This product requires IBM iSeries Client Access

I have some exciting new product releases rapidly approaching. After spending an unbelievable amount of time developing PHP on the i, I realized there were a number of utilities that either didn't exist (a good FTP client to edit PHP source remotely) or existed in antiquated forms (iSeries navigator). Because of that, I decided to start developing a suite of Windows-based tools to bridge that gap with a focus on rapidly developing Joomla! extensions on the IBM i.

The first of these tools is iFTP, a fully-featured FTP client that tackles some of the quirks of the IBM i FTP host that basically no currently available FTP client manages entirely*. Now you can connect, download, upload, and 'edit in place' files on the i without needing to open Navigator and copy them to your local computer and back for every change.

I anticipate having the tested Beta version available this week (by 6/4/2010) and a more rigorously tested version available shortly thereafter. As of now, this product will be offered under an open license free of charge.

Future versions of iFTP will allow management of Zend projects as well as many other enhanced features for taking the work out of developing PHP projects on the i

* - During my work on this project I learned that the FTP server in V6R1 returns file listings in a COMPLETELY different format than V5R4. I need to do a lot more research but these two should be handled.

Download ZiMB iTools iFTP Beta v0.6.0 here.