Source : Free On-Line Dictionary of Computing

archive site
     
         (Or "FTP site", "FTP archive") An {Internet}
        {host} where program source, documents, {e-mail} or {news}
        messages are stored for public access via {anonymous FTP},
        {Gopher}, {World-Wide Web} or other document distribution
        system.  There may be several archive sites for e.g. a
        {Usenet} {newsgroup} though one may be recognised as the main
        one.
     
        FTP servers were common on the Internet for many years before
        the {World-Wide Web} (WWW) was invented and are still used in
        preference to web servers for serving large files such as
        software distributions.  This is because FTP is more efficient
        than {HTTP}, the protocol of the WWW.  Many sites therefore
        run both HTTP and FTP servers.
     
        [Is FTP more efficient?  How much more?]
     
        Some well-known archive sites include {Imperial College, UK
        (ftp://src.doc.ic.ac.uk/)}, {UUNET, USA	(ftp://ftp.uu.net/)}.
     
        See also {archie}, {GNU archive site}, {mirror}.
     
        (1998-07-02)