Arch Linux

eilenbeb

Member

Registered: 2009-03-08

Posts: 46

Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

...but I can't remember what it would be called.

Essentially, it's a GUI for decompressors.  The key feature is that it reads the index of a compressed file on the web (with dir structure) and one can simply download selected files/dirs.  I've not seen anything like this in a long time.

(I used to use one -heavily- back in the modem days, heh)
Anyways, I just came across a situation where such a tool would be usefull, but I haven't a clue where to start looking.

Oh, yeah.  You could also 'preview' files (like readme's and changelogs...  Kinda handy, that).

Not really an issue, but if any of these tools're still floating around...  Any ideas anyone?

Last edited by eilenbeb (2014-05-12 17:41:55)

karol

Archivist

Registered: 2009-05-06

Posts: 25,440

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

Please edit the title to make it more informative.
What is the use case? You don't want to download the whole file?

WorMzy

Administrator

From: Scotland

Registered: 2010-06-16

Posts: 13,723

Website

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

Are you sure you're not thinking of torrents? I can't remember anything like this for archives, and I can't see how it would work on a out-of-the-box webserver. Could this have been functionality offered by a specific website, or group of websites?

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Awebb

Member

Registered: 2010-05-06

Posts: 6,688

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

I remember something like that. It was basically a cgi script, that fetched a package, displayed the file tree as HTML and you could download single files and folders. It was a very handy thing, back then when having a server was cheaper than having a good landline. I'll subscribe to this thread, I think this would be perfect for mobile use. If I can remember the name, I'll let you know.

eilenbeb

Member

Registered: 2009-03-08

Posts: 46

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

Ok, I've tried to respond but I keep getting logged out before I can post.  I'm gonna post this as it is and fill in the rest with edits.

@karol:  Done.  I hope that's little bit better anyways.  And, yeah, my connection's gonna be limmited for a while, see below.

@WorMzy:  If the tool used torrents it was well disguised (no torrent file, only one connection, etc).  Seemed to work on most any .zip on the net, and a few other formats as well.
I always thought it used ftp/html 'resume' feature to grab the right portions of the file.  This tool seemed to work wherever resuming worked.

Last edited by eilenbeb (2014-05-12 18:34:34)

ewaller

Administrator

From: Pasadena, CA

Registered: 2009-07-13

Posts: 20,722

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

Ok, I've tried to respond but I keep getting logged out before I can post.  I'm gonna post this as it is and fill in the rest with edits.

I create long posts in emacs and paste them here in one fell swoop.

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eilenbeb

Member

Registered: 2009-03-08

Posts: 46

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

@Awebb:  Could've been a script with a wrapper? I was using the windows version on one of them, but I also remember seeing tarballs available.

@ewaller:  Haha yeah, not enough coffee this morning yet.

Ok, so some background.  Timeframe would've been somewhere 1994 - '98.  My coding assignments usually required some kind of SDK or DDK, usually from MS.  The local connection was mostly crappy dialup and -not- 56k.
Usually all I needed was the header files from the K's.  I wasted DAYS trying to get what I needed until I found this tool.

Anyways, this is a new laptop build, and it's nowhere near ready.  I'm gonna be on a boat for 3 months away from any decent internet connection (hotspots only)
Here's an example:  Let's say I forget something important from the AUR.  I can grab the tarball, grab the source's indexes, and disconnect.  Then I can take my time stripping out what I don't need like translations, manuals, xtra themes, etc.  Then I can reconnect, dl just what I need, and build.  Usefull, huh?

(Ok,all done editing)

Last edited by eilenbeb (2014-05-12 18:49:16)

drcouzelis

Member

From: Connecticut, USA

Registered: 2009-11-09

Posts: 4,092

Website

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

I was doing some research on the Pale Moon web browser when I happened to discover the firefox-archview package, which is a "Firefox extension to open archive files online without downloading the whole archive". Is that what you were looking for?

Awebb

Member

Registered: 2010-05-06

Posts: 6,688

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

@Awebb:  Could've been a script with a wrapper? I was using the windows version on one of them, but I also remember seeing tarballs available.

I don't really know, I never installed it myself, only used it on a pal's server.

eilenbeb

Member

Registered: 2009-03-08

Posts: 46

Re: Looking for a web tool... Download portions of an archive on the web

firefox-archview sounds good, but sadly it doesn't work.  It's outdated, unmaintained and only seems to work with -very- old versions of firefox.
I guess high speed internet kinda killed the need for such a thing...

Still, I'm gonna keep looking.  Maybe some external downloader somewhere has such a feature.