How to open a local site folder in an FTP program

If FTP by Zaweba is installed, every site card in Server by Zaweba has an Open in FTP by Zaweba button. Press it and the site's folder opens in FTP by Zaweba, ready to compare with your web host and upload. Without that app installed the button simply isn't shown, and Open folder takes you to the folder in File Explorer instead.

It closes the gap between building a site on your PC and putting it online. You've been working in a local folder that Server serves at name.test. When it's ready, the same folder is what you want to send to your host, and there's no reason to go looking for it.

The two apps and how they meet

Server by Zaweba runs Apache, PHP and MariaDB on your PC, so you can build and test sites locally. Each site is a card in the sites list showing its addresses, its folder and its database, with buttons to open it in the browser, open its folder, open its database in Adminer, or remove it.

FTP by Zaweba is a Windows FTP, FTPS and SFTP client for websites. It keeps local and server copies side by side, shows a preview before every sync, and keeps a safety net of history and trash. It also has a built-in code editor and a Live Preview, and a Disk view of the space on your server.

The Open in FTP by Zaweba button hands the site's local folder from one to the other. Server only shows it when FTP by Zaweba is installed, so the card never offers something that won't work.

From the sites list to your host

Open Server and go to the sites list. Find the site you want to publish and press Open in FTP by Zaweba on its card. FTP by Zaweba opens with that folder as the local side.

Connect to your web host in FTP by Zaweba. With the local folder and the server side next to each other, you can see what differs, preview what a sync would change, and send the files across. Because FTP by Zaweba shows a preview before every sync, you get a chance to spot anything that shouldn't go up before it does.

What not to upload

A local site folder sometimes collects things that belong only on your PC: test scripts, a phpinfo page from the new-site wizard's starter, notes, or a database dump you exported for safety. Look through the preview and leave those behind. A phpinfo page in particular tells strangers a lot about a server, and a database dump can contain private details.

Database settings are another thing to watch. Locally your site connects to MariaDB on your own PC, with the details from Server's dashboard. On your host the database name, user, password and server will be different, so the settings file usually needs its own version there rather than the local one.

The database is a separate job

FTP moves files, not databases. If your site needs its local data online as well, export it with Export SQL on Server's Databases page, which writes a .sql dump with routines and triggers. Then import that dump with the database tools your host provides. Keep the dump out of the site's web folder while you do this.

When the button isn't there

No Open in FTP by Zaweba button means FTP by Zaweba isn't installed on this PC. You can still use Open folder to reach the files in File Explorer and point any FTP program at that folder. Installing FTP by Zaweba adds the button to every site card in Server by Zaweba.