[CLUE-Tech] Looking for GUI download manager

[Collins Richey]

On Thu, 14 Oct 2004 13:45:25 -0600, George Gammel <ggammel1 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Joe "Zonker" Brockmeier"
> To: <clue-tech at clue.denver.co.us>
> Sent: Thursday, October 14, 2004 6:32 AM
> Subject: Re: [CLUE-Tech] Looking for GUI download manager
> 
> > On Wed, 13 Oct 2004 22:19:47 -0600, George Gammel  wrote:
> >
> > > I have a Windows program I use called GetRight.  It lets me put in a
> text
> > > file a list of URL's to download and the filename to save each to.  I
> can
> > > also set a schedule to do a daily download of this this.  I'm using this
> for
> > > downloading web based pages containing daily commodities market prices.
> I'm
> > > trying to find something in Linux to do this same function.
> >
> > Have you tried KGet? (http://kget.sourceforge.net/) I think it would
> > probably do what you're looking for, and should be included with most
> > recent distros that bundle KDE. I'm sitting at a Mandrake 10.1 machine
> > at the moment, and it was part of the default install. It also
> > integrates with Konqueror, which can be pretty handy.
> 
> Sounds like a workable idea, but I seem to be "stuck" with using Mandrake
> 8.2 (which uses KDE 2.2 and doesn't include Kget - I think).  For whatever
> reason, I just can't get Mandrake 10.0 to install.  It won't boot off the
> CD, so I have to use the boot floppy method.  And that just won't find the
> SCSI cdrom.  It appears to try to use the same SCSI driver that Mandrake 8.2
> uses, but it will not work.  Obviously, the driver is somehow different.  I
> don't seem to find any other way to update to Mandrake 10.0.  Any
> suggestions?
> 
> I thought about trying to download and install KDE 3.3 (which would probably
> include Kget), but I think my chances of successfully doing that are quite
> slim.  I have had pretty poor results in trying to download and install any
> new software.  I'm sure my lack of experience is partly at fault.
> 

Your best (tm) solution, as already proposed, is to craft your own
script to invoke wget. This has several advantages:

1. It's the unix/linux way - combining simple tools/filters to
accomplish a complex task.
2. You code it you know how it works. This gives your the opportunity
to become proficient in shell/perl/python/php (pick your poison)
scripting.
3. Once you have it working in batch mode, you can invoke it from
cron. Just be sure you haven't made any assumptions about paths,
environment, etc. that will break when invoked from cron.

Off topic advertisement: your woes about getting your distro upgraded
for a new version of (pick a package) sound remotely (my memory only
goes back so far) familiar. That's why I switched to Gentoo years ago.
If continuous upgrade of your system without need to reinstall is
important to you and you can live with lengthy compile times (an
overnight process) for major packages like kde, checkout Gentoo. It
also helps if you have broadband access; it's a little more painful
with classic dialup.

-- 
 /\/\
(CR) Collins Richey
 \/\/        "I hear you're single again." "Spouse 2.0 had fewer bugs than
              Spouse 1.0, but the maintenance ... was too much for my OS."
                  - Glitch (tm)