As a rule, we only deploy websites from Subversion and this is something that we made company policy long ago. However, there are times when we are limited to FTP access and for these occasions it’s good to have a decent FTP client. Panic’s Transmit has, for a long time, set the standard for FTP clients on Mac OS X.
It’s been five years since Panic released Transmit 3 and the software has definitely held it’s ground. However, success hasn’t made Panic complacent, they’ve just released Transmit 4 and it’s packed full of improvements. The UI has been completely re-imagined and all your favourite functionality has been made cleaner and more streamline. Transmit now features Amazon S3 support and even allows you to send commands over SSH.
The two biggest changes in Transmit are the speed and the new Disk feature. As far as FTP clients go, Transmit is fast. Panic claims that Transmit 4 is up to 25 times faster than Transmit 3 when it comes to downloads. I haven’t benchmarked it myself but there is definitely a noticeable difference when it comes to browsing. The Transmit Disk feature allows you to mount any of your favourites in Finder. Even without Transmit running you can drag files straight onto the Disk an it’ll be uploaded.
For existing Transmit users this upgrade is a “must have”. For all other OS X users, if you need an FTP client, give Transmit a go. More detail available on the Transmit page.