FlashGot

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
FlashGot
Developer(s)InformAction
Stable release
1.5.6.14[1] / December 1, 2016; 7 years ago (2016-12-01)
PlatformMozilla Firefox
Available in43 languages[2]
List of languages
Afrikaans, Albanian, Arabic, Belarusian, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Croatian, Czech, Dutch, English, Estonian, French, Finnish, Galician, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Kazakh, Korean, Lithuanian, Macedonian, Malay, Norwegian Bokmål, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukraininan
TypeFirefox add-on
LicenseGPLv2
Websiteflashgot.net

FlashGot was an add-on for Firefox that allowed interoperability between the Firefox browser and external download managers. It is no longer compatible with later versions of Firefox. It is not itself a download manager but is designed to allow the Firefox interface to be extended to connect to the selected external download manager. This avoided launching the download manager as an independent application and cutting and pasting the across the links of the files that need to be downloaded.[clarification needed] Forked browsers like Pale Moon and Waterfox are also supported.[citation needed]

Software[edit]

A download manager is an app specialized in downloading files from the Internet faster and in a more organized manner. However, not all these apps integrate with Mozilla Firefox. The FlashGot add-in resolves this situation by integrating the download managers into Firefox allowing interoperability.[3] As of December 2011, FlashGot recognizes and supports 51 different external download managers.[2] When a user chooses to download one or more files, FlashGot offers to send them to the detected download manager. Additionally, FlashGot can detect video embedded in web pages and send their download links to download managers. It supports downloading from the popular YouTube service. It also contain powerful extended media download functions.

Mozilla broke compatibility with Flashgot (and many other add-ons) in version 56, so it works only on older Mozilla versions.

FlashGot supports metalinks for sending mirror and checksum information to supported download managers for faster and more reliable downloads.

Version 1.2.1.13 included an experimental "Search Refinements for downloadable files and media" feature based on Surf Canyon technology.[4] This functionality, which submitted search keywords to Surf Canyon for processing, was easy to opt out of with one click but enabled by default, prompting criticism equating the feature to adware and spyware,[5] even though no user data was reused, shared or stored.[6] The feature was disabled in version 1.2.1.14 and removed in version 1.2.1.15.[7]

The last version of FlashGot was released in December 2016 and is not compatible with Firefox 57 or later versions.[8] FlashGot is free software, as it is released under the GPLv2 open source license.[8]

Reception[edit]

In March 2006, PC World included FlashGot in its list of "101 Fabulous Freebies" and regards it as "indispensable".[9] It was ranked as 16th most popular Firefox plugin in Computer Bild.[10] FlashGot was reviewed by download.com,[11] TechAdvisor[12] Softpedia,[13] TomsGuide.com[14] and Softonic.[15]

Ports[edit]

Grabit[edit]

Grabit is a port of FlashGot for Pale Moon.[16]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "FlashGot Mass Downloader :: Add-ons for Firefox". 2 November 2018. Archived from the original on 2 November 2018.
  2. ^ a b "Download Manager". FlashGot home page. InformAction. Archived from the original on 2011-12-16. Retrieved 21 December 2011.
  3. ^ PC Magazine: The Independent Guide to IBM-standard Personal Computing. PC Communications Corporation. 2006. p. 117. Retrieved 3 October 2018. FLASHGOT powers up download managers so that they work with Firefox, even if they were originally designed for Internet Explorer. Consequently, you'll need to have a download manager (such as GetRight or FlashGet) in place; by itself, ...
  4. ^ "FlashGot's Search Refinements Feature". Archived from the original on 2011-07-23. Retrieved 2010-02-28.
  5. ^ Evron, Gadi (17 February 2010). "Mozilla's Add-On Policies And Spyware Surprises". Dark Reading. Archived from the original on 2011-03-08. Retrieved 2010-02-23.
  6. ^ "Surf Canyon Privacy Policy". Archived from the original on 2010-02-10. Retrieved 2010-02-28.
  7. ^ "FlashGot CHANGELOG". Archived from the original on 2010-02-17. Retrieved 2010-02-23.
  8. ^ a b "FlashGot Mass Downloader". addons.mozilla.org. Archived from the original on 2016-12-12. Retrieved 2016-12-01.
  9. ^ Tweney, Dylan (28 March 2006). "101 Fabulous Freebies". PC World. Archived from the original on 2011-12-22. Retrieved 21 December 2011.
  10. ^ "FlashGot für Firefox 1.5.6.14 – Download – COMPUTER BILD". Computer Bild. 12 June 2017. Archived from the original on 2018-09-17. Retrieved 2018-09-17.
  11. ^ "FlashGot". download.com. Archived from the original on 2018-03-02. Retrieved 2018-09-30.
  12. ^ Williams, Mike. "FlashGot 1.5.6.14 – Internet Tools – Downloads". TechAdvisor. Archived from the original on 2018-10-01. Retrieved 2018-09-30.
  13. ^ "Download FlashGot 1.5.6.14". Softpedia. 10 February 2017. Archived from the original on 2018-03-01. Retrieved 2018-09-30.
  14. ^ "Download FlashGot 1.5.6.9 (Free) for Windows". tomsguide.com. Archived from the original on 2017-05-17. Retrieved 2018-09-30.
  15. ^ "FlashGot". Softonic. Archived from the original on 2016-10-15. Retrieved 2018-09-30.
  16. ^ "Grabit". realityripple.com.

External links[edit]