NAME
bittorrent-downloader — download files using a scatter-gather network
SYNOPSIS
btdownloadheadless [options ...] URL
btdownloadheadless [options ...] filename
btdownloadcurses [options ...] URL
btdownloadcurses [options ...] filename
btdownloadgui [options ...] URL
btdownloadgui [options ...] filename
btlaunchmany [options ...] directory
btlaunchmanycurses [options ...] directory
DESCRIPTION
This manual page documents briefly the options available to the
bittorrent-downloader commands.
This manual page was written for the Debian distribution because the
original program does not have a manual page.
btdownloadheadless, btdownloadcurses, btdownloadgui, btlaunchmany, and
btlaunchmanycurses are all programs that allow a user to download files
using bittorrent, a peer to peer, scatter-gather network protocol. They
all share a common set of options, shown below. For more information on
how to run them, and their program-specific options, see their
individual man pages.
OPTIONS
These programs follow the usual GNU command line syntax, with long
options starting with two dashes (‘--’). A summary of options is
included below.
--max_uploads number
the maximum number of uploads to allow at once (defaults to
7)
--keepalive_interval seconds
the number of seconds to pause between sending keepalives
(defaults to 120.0)
--download_slice_size bytes
the number of bytes to query for per request (defaults to
16384)
--upload_unit_size bytes
when limiting the upload rate, the number of bytes to send at
a time (defaults to 1460)
--request_backlog number
the maximum number of requests to keep in a single pipe at
once (defaults to 10)
--max_message_length length
the maximum length prefix encoding you’ll accept over the
wire. Larger values will get the connection dropped.
(defaults to 8388608)
--ip ip the ip to report you have to the tracker (defaults to ’’)
--minport port
the minimum port to listen on (defaults to 10000)
--maxport port
the maximum port to listen on (defaults to 60000)
--random_port 0|1
whether to choose randomly inside the port range (instead of
counting up linearly from min to max) (defaults to 1)
--responsefile file
the file the server response was stored in, as an alternative
to --url. If this option is used, no filename or URL should
be present on the command line. (defaults to ’’)
--url URL the URL to get the torrent file from, as an alternative to
--responsefile. If this option is used, no filename or URL
should be present on the command line. (defaults to ’’)
--crypto_allowed 0|1
whether to allow the client to accept encrypted connections.
(defaults to 1 if python-crypto is installed, 0 otherwise)
--crypto_only 0|1
whether to only create or allow encrypted connections.
(defaults to 0)
--crypto_stealth 0|1
whether to prevent all non-encrypted connection attempts;
will result in an effectively firewalled state on older
trackers. (defaults to 0)
--selector_enabled 0|1
whether to enable the file selector and fast resume function
(defaults to 1)
--expire_cache_data days
the number of days after which you wish to expire old cache
data (0 = disabled) (defaults to 10)
--priority -1|0|1|2[,-1|0|1|2 ...]
a list of file priorities, separated by commas. There must be
one per file. 0 = highest, 1 = normal, 2 = lowest, -1 =
download disabled. Order is based on the file/torrent order
as shown by btshowmetainfo. For example, to download only the
third of four files use: --priority -1,-1,2,-1 (defaults to
’’)
--saveas filename
the local filename to save the file as, null indicates query
user (defaults to ’’)
--timeout seconds
the number of seconds to wait between closing sockets which
nothing has been received on (defaults to 300.0)
--timeout_check_interval seconds
the number of seconds to wait between checking if any
connections have timed out (defaults to 60.0)
--max_slice_length length
the maximum length slice to send to peers, larger requests
are ignored (defaults to 131072)
--max_rate_period seconds
the maximum number of seconds to use in guessing what the
current rate estimate represents (defaults to 20.0)
--bind ip|hostname[,ip|hostname ...]
a comma-separated list of ips and hostnames to bind to
locally (defaults to ’’)
--ipv6_enabled 0|1
whether to allow the client to connect to peers via IPv6
(defaults to 0)
--ipv6_binds_v4 0|1
set if an IPv6 server socket won’t also field IPv4
connections (defaults to 0)
--upload_rate_fudge seconds
the time equivalent in seconds of writing to kernel-level TCP
buffer, for rate adjustment (defaults to 5.0)
--tcp_ack_fudge overhead
how much TCP ACK download overhead to add to upload rate
calculations (0 = disabled) (defaults to
0.029999999999999999)
--display_interval seconds
the number of seconds between updates of displayed
information (defaults to 0.5)
--rerequest_interval seconds
the number of seconds between requesting more peers (defaults
to 300)
--min_peers number
make tracker requests every --rerequest_interval until this
number has been reached, then switch to the standard longer
interval (defaults to 20)
--http_timeout seconds
the number of seconds to wait before assuming that an http
connection has timed out (defaults to 60)
--max_initiate number
the number of peers at which to stop initiating new
connections (defaults to 40)
--check_hashes 0|1
whether to check hashes on disk (defaults to 1)
--max_upload_rate kB/s
the maximum kB/s to upload at (0 = no limit, -1 = automatic)
(defaults to 0)
--max_download_rate kB/s
the maximum kB/s to download at (0 = no limit) (defaults to
0)
--alloc_type normal|background|pre-allocate|sparse
the allocation type (may be ’normal’, ’background’, ’pre-
allocate’ or ’sparse’) (defaults to ’normal’)
--alloc_rate MiB/s
the rate (in MiB/s) to allocate space at using background
allocation (defaults to 2.0)
--buffer_reads 0|1
whether to buffer disk reads (defaults to 1)
--write_buffer_size space
the maximum amount of space to use for buffering disk writes
(in megabytes, 0 = disabled) (defaults to 4)
--breakup_seed_bitfield 0|1
whether to send an incomplete bitfield and then ’have’
messages, in order to get around stupid ISP manipulation
(defaults to 1)
--snub_time seconds
the number of seconds to wait for data to come in over a
connection before assuming it’s semi-permanently choked
(defaults to 30.0)
--spew 0|1
whether to display diagnostic info to stdout. This option is
not very useful when using the curses or gui interfaces.
(defaults to 0)
--rarest_first_cutoff number
the number of downloads at which to switch from random to
rarest first (defaults to 2)
--rarest_first_priority_cutoff number
the number of peers which need to have a piece before other
partials take priority over rarest first (defaults to 5)
--min_uploads number
the number of uploads to fill out to with extra optimistic
unchokes (defaults to 4)
--max_files_open number
the maximum number of files to keep open at a time, 0 means
no limit (defaults to 50)
--round_robin_period seconds
the number of seconds between the client switching upload
targets (defaults to 30)
--super_seeder 0|1
whether to use special upload-efficiency-maximizing routines
(only for dedicated seeds) (defaults to 0)
--security 0|1
whether to enable extra security features intended to prevent
abuse (defaults to 1)
--max_connections number
the absolute maximum number of peers to connect with (0 = no
limit) (defaults to 0)
--auto_kick 0|1
whether to allow the client to automatically kick/ban peers
that send bad data (defaults to 1)
--double_check 0|1
whether to double-check data being written to the disk for
errors (may increase CPU load) (defaults to 1)
--triple_check 0|1
whether to thoroughly check data being written to the disk
(may slow disk access) (defaults to 0)
--lock_files 0|1
whether to lock files the client is working with (defaults to
1)
--lock_while_reading 0|1
whether to lock access to files being read (defaults to 0)
--auto_flush minutes
the number of minutes between automatic flushes to disk (0 =
disabled) (defaults to 0)
--dedicated_seed_id code
the code to send to a tracker, identifying as a dedicated
seed (defaults to ’’)
--save_options 0|1
whether to save the current options as the new default
configuration for the current program (defaults to 0)
SEE ALSO
The single torrent downloaders: btdownloadheadless(1),
btdownloadcurses(1), btdownloadgui(1).
The multiple torrent downloaders: bittorrent-multi-downloader(1),
btlaunchmany(1), btlaunchmanycurses(1).
The bittorrent tracker: bttrack(1).
The torrent file creators: btmakemetafile(1), btmaketorrentgui(1),
btcompletedir(1), btcompletedirgui(1).
The torrent file modifiers: btcopyannounce(1), btreannounce(1),
btrename(1), btsethttpseeds(1).
The torrent file displayer: btshowmetainfo(1).
AUTHOR
This manual page was written by Cameron Dale <camrdale@gmail.com>
(based on the original man pages written by Micah Anderson
<micah@debian.org>) for the Debian system (but may be used by others).
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
under the terms of the GNU General Public License, Version 2 or any
later version published by the Free Software Foundation.
On Debian systems, the complete text of the GNU General Public License
can be found in /usr/share/common-licenses/GPL.
bittorrent-downloader.bittornado(1)