Sending files to OpenVMS - strange behaviour

Using SmartFTP v2.5.1006 to transfer html files to an OpenVMS server, I get the following set of actions showing in the log:
[19:47:43] TYPE A
[19:47:43] 200 TYPE set to ASCII.
[19:47:43] PASV
[19:47:43] 227 Entering Passive Mode (x,y,z,200,238,55)
[19:47:43] Opening data connection to x.y.z.200 Port: 60983
[19:47:43] LIST
[19:47:43] 150 Opening data connection for HT_ROOT:[000000]*.*;* (x.y.z.55,2377)
[19:47:43] 20803 bytes transferred. (86.8 KB/s) (234 ms)
[19:47:43] 226 LIST Directory transfer complete.
[19:47:43] File "home.html" not found in directory listing.
[19:47:43] TYPE I
[19:47:43] 200 TYPE set to IMAGE.
[19:47:43] PASV
[19:47:43] 227 Entering Passive Mode (x,y,z,200,238,56)
[19:47:43] Opening data connection to x.y.z.200 Port: 60984
[19:47:43] STOR home.html
[19:47:43] 150 Opening data connection for HT_ROOT:[000000]home.html; (x.y.z.55,2378)
[19:47:44] 14448 bytes transferred. (129 KB/s) (109 ms)
[19:47:44] 226 Transfer complete.
[19:47:44] MDTM 20070923092635 home.html
[19:47:44] 502 MDTM is unimplemented.
[19:47:44] SIZE home.html
[19:47:44] 502 SIZE is unimplemented.
[19:47:44] SIZE not supported.
[19:47:44] Obtaining file information (size/date) from directory listing.
[19:47:44] Ignoring LIST options.
[19:47:44] TYPE A
[19:47:44] 200 TYPE set to ASCII.
[19:47:44] PASV
[19:47:44] 227 Entering Passive Mode (x,y,z,200,238,57)
[19:47:44] Opening data connection to x.y.z.200 Port: 60985
[19:47:44] LIST
[19:47:44] 150 Opening data connection for HT_ROOT:[000000]*.*;* (x.y.z.55,2379)
[19:47:44] 20905 bytes transferred. (86.8 KB/s) (235 ms)
[19:47:44] 226 LIST Directory transfer complete.
[19:47:44] File "home.html" not found in directory listing.
[19:47:44] Ignoring LIST options.
[19:47:44] PASV
[19:47:44] 227 Entering Passive Mode (x,y,z,200,238,59)
[19:47:44] Opening data connection to x.y.z.200 Port: 60987
[19:47:44] LIST
[19:47:44] 150 Opening data connection for HT_ROOT:[000000]*.*;* (x.y.z.55,2380)
[19:47:44] 20905 bytes transferred. (93.2 KB/s) (219 ms)
[19:47:44] 226 LIST Directory transfer complete.
[19:47:44] Transfer successful.

All this to transfer 1 file - is there any way that I can cut down the number of firectory listings and relistings it is doing - when transferring thousands of files, this *really* eats into the CPU and IO?

Cheers

Hello ..

The directory listing fallback is due to the fact that your FTP server doesn't support basic command as SIZE and MDTM.

Regards,
Mat

Hi

OK, so lets see how this works.....there are two commonly available TCP/IP stacks available for OpenVMS: 1) HP and 2) Multinet. Neither fully implement what you are doing.

Not that surprising they aren't supported - they seem to be standardised in RFC 3659 which has a date of March 2007 on it, see http://rfc.net/rfc3659.html

Though it does suggest that some servers have been using SIZE and MDTM as non-standard extensions for sometime.

You could argue that SmartFTP doesn't properly implement the MDTM command. RFC 3659 says that the format of the command is:
mdtm = "MdTm" SP pathname CRLF

You appear to have implemented the non-standard (but not uncommon)
mdtm = "MdTm" SP [time SP] pathname CRLF

So, I assume that as SmartFTP recognises/supports OpenVMS that someone tests the operation against it? If this is so, didn't anyone else notice this operational characteristic? Couldn't an OpenVMS selection in "server type" cause this type of checking to be ignored? On the other hand, maybe nobody does test against OpenVMS - I did volunteer to do this over two years ago - and I do see that others are having other/similar problems......