Download Ninja (Official Updates Thread)

[MikeD]

Is there any way you could raise the thread count per download even higher? Currently DN maxes out at about 3.5 MB/s at the max threads, Eagleget supports up to 32 threads per download which gets me to my download cap of 7 MB/s.

Yup, that's easy enough

Also, is there a way you could have DN auto-start upon starting a download? Currently it gives out an error message about DN not being open, it would be handy if DN just opened itself upon downloading something when DN is not currently running.

I've thought about this but because of how the browser extensions work there is no non-invasive way of doing this that I can think of. Google for example specifically want's to keep you away from any system level stuff which is understandable, extensions should not be able to launch system apps. The technology that IDM uses for example in Chrome is being phased out over the coming Chrome versions so it will be interesting to see how they deal with it.

One way to deal with it would be to have a Windows service running in the background but I don't really like that idea as it takes up system resources and also makes any sort of portable version near impossible as some installation would need to take place to install the service.

Anyway I'll have a think and see what I can come up with.

 

[MikeD]

Is there Internet Explorer support now?

No, not yet, I need to look at adding that

Congrats.
This is definitely developing fast & feature rich.
Definitely one of the best free/paid download manager.
No beta are released but must say I have found all the versions quite stable with no major prob.

Thanks, I'm going to start releasing Beta versions I think.

Does it shows file size with the quality of video now?

No, and this wouldn't be easy to do as Google does not provide that information without actually requesting the file.. it would be possible to get but the parsing would take quite a bit longer.

Does it shows hidden format of Youtube? If yes, I think there should be an option to not show hidden formats as many users dont know that hidden formats are audio only/video only & need to be merged to play them.

I tried to make the Youtube section as simple as possible and there is some logic in the back end to try to get the closest video available to the format/resolution selected but it might be an idea to add an option to see all available formats.

I find the GUI dark & little big. Though the size can be adjusted but whole info is not visible then & you have to slide it that I dont like. I think it would be better if the GUI size is little small & download window should have show details/info tab that would show more details that would be better compared to sliding. As I said I find GUI dark so waiting for the themes that you promised which would solve my prob & many others too.

Yes themes will be coming at some point.. I'm looking forward to seeing what sort of colour schemes people come up with

 

[MikeD]

It would be good if the download summary window when clicked opens GUI to show downloads progress.
It would be good if there is an option to automatically remove completed downloads from the downloads list.

I like both these, will add them to the list

What happens to incomplete/stopped/paused downloads?
I mean do they appear in the download folder? If yes, then I think it would be better if they are hidden or any other way you think would be better to avoid mess/mix of completed & incompleted downloads in the downloads folder.

Well at the min they are stored in the same folder, non-hidden, the idea is that when downloading things like a long video you can start to watch the video before the download is complete.. I could add an option to hide non-complete downloads though.

 

[MikeD]

I dont understand how your video downloads work?
I am selecting mp4 & 720p.
It downloads the original video & then converts but media info shows the resolution for the converted file as the same as the original file i.e 360p & not 720p. Even if the file is converted to 720p, the quality would remain the same i.e 360p or decrease, just the height/width increased, right?

If the original video is only available in 360p for example it will not attempt to convert it to 720p as that would be pointless, but if the video has a higher resolution available, say 720p and you select a resolution of 360p it will attempt to download the closest resolution and then convert if needed.

Previously it was good where you can directly select what resolution you want to download & that would give real 720p or HD mp4 videos.
And converting these mp4 to other formats mkv, etc... will affect the quality or not?

I've tried to make the design a lot more simple giving fewer options but I could add an option to show all available media so you can actually select which one you want before hand.

Now rightclick download with DN on video is not working, its giving html file. Previously it was correctly showing all the available resolutions.

Can you please give some examples of this?

 

[MikeD]

Uses a lot of memory

This is a Microsoft garbage collection thing more than anything else I think. MS .NET tents to keep a lot in memory automatically if you have quite a bit of free space to use, the theory being that it doesn't have to spend time re-allocating later on and if that space is available then why not use it.

DN does use a little more than usual though due to the overhead of the WPF but I'll see if I can do anything to keep it in check.

 

[Petrovic]

Download Ninja Changelog
build 13 (July 18 2014)
Fixes

• Fixed auto-update crash when start minimized is selected

build 12 (July 18 2014)
Fixes

• Update to compensate for change in YouTube video algorithm
• Corrected version number checker in auto-update

http://downloadninja.com/changelog/

 

[hopefully_secure]

Yup, that's easy enough



I've thought about this but because of how the browser extensions work there is no non-invasive way of doing this that I can think of. Google for example specifically want's to keep you away from any system level stuff which is understandable, extensions should not be able to launch system apps. The technology that IDM uses for example in Chrome is being phased out over the coming Chrome versions so it will be interesting to see how they deal with it.

One way to deal with it would be to have a Windows service running in the background but I don't really like that idea as it takes up system resources and also makes any sort of portable version near impossible as some installation would need to take place to install the service.

Anyway I'll have a think and see what I can come up with.

I see. I don't know how Eagleget does it but I'm guessing they do what IDM does and it will be phased out of Chrome as you said. Thanks for the response!

 

[MikeD]

Thanks to everyone who reported issues in the last 24 hours.. I've just released an update (build 17) that includes the following:

http://get.downloadninja.com

build 17 (July 19 2014)

Enhancements

• Increase max download connections to 32
• Option to auto remove completed downloads
• Double click on download summary to open main window
• Added file extension list for clipboard URL checking
• Added media website list for clipboard URL checking
• Re-enabled download media formats in Chrome/Firefox extensions
• Media selector in add media download screen
• Check for updates button on about page

Fixes

• Main download queue does not auto start after upgrade (fixed for upgrades, existing users need to manually enable in settings)
• Fixed crash when verifying download if main window hidden on startup
• Removed virtualized list entries as they don’t display properly on some systems
• Changed how ‘Hide Main Window at startup’ option works to resolve several related crashes
  
• General bug fixes

 

[Ink]

Question, is DN still Beta?

 

[MikeD]

I suppose technically yes it is.. I've done a lot of testing myself but its impossible for one developer to properly test across multiple platforms and scenarios.

Feature wise its pretty much there now apart from maybe translations and the theme builder/editor so I'm fairly sure over the next month all the remaining kinks should be ironed out.

After that time I suppose it could be considered to be stable.

 

[MikeD]

Once we reach that point of stability I'll start releasing two versions of the system

1) Latest Stable (only minor bug fixes to be included)
2) Latest Beta (current development version with new features)

As I'm now in bug fixing / tweaking phase I'm not bothering with that at the moment but I suspect that from next month that will be the case.

 

[Deleted member 2913]

No, and this wouldn't be easy to do as Google does not provide that information without actually requesting the file.. it would be possible to get but the parsing would take quite a bit longer.

I tried to make the Youtube section as simple as possible and there is some logic in the back end to try to get the closest video available to the format/resolution selected but it might be an idea to add an option to see all available formats.

It would be good if file size is shown with the quality. It gives a better idea to decide the downloads & helpful for users with limited bandwidth & slow internet.

By all available formats, do you mean hidden formats? If yes, then add an option to hide hidden formats of Youtube as I read that hidden formats are video only & audio only & need to be merged to play. Many users may not know this.

Well at the min they are stored in the same folder, non-hidden, the idea is that when downloading things like a long video you can start to watch the video before the download is complete.. I could add an option to hide non-complete downloads though.

It would be good to add an option to hide non-complete downloads plus with an option "check if a download with the same url exists", this will ask to resume or restart the downloads. The downloads will be resumed or restarted & after download completion, hidden non-complete file will be available as it was downloaded completely now.

If the original video is only available in 360p for example it will not attempt to convert it to 720p as that would be pointless, but if the video has a higher resolution available, say 720p and you select a resolution of 360p it will attempt to download the closest resolution and then convert if needed.



I've tried to make the design a lot more simple giving fewer options but I could add an option to show all available media so you can actually select which one you want before hand.



Can you please give some examples of this?

The converter thing is really confusing.
Even if a particular Youtube video has only 360p, then too in DN you can select 720p & DN downloads the 360p file & starts converting. Users may think that DN converted it to 720p, but its not, this is confusing.

The above in bold is better.

What I meant was, previously when I rightclicked on video clip & clicked download with DN then GUI use to open & when clicked on check for the media then all the available media/resolutions were shown. But this was not working in build 13 i,e DN was downloading html file.

Rightclick on video clip, click on download with DN & DN will show all the available media with file size - This would be good.

I suppose technically yes it is.. I've done a lot of testing myself but its impossible for one developer to properly test across multiple platforms and scenarios.

Feature wise its pretty much there now apart from maybe translations and the theme builder/editor so I'm fairly sure over the next month all the remaining kinks should be ironed out.

After that time I suppose it could be considered to be stable.

If its beta, plzz mention it on the site & software.
I thought it was a released version. I dont install betas on my system.
I also requested the reviewer of a popular site to test & review it. If I knew it was beta, I would not have requested to test.
Here is the link
http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-download-manager.htm
Tests/review is going on for download managers.
Currently he is testing DN.

Thanks to everyone who reported issues in the last 24 hours.. I've just released an update (build 17) that includes the following:

http://get.downloadninja.com

build 17 (July 19 2014)

Enhancements

• Increase max download connections to 32
• Option to auto remove completed downloads
• Double click on download summary to open main window
• Added file extension list for clipboard URL checking
• Added media website list for clipboard URL checking
• Re-enabled download media formats in Chrome/Firefox extensions
• Media selector in add media download screen
• Check for updates button on about page

Fixes

• Main download queue does not auto start after upgrade (fixed for upgrades, existing users need to manually enable in settings)
• Fixed crash when verifying download if main window hidden on startup
• Removed virtualized list entries as they don’t display properly on some systems
• Changed how ‘Hide Main Window at startup’ option works to resolve several related crashes
  
• General bug fixes

DN website is showing build 13.
Plzz keep the website updated.

Build 17
Like the "Load available media" for videos downloads
But its not showing 1080p and some videos its showing couple formats 2 times i.e duplicate I guess & not showing mp3 & mp4 audios.

If in the original format, I select mp4 & original resolution, I select 720p, would it download mp4 720p video?

Under Monitor - Connections - Any adverse effect of increasing from 10 to 32?
Does increasing 10 to 32 accelerates the download speed?
Why the default 10?

 

[hopefully_secure]

Thanks to everyone who reported issues in the last 24 hours.. I've just released an update (build 17) that includes the following:

http://get.downloadninja.com

build 17 (July 19 2014)

Enhancements

• Increase max download connections to 32
• Option to auto remove completed downloads
• Double click on download summary to open main window
• Added file extension list for clipboard URL checking
• Added media website list for clipboard URL checking
• Re-enabled download media formats in Chrome/Firefox extensions
• Media selector in add media download screen
• Check for updates button on about page

Fixes

• Main download queue does not auto start after upgrade (fixed for upgrades, existing users need to manually enable in settings)
• Fixed crash when verifying download if main window hidden on startup
• Removed virtualized list entries as they don’t display properly on some systems
• Changed how ‘Hide Main Window at startup’ option works to resolve several related crashes
  
• General bug fixes

Great update. I've fully switched over to DN now, with 32 connections it is actually faster than Eagleget now (at least for me), thanks!

 

[MikeD]

It would be good if file size is shown with the quality. It gives a better idea to decide the downloads & helpful for users with limited bandwidth & slow internet.

By all available formats, do you mean hidden formats? If yes, then add an option to hide hidden formats of Youtube as I read that hidden formats are video only & audio only & need to be merged to play. Many users may not know this.

File size is not given by YouTube so to get that the app would need to make a connection to each time which would be quite slow as videos often have 10+ downloads associated with them.

I'll have a play around and see what the speed would be like doing so anyway.

YouTube provides lots of formats for their video player.. some are just audio and some are just video, their player then decides which streams it uses based on your resolution settings.

There are no 'hidden' formats as such, just formats that might be more useful than others. DN lists all those formats in the add media window with the exception of video only streams

 

[PlayerFromTheITtic]

@yesnoo could you please tell everything you want in ONE post (like everyone else), not 6? You can edit a post to add more content into, and things like double post may not be seen very well here

 

[MikeD]

@yesnoo could you please tell everything you want in ONE post (like everyone else), not 6? You can edit a post to add more content into, and things like double post may not be seen very well here

I'm afraid I'm also guilty of posting in multiple posts from now on I'll keep things to this thread.

 

[MikeD]

It would be good to add an option to hide non-complete downloads plus with an option "check if a download with the same url exists", this will ask to resume or restart the downloads. The downloads will be resumed or restarted & after download completion, hidden non-complete file will be available as it was downloaded completely now.

added both to the list.

 

[PlayerFromTheITtic]

I'm afraid I'm also guilty of posting in multiple posts from now on I'll keep things to this thread.

I guess we can make an exception, since you're a developer of a great potential of a download manager

Anyway, don't forget to let us know about translations! It seems we should wait until you have stopped adding some strings into DN

 

[MikeD]

If its beta, plzz mention it on the site & software.
I thought it was a released version. I dont install betas on my system.
I also requested the reviewer of a popular site to test & review it. If I knew it was beta, I would not have requested to test.
Here is the link
http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-download-manager.htm
Tests/review is going on for download managers.
Currently he is testing DN.

Well the whole beta status thing is rather subjective.. its really down to some arbitrary decision as to weather something is or isn't stable enough. I had not considered DN to be in beta until @Huracan asked, even now I'm not 100% sure if I would consider it to be beta or not.

I think build 17 is fairly stable now so as I said earlier that will be considered the stable version.. new features will now be added into a beta version before general release apart form small bug fixes / enhancements.

Thank's for requesting the review on TechSupportAlert, hopefully he is using build 17 I'm very excited to see what he says!

 

[MikeD]

The converter thing is really confusing.
Even if a particular Youtube video has only 360p, then too in DN you can select 720p & DN downloads the 360p file & starts converting. Users may think that DN converted it to 720p, but its not, this is confusing.

The above in bold is better.

What I meant was, previously when I rightclicked on video clip & clicked download with DN then GUI use to open & when clicked on check for the media then all the available media/resolutions were shown. But this was not working in build 13 i,e DN was downloading html file.

Rightclick on video clip, click on download with DN & DN will show all the available media with file size - This would be good.

I think a lot of the confusion comes from YouTube supplying multiple format streams to its player.. so you have 10+ streams to download directly from YT in different resolutions but then the conversion allows you convert the format and change resolution if you want.. so technically its possible to choose a 360p video and select to convert it to 720, in this case DN doesn't actually perform that conversion as it can't add data to the quality. The only exception is if you choose to change the file format from say mp4 to mov.

I suppose I could change the app to remove the option to convert to a higher resolution if 360p was selected for example or at least show a warning.