ftp, but no apt-get

[tf <hmf@softhome.net>]

howdy guys,

my little saga  continues.  using cftp, I'm able to access my website's remote directory, but while connected, can still not use 
apt-get to build a system.

Can I just ftp packages to some directory on my machine, then dselect them from there? can't think of how to say this, but how 
do you associate an ip address with a name?  getting to my website I used the dotted quad.. (how could I specify debian's ftp 
address? using ftp://us.debian.org/debian results in a hostname lookup failure)

also, I don't have mail set up yet, so how could I give it  to debian's ftp site as a password? and can I ftp sets of packages? (not 
using the normal procedures of apt and dselect, just an ftp client?)

working on it...


-tf