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Modern TLS is less complicated than SSH, but even if it weren't, running two competing cryptographic transports is more complicated than just running one.

SFTP also provides what is in effect a shell (or, charitably, a remote filesystem), baked into the protocol. For example, SFTP has SETSTAT, which lets you set file attributes. None of what SFTP allows you to do is particularly difficult in HTTP (some of them are made harder by browsers, but that argument doesn't cary any weight since SFTP already requires you to use something other than a browser), but at the same time, none of them need to be baked into a file transfer protocol, either.



If you only want file uploads, sure, but that's not all FTP is used for - if you do just want file uploads, sure POST to your hearts content.

But designing a HTTP API to implement the function that FTP gives you sounds like madness.




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