Talk:FlashGot

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Perhaps it's just me but neither this entry nor the FlashGot homepage seems to clearly explain to me why this program is needed. Why is download management needed beyond what Firefox already offers. Existing explanations seems to not to offer any concrete, easily understood benefits. Dixon pete 13:08, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I also am sort of perplexed as to what Flashgot is for. Even searching can't seem to come up with any explanation of what it does that my download manager can't do .

It's popularity is a mystery to me, as well. I'm still not exactly sure what it does or why it's needed. I use FlashGot as a middle-man for GetRight, as it's unable to detect downloads in Firefox. As far as download managers are concerned, some files are capable of being received quicker through them by splitting files into multiple parts. Aside from that, I'm convinced FlashGot is a communist myth. —Ortchel 04:51, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Agreed agreed agreed. I downloaded FlashGot once because it seemed so popular and it was completely useless - I got rid of it in no time. I came here for some answers like all of you - alas! Maybe this extension is some kind of practical joke or something, but I notice that it is STILL available! Bizzare - I thought only Microsoft programs had these kinds of useless features. --DreamsReign 12:06, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
I've used Flashgot for the grand total of half an hour now so I'm no expert but this is what it does to my understanding -
  • Adds FireFox support for download managers that don't have it - and by running as a browser Addon, it makes some of the other tricks/hacks redundant eg. some download managers may hook the OS and monitor the clipboard for potential URLs, this in turn improves portability ie. it becomes possible to say run Getright in WINE on a Linux box and use Flashgot as the "glue" to a native binary Firefox (without this glue, getright wouldn't be able interface correctly with the non-WINE firefox (I think))
  • passes session cookies/referrer URL to download managers that support it (NB: some sites deny download if a cookie is absent or based on the referrer HTTP value)
  • it interfaces firefox to non-gui downloaders cURL and wget which are otherwise a pain to use for us lazy GUI kiddies!
* Probably more, I don't know.......... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.242.17.174 (talk) 07:16, 13 March 2008 (UTC)