Don't Download Bug

[JMJimmy]

There appear to be several bugs with the "Don't download" (context menu)

1. Files that were queued automatically then manually set to skip (Right Click->Don't Download) continue to download.

2. If a folder is deleted where a file that is set to skip is to be located, the entire torrent halts and returns an error message.

a) Bug in that the folder should not be required if the file isn't going to be downloaded (note: doesn't fail until a piece of said file is attempted to be downloaded see bug 1)

If a specific file in a multi-file torrent fails this should not halt the seeding/downloading of the remaining files, simply give a descriptive error relating to the specific file. Especially when existing files have completed successfully.

JMJimmy

MBP2,2 - XP Pro (updated), no known conflicting software.

[Ultima]

Preliminaries: Cross-file edge pieces

1) Which pieces continue to download?

2a) Just because you skip a file doesn't mean it doesn't need to exist. If you have the data, µTorrent will upload it at others' request. It can't do that if the file disappears, so of course it'll complain.

2b) Previously discussed. Not a bug, just a design decision that may or may not be redone.

[JMJimmy]

1. As an example: torrent contains 20 arbitrary files -> \Sample\file1.txt is set to Don't Download after it's automatically queued. Nothing has downloaded at this point the file is at 0%. Despite setting to do not download uTorrent downloads it anyway. (all pieces)

2.a) In this case it's a file that has not downloaded yet. No data is stored locally and it's a file that doesn't *need* to exist (ie: random .txt file). So in this case, setting the file to "Don't Download" it should be safe for the user to assume that the folder created to contain that file can be deleted (if not uTorrent deleting that folder itself since nothing belongs in it anymore)

.

Fair enough, it's a rather complex code set to accomplish this so it's very understandable.

[Ultima]

1) How many pieces are there in the file? I've never seen this happen before for files spanning more than one piece.

2a) If you choose to preallocate all files, you're acknowledging that you understand the consequences. I'm not seeing why µTorrent should try and guess that the user wants to remove incomplete (allocated but undownloaded) files.

[JMJimmy]

1) 1 & 3 piece files. 1 it downloads fully, 3 piece it seems to download the first and last piece.

2) It's not that uTorrent should guess this, but when the user selects "Don't Download" specifically they're telling uTorrent that they don't want that specific file.

[Ultima]

1) And you selected skip before µTorrent began downloading a piece from the file?

2) If you specifically skipped the file, then don't pre-allocate all files in the torrent, and enable diskio.use_partfile.

[JMJimmy]

1) Correct.

2) For the majority of what I torrent pre-allocation is the preferred setting to ensure sufficient disc space is maintained throughout the download. Manual setting of skip is intended to reduce the amount downloaded in a limited space environment. (also why uTorrent vs larger bt client).

[Ultima]

1) Very odd. I honestly don't know what to say about that. I can't refute that you've seen such behavior, though, so we'll see what the devs say.

2) Feel free to request your desired behavior as a new feature request then. Be mindful of describing it carefully, lest others misunderstand what it is you want to happen.

[JMJimmy]

1) Here's a screen from my current download:

All of the files marked "skip" where de-selected via the popup dialog box where you choose which files you want downloaded. Same behaviour occurred when manually marking files via the context menu prior to any pieces being downloaded.

Edit: Also note that files that were not selected for download still pre-allocated 100% of the space for the file

Hope this helps.

JMJimmy

[DreadWingKnight]

Cross-file pieces.

Point proven.

[Ultima]

@JMJimmy:

Preliminaries: Cross-file edge pieces

I was hoping you'd already read this first, and assumed you did. That's the only reason I had no other words: I assumed you understood the consequences of BitTorrent being piece-based rather than file-based after reading that link.