Workaround for the lack of a scheduler in the Mac version

[ben_]

I have come up with a way of getting some sort of crude scheduling to work with uTorrent using Automator. I have used this to get my Mac to open uTorrent only during my off-peak hours for my broadband. Here are my instructions:

1. Go to the energy saver preferences and tell the computer to startup/wake up every day at a specific time. I have set it to start up 1 minute before my peak hours start.

2. Open Automator and choose to create a new iCal alarm.

3. In the search box, search for "launch" and choose the "Launch Application" action in the results box. Drag the action into the workflow box on the right. Choose uTorrent from the drop down list of Applications.

4. Save the action, it should then open iCal and add the event. Set the event to run at whatever time you want and set the alarm (ie. to run the action) to trigger at "0 minutes before". Set the event to recur every day.

5. Repeat steps 3 and 4, but this time search for the "Quit Application" action in Automator.

There are two more things that you have to keep in mind. First of all, you need to open the uTorrent preferences and uncheck the option to prompt the user before quitting. Second, obviously you need to open uTorrent, start the downloads you want to run and then quit uTorrent so that when it opens automatically, they will start downloading.

Hope this helps!

[swiftwilly]

Ben,

Thanks for the help.

Took me 4 days to finally get your method working after alot of trail and error tests.

Finally, the system wakes up and launches utorrent BUT, after checking it this morning all the torrents had the download arrow but were RED in colour.

Do you know how to work around this?

Much appreciated - it is driving me nuts!

[ben_]

Hi swiftwilly.

I replied to your other post, I've only just noticed your reply here. I haven't experienced the problem you mention. Do you get an error message in the status column when the torrents stop working? It might help to figure out the problem.

Sometimes my torrents stop working and give me an error: "bad file descriptor" message in the status column but that isn't related to the automator action as far as I can tell because it happens when I stop and start torrents manually.

You could try deleting the .dat file in the folder for each download and then right clicking on each torrent and trying a "force recheck".

Are you downloading to your internal drive or an external one? Sometimes external drives take a while to mount so maybe the torrent starts trying to download before your drive has finished mounting.