# Is there a way to send large files to someone on the Internet? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 15, 2012, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931 "2012-02-15T16:12:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/41 "2012-02-16T17:05:46Z")
> [@stpauler](#): > > And yet mine continues to work in “trial mode”. You may have no compunctions about violating the copyright license, but from what I understand of the rules [you shouldn’t be advising others to do that here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=7696990&postcount=5), regadless how easy it is. ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/42 "2012-02-16T17:14:04Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > You may have no compunctions about violating the copyright license, but from what I understand of the rules [you shouldn’t be advising others to do that here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=7696990&postcount=5), regadless how easy it is. And from what I understand of the rules, you shouldn’t be junior modding. > [@](#): > > Junior Modding – When someone who is not a moderator tries to dictate how another poster should act. Thus, usurping the role of moderator when not entitled to do so. (At one end of the practice, this is just seen as annoying and arrogant on the part of person playing “junior mod”; at the other end of the practice, this is a rules violation and warnable offense.) :eek: Also, continued use is not a copyright infringement. But since you seem to be playing lawyer as well as mod, maybe you’ll be able to pull up relevant legal proof that it is. ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/43 "2012-02-16T17:26:13Z")
> [@stpauler](#): > > And from what I understand of the rules, you shouldn’t be junior modding. > :eek: Disregard this part. Too late to edit out. [Please see me here instead of hijacking this thread.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=14780893#post14780893) ---
**Author:** ![gazpacho](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6f9a4e/32.png) [@gazpacho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gazpacho)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/44 "2012-02-16T17:27:45Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > Boy, I agree there. > > They really need to retool the email system to make it so that it’s automatic and grandma-friendly for any size file. Just off the top off my head, make it so when you drag a file into your email, the email software detects it’s over a certain limit, and starts the upload to a server somewhere, perhaps provided by your email provider. You send the email which just contains a link, and when the recipient opens it and clicks the link, it starts the download if it can or tells the user to wait until it is ready. Smarter systems can could start the download even before the upload is completely done. All can be transparent to the user. This symbolizes just how broken the internet is for home users. We are all peers on the same network. We should send the files directly from one computer to the other computer. There should be no need for any third party megaupload like site. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/45 "2012-02-16T19:49:55Z")
> [@benbo1](#): > > ok, some math here - let’s assume a file of 9 gigs - 9,000 mb. Upload speed = 0.6mb/sec. So, 6,000 mb would take 10,000 seconds. Multiply by 1.5 to get to 9,000mb, that’d be 15,000 seconds, or 250 minutes - just over 4 hours. What am I missing? This sounds reasonable, 4 hours 10 minutes. 1,024 mb = 1 gig, so it would actually be 9,216 total mb, 2.4% higher, so maybe closer to 4 & 1/2 hours, assuming uninterrupted connection. Is this right? Or would my ISP throttle the upload speed once it took \> 1 hour, so the 0.6mb/sec would fall way down? As others pointed out, you MIGHT need to multiply by 8. It’s possible you have a 0.6 megabyte upload speed (4.8 megaBITS per second), but that’d be way above the national average. Test it at a speed test site to find out for sure. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/46 "2012-02-16T20:17:09Z")
> [@](#): > > This symbolizes just how broken the internet is for home users. We are all peers on the same network. We should send the files directly from one computer to the other computer. There should be no need for any third party megaupload like site. Not everyone has an always-on internet connection, or even an always-on computer. With a third-party site, I can send the file when I’m online, and my recipient can receive the file when they’re online. Plus, with a third-party site, if I want to send the file to multiple people, I only have to upload it once. ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/48 "2012-02-16T21:19:50Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > RAR is neither [free](http://www.rarlab.com/shop2rarlab-whpanda.php?prod=winrar&x-source=winraronly) nor [free](https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html). Any idea when that changed? Mine just nags, but I’ve not updated it for a few years. ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/49 "2012-02-16T21:27:36Z")
> [@Baron\_Greenback](#): > > Any idea when that changed? Mine just nags, but I’ve not updated it for a few years. Actually, never mind, I’ve read the rest of the thread. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/50 "2012-02-16T22:47:41Z")
> [@stpauler](#): > > No, I’ve done it before with my own personal music and had it done in two minutes (creating a torrent link and sending said torrent link to friends). I didn’t bother password protecting it though. Maybe things have gotten significantly easier than when I last tried to do it. What was the process you went through? And would that process allow 10 GB, password-protected files (if a public tracker)? If you’re running a private BT setup, it’s still rather pointless to use BitTorrent instead of regular FTP or HTTP unless your connection is unstable enough to warrant continual error-checking and hashing. BT’s main advantage, the dispersal of bandwidth use among downloaders, is negated when there’s only two people involved. Plus, the initial creation of a torrent from a 10GB source will take a short while. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2012, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/51 "2012-02-17T00:04:48Z")
With single person BT, you also get auto-resume and integrity checking by default. If both people are irregularly online, BT can slowly transfer in the background when both people are online without having to bother with splitting the file or managing the process. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2012, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/52 "2012-02-17T00:09:28Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > With single person BT, you also get auto-resume and integrity checking by default. If both people are irregularly online, BT can slowly transfer in the background when both people are online without having to bother with splitting the file or managing the process. Yeah, that’s a good point (the auto-resume). ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2012, 9:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/54 "2012-02-17T09:06:51Z")
> [@Reply](#): > > Skype, hosting your own FTP/HTTP server, scp on Macs and \*NIX machines, etc. (S)FTP, HTTP(S), and scp are the “proper” tools for the job, since they were specifically designed for the sole purpose of transferring files, and have all sorts of features for ensuring that the data is transferred in a bandwidth-efficient manner (unlike, say, e-mail), securely (via optional encryption), and robustly (with error correction and resumption of interrupted transfers). Unfortunately, they’re just low-level protocols so unless you’ve got a particularly friendly UI they’re not going to be much help in the OP’s scenario. Skype solves the user-friendliness problem, but I’m not sure about the other aspects of it. Does it support resumption of interrupted transfers? (No one wants to see their connection drop out after spending hours downloading a file, just before it reaches the end.) Does it send the file more or less as-is, or does it have a massive 37% overhead like MIME-encoded e-mail? Does the transfer implement an open, peer-reviewed encryption scheme, or is all data sent in the clear, or with some undocumented, hand-rolled algorithm that any first-year computer science student could crack? Since Skype is a proprietary client using proprietary protocols, it may not be possible to answer all these questions. > [@](#): > > Also, if it’s a single 10-gig file, the recipient has to have a relatively modern computer. Older ones can’t handle files bigger than 4GB or so. It would have to be awfully old. Linux file systems commonly supported 16 GB or larger files as long ago as 1993; Microsoft Windows’s NTFS, introduced the same year but not popularized on home desktops until Windows XP in 2001, has a practical file size limit of 16 TB. AFAIK the default Mac OS file system has supported file sizes up to 8 EB since 1998. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2012, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/55 "2012-02-17T09:50:26Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > (S)FTP, HTTP(S), and scp are the “proper” tools for the job, since they were specifically designed for the sole purpose of transferring files, and have all sorts of features for ensuring that the data is transferred in a bandwidth-efficient manner (unlike, say, e-mail), securely (via optional encryption), and robustly (with error correction and resumption of interrupted transfers). Unfortunately, they’re just low-level protocols so unless you’ve got a particularly friendly UI they’re not going to be much help in the OP’s scenario. That wasn’t in response to the OP, whose needs are better served by file sending sites. That was in response to the person who needed to send a 10GB file, above the limit of most of those sites. > [@](#): > > Skype solves the user-friendliness problem, but I’m not sure about the other aspects of it. Does it support resumption of interrupted transfers? (No one wants to see their connection drop out after spending hours downloading a file, just before it reaches the end.) Does it send the file more or less as-is, or does it have a massive 37% overhead like MIME-encoded e-mail? Does the transfer implement an open, peer-reviewed encryption scheme, or is all data sent in the clear, or with some undocumented, hand-rolled algorithm that any first-year computer science student could crack? Since Skype is a proprietary client using proprietary protocols, it may not be possible to answer all these questions. Skype does resume. Skype encrypts using AES with its own keys. [Its security concerns](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype_security) are the topic of constant discussion, including many accusations of government backdoors. It’s good enough for most of the world, and it’s good enough for Grandma, who can hardly roll her own verified end-to-end hardware and software anyway. > [@](#): > > It would have to be awfully old. Linux file systems commonly supported 16 GB or larger files as long ago as 1993; Microsoft Windows’s NTFS, introduced the same year but not popularized on home desktops until Windows XP in 2001, has a practical file size limit of 16 TB. AFAIK the default Mac OS file system has supported file sizes up to 8 EB since 1998. You can thank FAT for slowing that down. FAT was still used despite XP due to NTFS’s initial incompatibilities (usually wrt to writeability) with OSX and \*NIX, USB flash drives, etc. You’d think this was a problem solved log ago, but from time to time I still see computers struggle with this. It’s certainly rarer now, but still something to watch out for. File size limits also affected earlier versions of ZIP, AVI containers, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2012, 10:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/56 "2012-02-17T10:21:25Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > (S)FTP, HTTP(S), and scp are the “proper” tools for the job, since they were specifically designed for the sole purpose of transferring files, and have all sorts of features for ensuring that the data is transferred in a bandwidth-efficient manner (unlike, say, e-mail), securely (via optional encryption), and robustly (with error correction and resumption of interrupted transfers). Unfortunately, they’re just low-level protocols so unless you’ve got a particularly friendly UI they’re not going to be much help in the OP’s scenario. Also, none of those protocols fix the real problem behind transferring files which is punching through NATs. Short history lesson: when the internet was invented, it was decided that IP addresses would be 32 bits, allowing for a total of 4 billion in the address range which nobody ever anticipated running out of. When we started running short on IP addresses, ISPs started putting their users behind NATs, effectively delaying the transition to IPv6. The problem is, barring a few esoteric techniques, a device behind a NAT can only connect to one not behind a NAT. This isn’t a problem in the standard, client-server web surfing model because all web servers are hosted on their own IP address but with peer to peer connections, you often run into problems. scp, SFTP & the like were invented before NATs became a problem and assume you’re able to form a connection to an IP address. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2012, 10:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/57 "2012-02-17T10:26:27Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > Also, none of those protocols fix the real problem behind transferring files which is punching through NATs. Short history lesson: when the internet was invented, it was decided that IP addresses would be 32 bits, allowing for a total of 4 billion in the address range which nobody ever anticipated running out of. When we started running short on IP addresses, ISPs started putting their users behind NATs, effectively delaying the transition to IPv6. The problem is, barring a few esoteric techniques, a device behind a NAT can only connect to one not behind a NAT. This isn’t a problem in the standard, client-server web surfing model because all web servers are hosted on their own IP address but with peer to peer connections, you often run into problems. > > scp, SFTP & the like were invented before NATs became a problem and assume you’re able to form a connection to an IP address. Do non-institutional home users get NATed by their ISPs? I’ve always had an actual IP with every connection I’ve had (though of course my own router will do NATing). ---
**Author:** ![Hirka\_T\_Bawa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/db5fbb/32.png) [@Hirka\_T\_Bawa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hirka_T_Bawa)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2012, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/58 "2012-12-16T06:00:53Z")
I do a Google search for a questions, and the 3rd link that comes up is my favorite message board that I spend most of my time on… No wonder we have so many zombies lately. But within a year, so I’ll bump the thread. > [@Chronos](#): > > Do both ends need to be grandma-friendly? Because I can send large files to anyone by putting them on the HTTP server on my desktop, and e-mailing a link. My end of the operation would be cumbersome for someone like my mother, but it’s completely transparent for the person I’m sending to. So **C** , I want to send a couple large, as in 350MB to 1GB+ files to a friend of mine, she is computer illiterate (honestly, didn’t even know what a ZIP was), She uses a Mac which I know nothing about, while I use PC… I’ve so far been trying to transfer with Skype, though the transfer speeds are 1/3 to 1/2 of what I would expect with basic speed tests… So, how would I set up an HTTP server on my computer (which is behind a NAT router) and is this as easy as it sounds? I just want her to be able to download a file from my computer as easy as I tell her to. Both computer will be on during the entire transfer… ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2012, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/59 "2012-12-17T20:55:14Z")
Sorry, I don’t know how to set up an HTTP server on a PC; it’s built into OSX. I expect, though, that if you Google “Apache” (the name of the most common webserver) you can find something free to download which will walk you through the necessary steps. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2012, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/60 "2012-12-17T23:02:57Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > BJust off the top off my head, make it so when you drag a file into your email, the email software detects it’s over a certain limit, and starts the upload to a server somewhere, perhaps provided by your email provider. The latest versions of Thunderbird do exactly this. I haven’t used the feature yet, but when I go to email a large file, it asks me if I want to use XYZ file sharing service instead. It looks like it’s designed to be pretty seamless. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2012, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/61 "2012-12-17T23:13:06Z")
> [@Hirka\_T\_Bawa](#): > > So, how would I set up an HTTP server on my computer (which is behind a NAT router) and is this as easy as it sounds? I just want her to be able to download a file from my computer as easy as I tell her to. Both computer will be on during the entire transfer… As Chronos said, Apache is free, common, and easy to set up (for a technical user). You’ll also need to poke a hole in your router to redirect port 80: usually this involves adding a line to a table in your router configuration that redirects incoming port 80 to your PC’s local IP address. If you want a tiny bit of extra security-through-obscurity, you can use a different port number (any number \<=65535; this defeats simple port scanners). For a little extra ease of use, you can also use a dynamic DNS service, so that you can send a more personalized domain domain to someone instead of a string of numbers. I use the service at [freedns.afraid.org](http://freedns.afraid.org/). ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2012, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931/62 "2012-12-17T23:16:24Z")
I trust the advice of GQers, but still, am wary of good-products that are _absolutely free!_ Or else I’m just curious. How does [mediafire.com](http://mediafire.com) make money? It looks great, BTW. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-way-to-send-large-files-to-someone-on-the-internet/612931.md?page=4)