Author's Posts

I’m happy to announce that aside from the Mac App Store, Transloader 3 is now also available on Setapp!

With Transloader, you can start downloads on your Macs, remotely from your iPhone, iPad, and other Macs.

Links

Transloader for Mac on Setapp
Transloader for Mac on the Mac App Store
Transloader for iPhone and iPad on the iOS App Store (free)

More Links

Get to know Transloader 3 – Blog Post Series
Transloader Website
Transloader Usage Tips

Enjoy 😊

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While Transloader is able to download all kinds of file links, it does not directly support downloading videos from YouTube, for example.

That’s where Downie by Charlie Monroe comes in.

Enter Downie

Downie lets you easily download videos from thousands of different sites.
Just copy-paste the link of a video you find on YouTube, or Vimeo – or any number of video hosting sites – to Downie, and it’ll download the video.
It’s that easy.

Downie and Transloader

Use Transloader in combination with Downie, and you can download videos you come across on your iPhones and iPads on a Mac remotely.
Set up a Link Action for YouTube links, and Transloader on Mac will forward those to Downie, which will download them right away.

Setting up a Link Action in Transloader

In Transloader’s preferences, select Actions and add a Link Action. Configure it to launch Downie for links that point to youtube.com:

Now, anytime you assign your Mac a YouTube link with Transloader, the Mac app will forward it to Downie for download:

Quick Tip

To avoid Downie potentially asking for user input while you’re away, open its preferences, select Advanced and select Run in automated mode.

And that’s it!

Get Downie

You can get Downie here (a free trial is available).

Get Transloader

Get Transloader for Mac, iPhone and iPad here (a free trial is available).

For more tips on getting the most out of Transloader, check out the Usage Tips page.

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For my freeware app SiriMote (which lets you control your Mac and its apps with your Apple TV Remote), I created a code-drawn representation of Apple TV’s Siri Remote (versions 2015-2021).

I figured, sharing is caring, so here you go, you can get at it over on GitHub.

It’s written in Objective-C, was built with Xcode 12.5.1 and runs on macOS 10.12.2 and newer.

Enjoy 😊

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With Transloader 3 finally publicly available, I’d like to invite you on a tour through the app and its functionality.
In Part VI, we created custom Link Actions to change Transloader’s behavior for certain links.
In this Part VII, we’re setting up File Actions to operate on certain files, once they’ve been downloaded by Transloader.
It’s so cool you’re here for this – let’s get crackin’!

Table of Contents

Part IStarting Downloads Remotely on Macs
Part IIDive Into Transloader’s iOS App
Part IIITransloader Siri Shortcuts on iPhone and iPad
Part IVPreferences and Settings
Part VLogin to Download
Part VILink Actions
Part VIIFile Actions

Part VII – File Actions

After Transloader has downloaded a file, you might want to do something with it automatically, like moving it into a specific folder, or opening it with an app.
That’s where File Actions come in. You give it a file type it should act upon, and if the downloaded file is of that file type, the app or Automator workflow you’ve selected is executed.
Let’s say we’d like to move downloaded video files into our ~/Movies folder.

Setting up a File Action

Actions are easily set up. Open Transloader’s Preferences, select Actions, click the + button at the lower left and select Add File Action.
You’ll be asked for a bit of input:

You can make File Actions execute for:
– files downloaded from specific hosts (e.g., “eternalstorms.at”)
For hosts, Transloader uses a partial search, so if you were to specify “youtu”, the File Action would apply to all links containing that string, like “youtube.com”, and “youtu.be”
– files with specific extensions (e.g., “zip”)
– files conforming to specific UTIs (e.g., “public.image” – which would make the Action execute for all image files)

In this example (moving downloaded video files into the ~/Movies folder), select “f it conforms to UTI”, and use “public.movie” as its value. It will make Transloader execute this action for all video files it downloads.

Before we click “Select App or Automator workflow…”, though, we need to create the Automator workflow.

Creating an Automator Workflow

Launch Automator, select New from the File menu and choose Workflow. This will save the file in a format Transloader will be able to run as a custom user script later on.

From the left panel, drag over the “Move Finder Items” action, select the Movies folder in the pop up and save the workflow.

For apps in the macOS sandbox to be able to run user-supplied scripts, they need to be placed in a certain directory, functioning as a form of consent of the user for the app to make use of your script.
Each app has its own folder; for Transloader, it’s /Users/yourname/Library/Application Scripts/at.EternalStorms.Transloader/ .
You can either navigate there manually, or let Transloader help you a bit along the way when you set up a File Action. While it can’t place the script into the folder itself (that would totally circumvent the purpose), it can open that somewhat hidden Application Scripts folder for you:

Back in Transloader, click “Select App or Automator workflow…”, and select “Go to Application Scripts Folder”. Transloader will show a new Open dialog, with the Application Scripts folder pre-selected. Right-click it and select “Show in Finder” to go there directly, so you can place the workflow you’ve just created into it. Afterwards, select the workflow in Transloader’s Open dialog. Save the Action, and you’re done.

File Action… in Action
With the File Action set up, anytime Transloader downloads a video file, it’ll be moved to your ~/Movies folder
Simpler File Actions

While most File Actions will likely involve creating Automator workflows (just because it makes it so easy to work with files), there certainly are simpler cases for using File Actions.
For example, if you’d like to open any image file Transloader downloads with Preview.app, it’s easily done:

Wildcards

If you’d like Transloader to forward all downloaded files to one workflow, you can use an asterisk ‘*’ as the host, file extension or UTI.

Exporting and Importing Actions

You might notice that File Actions are local to the Mac you set them up on, and won’t sync across your Macs.
There’s a reason for this: Apps or Automator Workflows you select on one Mac might not be available on another, rendering the actions that use them defunct. Now, I want to improve this with a future update, but up until at least v3.1 (work in progress), that’s just how it is.
However, you can manually export and import actions:

To import Actions on another Mac, double-click the file you’ve exported on it.

For extra convenience, the last 15 values you’ve used in Actions (like “public.movie”, or “zip”) are synced across your Macs, so that when you want to set up similar Actions on different Macs, you won’t have to do everything by hand.

Conclusion

Finally, you know everything there is to know about Transloader 3!
How does it feel? Enlightening? Empowering? Fan-super-freaking-tastic? All of the above? I bet it does.

Thank you for having joined me in this exciting tour through the app. I hope you find it useful, and enjoy it!
Have any feedback or questions? Don’t hesitate to write me!

Links

Transloader Website (with a free, 15-day trial for Mac)
Transloader on the Mac App Store ($4.99 / €5.49 for a limited time)
Transloader on the iOS App Store (free)
Transloader Usage Tips

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