It was actually supposed to be v2.2.4, but I mistyped, so here we are. Improves the “Get Item from List” Siri Shortcut by providing icons and subtitles for improved identification of items. It also fixes two crashes, one of which occurred on iOS 15.
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 itâll 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 Transloaderâs 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 thatâs 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.
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’!
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 Transloaderâs Preferences, select Actions, click the + button at the lower left and select Add File Action. Youâll 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 âMove Finder Itemsâ 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, itâs /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 canât 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 âSelect App or Automator workflowâŚâ, and select âGo to Application Scripts Folderâ. Transloader will show a new Open dialog, with the Application Scripts folder pre-selected. Right-click it and select âShow in Finderâ to go there directly, so you can place the workflow youâve just created into it. Afterwards, select the workflow in Transloaderâs Open dialog. Save the Action, and youâre 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 youâd 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!
