MAMP Pro OS X Lion FTP - Cannot Find wp-content directory

Question

I am trying to develop a WordPress theme locally on my Mac (running OS X 10.7.3) running MAMP Pro, and am having trouble utilizing FTP.

I know in 10.7, FTP has been deprecated, but was able to get FTP up and running via this tutorial: http://osxdaily.com/2011/09/29/start-an-ftp-or-sftp-server-in-mac-os-x-lion/

Now, it accepts the FTP credentials, but says it cannot find the wp-content directory.

Via MAMP Pro, I've got it setup with a bunch of subdomains. For example this wp install is at something like this:

wptest.ryankeefer.computername.local

I'm wondering if it is trying to find the wp-content dir at "ryankeefer.computername.local" rather than where it's actually at (wptest.ryankeefer.computername.local). Any ideas on how to get it pointed to the right place?

I can obviously get around the FTP portion for adding and upgrading plugins to the wp-content/plugins/ directory directly, but would like to have the FTP option as well.

Answer 1

To find a folder on your filesystem open the Terminal.app then run (omitting $):

$ find / -name "wp-content" -type d

Or since you're looking for the wp-content for wptest:

$ find / -name "wp-content" -type d | grep -i wptest

Alternatively you could look for MAMP's httpd.conf file, open it in your favorite editor, and locate the DocumentRoot path for the subdomain you're trying to access:

$ find / -name "httpd.conf" -type f

Take the path that is returned and paste that in to your FTP client's path bar, or use Finder to browse to that path.

As a recommendation, I think you'd be better served by not FTP'ing to your local machine unless you have some fancy reason for doing so. FTP by itself is insecure, deprecated and moving forward I'd recommend you enable Remote Login (under System Settings -> Sharing) and transfer files using SCP... though I'd just use Finder, or point your editor directly to the path of your development environment.