from your terminal, see if returns with a reply or a connection timed out. If the server is down then you will get a connection timed out in the result there. Also check whether the login you are under is allowed to access the ftp server or not. The permissions for that particular user should be given in order for you to access it.

I agree with what the user above me has said regarding the firewall. Since you are using a Linux based operating system, i am guessing by default iptables which is the core firewall on all Linux distributions is blocking the port needed for the ftp service. As far as i know by default iptables will block all such services and their ports. You need to manually change them to ensure that they aren't blocked. To change the rules for that you will need to login under root user as only then you can manipulate the rules. Run the following command on the ftp server by logging over ssh, iptables -L -n. This will show you whether the port is blocked or not. Be careful while venturing in to this territory, good luck.

Mostly the firewall is responsible for this or you just do not have the user permissions set properly to allow ftp access on that user id. First check whether the permission is set or not since it is the easier out of the two possibilities to fix manually. Also ping won't return any results if the server has port 80 requests blocked so that's not a good solution to check in my opinion. There is also the possibility, a remote one but possible none the less, your router and hence the hardware firewall has ftp ports blocked leading to this issue.

Try using a different client to access the ftp server. I am using gFTP and haven't faced any problems as such on that client. Also check whether iptables the underlying firewall on all Linux operating system has a rule allowing ftp port and services. By default it will block all the services such as these. You need to write a rule in it or use a front end applications like gufw or firestarter to help you do that. The syntax is pretty tedious so i suggest you not to go do anything silly unless you know exactly what you are doing. Messing up the rules in iptables will only land you in more trouble. also you could give a try to accessing the ftp via the command line aka the terminal too.

FTP uses port 21 as the commands port and port 20 as the data port. You need to set a rule in iptables which allows both the ports. Most probably by default both these ports are blocked and hence your error. Also won't hurt to check whether the ftp server is actually down or not by asking someone you know to ping it or try accessing it. To change the rule or set the rule you will need to login as the root user. You will need the iptables rule to open port 21 for doing the necessary task. You can easily find it out and copy paste it. Also make sure file /etc/hosts.deny does not block the access to port 21 the particular ftp host you are trying to connect to.