Shadow .torrent / Duplicate Prevention

Feature requests not specific to either the Mac OS X or GTK+ versions of Transmission
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ThePowerTool
Posts: 14
Joined: Wed May 29, 2013 4:00 pm

Shadow .torrent / Duplicate Prevention

Post by ThePowerTool »

The way I understand it works now:
1. Select a torrent and it checks torrents/ for file/hash. If the torrent (verified by hash) is present then stop. If no duplicate torrent already exists then download torrent.
2. Select an item from the displayed list of downloading/completed torrents in the Transmission UI and press delete to remove the entry from the UI and delete the associated entry (file) in torrents/. It is also possible to delete all downloaded/associated files.
Note: Step 1 can be repeated without ever risk of a dup torrent (under normal circumstances--I don't know if there are exceptions). If you perform step 2 then step 1 will allow you to re-download a duplicate torrent.
3. If you move a torrent and assoc data offline you have to make sure you store the torrent file manually and keep track of it's location should you ever want to share the torrent again (I'm no expert so if there's a better way please let me know!!).

Because of this I have not deleted any entry in my client UI. The main reason is to avoid accidental duplicates. I'm not going to go into all the scenarios but the most glaring one I've repeatedly seen is I click on one torrent "B" and end up downloading "A" and it displays as "A" becasuse the contents are different from the separate "representation" presented when grabbing the torrent file.

I would really love a cleaner interface (vs. having every torrent I ever downloaded displayed). My suggestion would also have the added benefit of making it easier to re-share a torrent and eliminating the need for me to manually track torrent files.

My request:

In the UI in settings provide a checkbox for "Shadow Delete" so that when it is checked and you press delete on a displayed entry the entry is removed from the displayed list and the torrent file is left in torrents/.

If I click on a duplicate torrent give me a dialog box stating it is a duplicate and allow me to view properties (and see the files list). Also give me the option to download the torrent again and state that the torrent I clicked has the same hash as the torrent in torrents/ (my original downloaded torrent file).

This way you get the following benefits:
1. Better and more thorough capture of duplicate requests with warning and details
2. Cleaner interface--you can now safely remove from the UI your old torrents
3. Easier tracking of torrents for purposes of re-sharing (unless I'm the only person that unshares and then re-shares) while eliminating the need to manually manage/track torrent files associated with files/directories.
4. Migration of torrents-downloaded data--if this is done properly you could back up torrents/ and then place the data in torrents/ under a new version of Transmission and have all of your shadow files from version-to-version permanently eliminating dup-risk.

Does this make sense or am I the only person that has these manual-task issues with the current UI?

I'm no coding expert or I'd have assembled something to demo. I would be happy to volunteer my time for testing.

I look forward to feedback. FYI--this is my first post!!! Also FYI--I searched the forum under multiple terms to see if I could find something similar but only found items that skirted this issue rather than directly addressing it.

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P.S. If you really wanted to go all-out you could make the UI heirarchical like a file browser GUI--of course that comes with it's own set of challenges because just adding the heirarchy leaves a ton of problems around how to find and manage items (partially addressed with folders and click-n-drag). Thinking on this I really see this as secondary to the above changes as they add minor function and significant value.
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