Strongspace SFTP and Basecamp - Signal vs. Noise (by 37signals)

Strongspace SFTP and Basecamp 09 Aug 2005

26 comments Latest by Jens Meiert

The good folks at TextDrive just launched a new service called Strongspace. The describe it like this: “Strongspace is a secure place to gather, store, back-up and share any type of file with your co-workers, friends and family. You can upload, download and manage your files over SFTP (Secure FTP) or with any modern web browser.” Basically it’s a SFTP server with a clean web-based UI. The prices are right and the interface is tight. And it’s built with Ruby on Rails.

It’s an especially good fit for people using Basecamp who need some additional storage space. They’ve posted simple instructions for setting up Basecamp to use your Strongspace account and even put together a quicktime video demonstrating the set-up. The signup page also has a spot for your Basecamp URL for future integration between Strongspace and Basecamp.

Well done guys and thanks for making it easy and affordable for Basecamp customers to add additional storage to their account.

26 comments so far (Jump to latest)

Brad 09 Aug 05

This sounds great, but the thing that worries me is that the TextDrive, TextPattern, and even Daily Oliver sites seem to be down quite frequently. In fact I’m getting “cannot find server” messages right now for www.strongspace.com. I want to support them, but I worry about reliability…

Justin French 09 Aug 05

Brad, I assure you, we’re utterly frustrated with the downtime. It’s at the point where we refuse to lease hardware, and refuse to rely on the people that are “looking after” our current servers, so we went out and bought 37 servers of our own, filled them with RAM and RAID5 arrays, and are in the process of setting up our own rack in another data centre.

I won’t make any excuses, but I will say that we take uptime and server performance very seriously.

Thanks, that gives me some confidence! I love the products and services you offer and the downtime issue has been the only thing keeping me from using them!

Matt T. 09 Aug 05

“So a GiB is simply the accurate and slightly larger cousin of the Gigabyte…”

Jeez guys, pretentious much?

emm ess eff 09 Aug 05

Seems like a good take on the ‘hard drive in the sky’ concept. Am I correct in assuming that only Basecamp sites are authorized for remote linking to Strongspace files?

37servers?

Don Wilson 09 Aug 05

That layout looks exactly like a certain service by a certain company.

Emm: Any user with a valid login can view a file on a Strongspace account. There’s no tricky Basecamp > Strongspace handshakes at this stage � BC uploads to SS via SFTP, and SS makes the files available to logged in / authorized users over http.

Jaime Macias 09 Aug 05

That is a fantastic offering, i have my Basecamp account set up with my webserver to do exactly that. The problem i am facing is the file restriction size (10MB). Is there a reason for this, and will it ever be removed. I find myself having to instruct clients how to use the files tab, and then I have to teach them how to use Dropload or traditional FTP in the event the file is too large. In an ideal world i would be able to just use my trustry Basecamp interface. All of that aside congrats to the Textdrive team.

Jaime, there’s no file size restrictions on the SS side of things. I’ve uploaded a 190MiB file over http (the browser interface) without any dramas at all. I can’t speak for BC of course.

Dan Boland 09 Aug 05

I had a feeling someone would come along with a Ruby on Rails file transfer web app. Nice job guys.

Ha, that’s what I thought too. That’s pretty much my only nitpick. Don’t get me wrong, Lucida Grande is a great font, but…

�So a GiB is simply the accurate and slightly larger cousin of the Gigabyte��

Man, sometimes it seems like you can’t say anything without being labeled as pretentious or arrogant. Give them a break, a lot of people have no idea what a GiB is.

Oops, I meant to quote that, um, rude line as well. I don’t think anyone here is pretentious. Yet. ;D

“Give them a break, a lot of people have no idea what a GiB is.”

That was the point. They should just use GB like everyone else, even if “OMG It’s Not Right!”. No need to show off how smart they (think they) are.

Niklas 09 Aug 05

Oh god, I really like TextDrive, but please someone talk them out of using the phrase “military-grade encryption”.

It’s such marketing-speak. Unless Blowfish has been recently certified for classified data, it’s not even true, is it?

Jens Meiert 09 Aug 05

“GiB” is really strange and demands for replacement by “GB”, yes indeed.

Wesley Walser 09 Aug 05

Nice Synergy going on in the online app sectors right now. This is shaping up to be a fun ride.

Ben Tucker 09 Aug 05

This is all very cool, but one thing in that movie made me wince: it looks like they’re submitting the stongspace login info over non-secure http to basecamp. Seems like a pretty weak link in all the security.

Michael Koziarski 09 Aug 05

Ben,

Strongspace logins are only accepted over HTTPS. But it’s true that basecamp is unencrypted on the lower plans.

Matthias L 09 Aug 05

�GiB� is really strange and demands for replacement by �GB�, yes indeed.

You’re kidding, aren’t you? ;) In my opinion there roughly 3 kind of people:

1. The Geek type: Techie people who already know what a GiB is - they won’t suffer from reading GiB instead of GB.

2. The Smart type: The ones that notice that GiB isn’t a typo but a different unit than GB. They will likely find out the difference and hence be a little bit smarter.

3. The non noticing type: Many people just won’t notice the difference between GiB and GB, perhaps thinking its a typo. Again nothing strange here, they will interpret GiB correctly, either.

Never mind.

Three cheers for the Gibibytes!

Matthias

pwb 09 Aug 05

GB > GiB.

Supposed to be “ne” or “!=”. GB is actually less than GiB.

pwb,

That’s why all the units are in GiB, as that the unit we use when measuring usage. I suppose we could just say XGB, and give people XGiB…

Chris Potter 11 Aug 05

“Emm: Any user with a valid login can view a file on a Strongspace account. There�s no tricky Basecamp > Strongspace handshakes at this stage � BC uploads to SS via SFTP, and SS makes the files available to logged in / authorized users over http.”

When will SS and Basecamp support a secure handshake from Bascamp to SS for users who want to download files posted to Basecamp (i.e., posted to the basecamp folder in my strongspace account, but resident on SS)?

Currently, my basecamp users can upload files, but they can’t download files from basecamp without being redirected to an SS login page. I really want to use SS, but can’t until there is seamless transfer to/from basecamp for downloading and uploading.

Justin French 11 Aug 05

Chris, we’re talking with 37s about an API, but it’s not our decision to make. All we can do is make best use of the options we have right now. But it’s worth pointing out that once you login to both SS and BC with “remember me”, there’s no passwords at all. I’ll be writing something more detailed in the SS weblog today, because I’m getting quite a few support tickets about it.

Jens Meiert 15 Aug 05

Huh, was way too fast, apparently. Learned my lesson, thank you, guys! :)