NAME

paraget - parallel file get

SYNOPSIS

  paraget [options] --mirror-set name filepath

EXAMPLES

  paraget --mirror-set cpan modules/by-module/XML/XML-Parser-2.29.tar.gz

DESCRIPTION

paraget implements getting a single file in parallel from different mirror sites.

The first time you run paraget, it will download a list of mirrors for various mirror-sets, such as CPAN and Debian from paraget's anonymous FTP space.

ARGUMENTS

filepath: Path to a file underneath the root of a mirrored tree.
--mirror-set name: Name of a mirror set. See ".paraget/mirror-sets/"" in "~ for more information.

OPTIONS

--size filesize: In order to eliminate the step of determining the filesize of the file to retrieve, one can pass it in as an argument. This is most likely to be used if paraget is called in an automated fashion.
--tmpdir directory: Use directory for temporary files. Falls back to $TMPDIR, then /tmp.

PERFORMANCE TIPS

In order to use the best mirrors for you, you should remove what you think are probably bad mirrors in your mirror-sets-files, those in ~/.paraget/mirror-sets/.

HEURISTIC

Currently, the heuristic paraget uses to choose how to assign servers to intervals is done by assigning the fastest server to the interval that is taking the longest to complete.

FILES

~/.paraget/mirror-sets/: The default directory for finding mirror sets. Underneath this should be files named as mirror sets, which each file containing a list of URL's that are mirrors for a particular tree. Lines can be commented out using hash-marks (#).

Examples

This could be for CPAN: ~/.paraget/mirror-sets/cpan:

  ftp://ftp.cpan.org/pub/CPAN
  ftp://download.sourceforge.net/pub/mirrors/CPAN

TODO

Implement persistent records-keeping, so that the speed of servers is remembered across sessions. Perhaps this could be offered as an online-service, so that each paraget install would not have to learn it on its own.

Heuristic tweaking/modularity

The heuristics that paraget uses are very hokey.

HTTP support

Currently, only FTP is supported; HTTP supports GET's with a file offset, so we should be able to add this easily.

KNOWN BUGS

Intervals sometimes have negative intervals; parget dies horribly.

Sometimes doesn't complete getting a file; stalls near the end. Just give up and kill paraget. We're very sorry.

Currently, we leave a dirty mess in the temporary directory. This could be used if we implemented re-getting of files, but since we don't, we should clean up after ourselves.

ABOUT

The homepage of this program is http://paraget.sourceforge.net/

COPYRIGHT

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, visit the following URL: http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html