# [solved]No stable/working download manager for Linux

## dE_logics

All known bugs to be have been solved in Retriever-2.0 download manager which is not opensource, but has a monopoly when it comes fully functional download managers for Linux.

Download page - 

http://www.halogenware.com/software/retriever.html

An upcoming version 2 will solve any other known problems atleast to me.

---------original message-----------

It's been a ~year since I've switched to Linux but there's not one download manager which has even come close to the likes of orbit and Flashget.

Requirements - 

1) Pausable downloads

2) Should recover all the downloads and their progress after a crash WITHOUT corrupting 3 anything

4) Multi-segmented

5) Bandwidth control (optional)

6) Should support multiple mirrors

7) Should have a GUI

That's about it.

Here are the various download managers I tries, and what I think about them - 

Gwget -- The Firefox download tool is better!

Kget-4.1.4 -- Violates requirement 2

Aria2 -- CLI, all GUI available make the command line version preferable.

Downloader for x - Seriously I've never seen a more unstable downloader than this, BTW it's no longer compiles in the new gcc.

wxdownload Fast 0.6 - First lets just talk about STARTING the download, then see if it's 'fast'. Point is the downloads stop and resume stop and resume...some sorta error comes by after ever 30th second...there's a bug for this but the project is dormant. In Gentoo this is accompanied by segmentation fault.

Express download manager 0.1 beta - its doesnt support FTP protocols.

axel - natively commandline, no good GUI.

getleft - Does not work...no executable.

uget 1.5 (forced to use currently) - Requirements 2, 4, 5, 6 violated.

multiget 1.2 - You have to manually save the download list, otherwise the newly downloaded files get lost if the program crashes. You cannot select multiple downloads.

Retrever 1.8 -- This was very close to being my ideal download manager, but first of all it's a debate if the piece of software is opensource or proprietary. Wiki says it's proprietary while it's 'about' says it's open source. Problem is, this download manager is maintained by a single dude and it's on his mood if he'll listen to you or not (the guy's name Hayden)...he did fulfill my few queries, but with the 1.8th version, there was a problem with the desktop integration, as a result I did not know how to start the application. Executing the jar file directly consumed 100% cpu and it was very slugging...Hayden did not help me with this, so I had to remove the software.

aget-0.4 -- no gui

emphetamine-0.99.6 -- All requirements except 7 violated.

downman-0.0.5-r1 -- very bad and premature GUI

fetch -- no GUI

urlgfe-1.0.2 -- almost identical to uget with more loss of using it but a bit more features that I don't require. Does not dock to tray. Does not autosave downloads.

mldonkey -- I stumbled upon a major bug and there appears no way it will be fixed in less than 2 years. Project is dormant.

http://savannah.nongnu.org/bugs/?28353

Downloadthemall! -- corrupt downloads are too often.

Anymore to try?Last edited by dE_logics on Wed Dec 23, 2009 8:20 am; edited 1 time in total

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## eccerr0r

(1) You can likely run most windows programs in Wine in Linux -- I'm surprised even WoW runs very well in Wine.  It sounds like this is your best option unfortunately - since -

(2) FTP suspend/resume is an added-on protocol enhancement and there's no widespread support of these protocols.  Not many people want to add on and break the standard protocol.  Since these desirable features are not in the standard protocol,

(3) FTP is becoming obsolete.  Mirrored FTP is becoming rare, most small file distribution is done via HTTP now.  Bittorrent protocols are now becoming the largest replacement for anonymous FTP for large file transfers for several reasons.  Bittorrent has check summing, partial/segmented download, most clients support bandwidth control, shared "mirrors" (and partial mirrors!), most have GUIs -- everything that FTP wishes it could be -- and is one reason why FTP is going out of style.  It has one thing left, just simplicity.

Personally I just use ncftp now if that's the only source.  No GUI, no real auto-mirror suppot, no checksums (traditional ftp protocol does not have end-to-end comparison/correction)... at least you can queue, suspend/resume (as much as it can), etc. -- just that ftp never had true check summing in the RFC protocol.

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## Bircoph

rsync, wget, curl, lftp are sufficient for all needs except GUI.

Yes, no GUI, it sucks, I do not use when not needed.

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## dE_logics

 *eccerr0r wrote:*   

> (1) You can likely run most windows programs in Wine in Linux -- I'm surprised even WoW runs very well in Wine.  It sounds like this is your best option unfortunately - since -
> 
> (2) FTP suspend/resume is an added-on protocol enhancement and there's no widespread support of these protocols.  Not many people want to add on and break the standard protocol.  Since these desirable features are not in the standard protocol,
> 
> (3) FTP is becoming obsolete.  Mirrored FTP is becoming rare, most small file distribution is done via HTTP now.  Bittorrent protocols are now becoming the largest replacement for anonymous FTP for large file transfers for several reasons.  Bittorrent has check summing, partial/segmented download, most clients support bandwidth control, shared "mirrors" (and partial mirrors!), most have GUIs -- everything that FTP wishes it could be -- and is one reason why FTP is going out of style.  It has one thing left, just simplicity.
> ...

 

Ok...FTP is not a necessity, I can do without it. But there are no download managers which satisfy all 6 points.

Orbit failed to run on Wine.

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## dE_logics

Ok...I somehow fixed Retriever.

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## eccerr0r

 *dE_logics wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Ok...FTP is not a necessity, I can do without it. But there are no download managers which satisfy all 6 points.
> 
> Orbit failed to run on Wine.

 

What kind of protocol were you thinking about then?

If you're talking about nonstandard protocols, then Linux always has a disadvantage...

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## dE_logics

No, standard protocols...or actually almost all or it should support the most common protocols.

Retriever supports FTP.

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## dE_logics

And there has always been a bug with retriever...it will stop all of a sudden for a download complaining about various thing...there's verity in it.

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## dE_logics

Actually it wont even complain!...it depends on it's mood. It will stop all of a sudden without any reason.

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## eccerr0r

For file transfers there are only a handful of standard protocols (FTP,HTTP,TFTP; and  some common like bittorrent, irc-DCC,etc.), and only BT supports pretty much all the requested features.  The other protocols do not support chunking/checksumming by RFC.  Resume was an afterthought and there's no real provision in most protocols to ensure file consistency.

BT is the notable exception as it's fairly new.  It accommodates the shortfalls of the older protocols with big files.

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## dE_logics

If the protocol does not support any/1 of the requirements, I'm ok with it, but the download manager should support the required feature if it's in the protocol.

Anyway...flashget also failed.

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## dE_logics

The retriever developer claims to have fixed the issue in Retriever 2...however there is one more.

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## Gef

dE_logics,

There's a request for an jDownloader ebuild. As I don't use it, I don't know if it fulfills your 4 requirements.

https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=297664

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## dE_logics

I did try this, but I don't remember a thing bout it.

I'm testing it.

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## dE_logics

Yeah, I know why I was not able to try this.

```

de@localhost /mnt/media/temp(media)/Jdownloader/JDownloader $ java JDownloader.jar 

Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: JDownloader/jar

Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: JDownloader.jar

   at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(URLClassLoader.java:200)

   at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)

   at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:188)

   at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:303)

   at sun.misc.Launcher$AppClassLoader.loadClass(Launcher.java:301)

   at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:248)

   at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClassInternal(ClassLoader.java:316)

Could not find the main class: JDownloader.jar.  Program will exit.

```

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## dE_logics

Ok, I got it working.

Looks good, though slow...testing.

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## dE_logics

It fails to qualify requirement 2.

But I think there is a solution in the setting...or is there?

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## keenblade

You can try  Free Download Manager under wine (did not try under wine but, in their forums it is said it works under wine). It is my ideal download manager under windows. And the best part, it is now opensourced. Maybe it will be ported to linux. It has everything you can expect from a download manager.

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## dE_logics

I'm giving it a shot. But if jdownloader gets fixed, it'll be great!

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## dE_logics

Nope, it failed to work - 

```
de@localhost ~/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Free Download Manager $ wine fdm.exe

err:module:import_dll Library MFC42.DLL (which is needed by L"C:\\Program Files\\Free Download Manager\\fdm.exe") not found

err:module:LdrInitializeThunk Main exe initialization for L"C:\\Program Files\\Free Download Manager\\fdm.exe" failed, status c0000135
```

Actually there are a few bugs in Retriever sill...a few major bugs which pop up rarely.

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## keenblade

 *dE_logics wrote:*   

> Nope, it failed to work - 
> 
> ```
> de@localhost ~/.wine/drive_c/Program Files/Free Download Manager $ wine fdm.exe
> 
> ...

 

There is  a fix  for mfc42.dll problem using winetricks . 

I looked at the d4x in your list. It really does not compile (d4x-2.5.7.2). Very close to what you (and me) need. It is pitty that it is not developed anymore. 

I prefer aria2 or wget, but will try uget as you mentioned. It seems like the best choice for now.  Since I stay away as much as I can from java apps,  Retrever and jdownloader are eliminated for me.

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## dE_logics

You should try mldonkey, there's just one bug.

Ensure that there're no premature (stopped, or downloaded partially) downloads whild you change the temp directory; otherwise the downloads will be corrupt.

In the mean time, I'm trying to fix wine.

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## dE_logics

FDM looses the whole download list if it's made to crash.

Anway, a few bugs still remain with wine. For e.g. I lost the mouse after starting fdm.

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