At first glance it looks like Apple has removed the FTP server support in Lion. But if you dig a little deeper you’ll find that the only thing that has really been removed is the GUI related to the FTP server.

Here’s how you can start the FTP server in Mac OS X Lion:

1. Open a terminal window.
2. Type in the following command:

sudo -s launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/ftp.plist

3. To turn it off, type in the following command:

sudo -s launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/ftp.plist