Re: How to download online videos?

[Rodolfo Medina <rodolfo.medina@gmail.com>]

Rodolfo Medina <rodolfo.medina@gmail.com> wrote:

>> All the videos that can be viewed online but cannot be downloaded normally.
>> The problem arose with a particular .flv video I wanted to download from a
>> web
>> site.  I managed to download it with MS-Windows RealPlayer, from the Windows
>> partition I have on my hard disk.
>>
>> I installed RealPlayer also on Debian, but it does not seem to work.
>>
>> I'd be glad if anybody suggests a particular tool that's known to really
>> work.


"Michael Marsh" <michael.a.marsh@gmail.com> writes:

> What has generally worked for me is to watch (or at least buffer) the
> streaming video in Firefox/Iceweasel, and find the appropriate cache
> entry (~/.mozilla/firefox/<garbage>/Cache).  "ls -ltr" typically makes
> it easy to pick out, since it will be recent and large.  Then I just
> copy the file from the cache to a more stable location, changing the
> file name from <random-looking hex> to my_video.flv.  If the file's
> too big, it'll get booted from the cache, but sometimes it shows up in
> /tmp (this seems unreliable).  Increasing the iceweasel cache limit
> generally makes this a non-issue, though.
>
> This works well with YouTube and Weebl's Stuff, if you need any data points.
>
> [...]
>
> Using something with a little more polish is great, but
> YouTube seems to be adept at engineering around all of the existing
> plugins and extensions.  I've found the "hard way" to be much more
> reliable, since any buffered video is going to have to be downloaded
> and cached somewhere.



If you clear the Cache just before the video goes, you can locate immediately
the file...

Seems to work, does not need any installation and should be very general.
What do you mean with `watch or at least buffer'?  You have to watch it, don't
you?

Thanks!
Rodolfo