virtualbox.org

I have a Win 8.1 PC on which I am running VirtualBox with a Windows 7 VM.
I'd like to run an FTP server on the VM, and obviously allow connections to it from the WAN
I have followed the guide at howtogeek. com / 122641 / how-to-forward-ports-to-a-virtual-machine-and-use-it-as-a-server/ (remove spaces) but I cannot get it to work.
I chose to leave it at NAT, but haven't tried the 'bridge' method because I really don't know what I am doing, so felt I ought to seek advice first.

My FTP server is running on port 21

Many thanks in advance.

From the article you linked (http://www.howtogeek.com/122641/how-to- ... -a-server/):

"in bridged mode, the virtual machine will appear as a separate device on your network and have its own IP address."

So, you wouldn't have any port forwarding, only to figure out the actual IP address that is assigned to your guest by your router. Come to think of it...

What is your setup? Does it look like this?

ISP <-> Modem <-> Host <-> Guest

If so, the article talks about the green <-> portion of your setup. You may have to configure your modem to do the port forwarding as well (the red <-> part)...

We run Filezilla on a guest at work, using a shared folder on the host as the ftp folder. I used "bridged" for the Virtualbox network flavor - the guest got an IP form the network, then I set the guest to a static IP with the same subnet & gateway as the rest of the network. I then opened port 21 in the router and pointed it at the guest's static IP address. Voila! We got FTP.

Excellent - thanks gentleman

Just needed 24 hours away from it, plus some guidance as to where to look, and it's now working.

Essentially, I did as Scott suggested. Ran the VM in bridge mode, got the IP, made it static, configured the router to port forward FTP to it, then shared to a folder on the host using a UNC path. Bit of fiddling in my server, 'Xlight' (share permissions) and it's now working.

Again, to you all, my grateful thanks