On 26 Apr 1999, Perry E. Metzger wrote:
> Jun-ichiro itojun Hagino <itojun@itojun.org> writes:
> > 	I would like to know the reason for this behavior.  The behavior
> > 	can easily be fixed to conform to RFC, by sending "CWD /" just after
> > 	the ftp login (just give me a pointer...).

I didn't see the original message, so I am not sure exactly what problem
you encountered, but from the part that Perry quoted I believe that just
sending "CWD /" would be wrong. 

If you want your ftp client to send "CWD /", "CWD foo/bar", "RETR file" 
then you should use an URL like "ftp://host/%2F/foo%2Fbar/file".  However,
NetBSD's ftp client doesn't properly distinguish between "/" and "%2F",
and would incorrectly send "CWD //foo/bar", "RETR file" when dealing with
the above URL. 

I have been meaning to fix this properly for a while, and your message
provided the necessary incentive.  See PR standards/7484. 

--apb (Alan Barrett)