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1. Introduction
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2. Tools
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3. Connecting
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4. Joining
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5. Viewing
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6. Resources
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1. Introduction :-
To download files from a website, you will need access to
the website. So you'll need a program that will allow you to download files.
The web browser is the most commonly used program for doing this, one of
Opera, Internet Explorer, or Netscape with the security settings applied for surfing
safe is fine. Also you can use a type of program known as a Downloader
since it allows for the automatic scheduling of file downloads.
Files that you download will be one of three general types: Encrypted, Compressed,
and
Data.
Encrypted files are files that have been encoded in such a manner as to render their
original contents invisible. Although there are many programs available for doing this.
The accepted standard is PGP. Files in this format will have the extension .pgp.
Compressed files are files that actually contain many other files and are encoded in
such a way as to reduce their overall size. Compressed files will need some sort of
program to uncompress them. A compressed file may contain executables or data
files. The most common type of compression is ZIP compression. Files compressed in
the ZIP format will have a .zip extension.
Data files, i.e. text files(.txt), pictures (.gif and .jpg), movie files (.mpg and .rm),
music (.wav and .mp3),etc... need some other type of program in order to be useful.
In some cases this program may also need to be downloaded. In other cases you may
already have the program on your computer. As an example, text files can be viewed
with the program Notepad which comes with Windows 95
Downloaded files can each be possibly encrypted, or compressed or both. So
recognizing that you may need to perform one or all of the the following operations
Decryption, Joining or De-compression is part of the skill in
successfully downloading and viewing files from the web.
2. Tools:-
Anonymizing Tools:
There are many programs available to assist you in remaining anonymous. One such
program is SocksCap32 which will allow you to anonymise yourself or sockisfy
your connection to network news and other protocols such as irc ftp etc. It is a
versatile and valid alternative to using proxy servers directly. Download and install it
from here . How to
setup Sockscap is to be found in the Socks
Basics faq.
Downloader/Scheduler:
A utility such as Getright from Headlight
Software or AutoFTP from PrimaSoft that
will let you line up your downloads to perform at a time when you dont need to do
other things on your computer. Alternatively you can connect to a web page catalog
its contents and selectively download items of interest leaving you free to pursue
some other net business. Another valuable feature of these tools is "auto-resuming"
so if your net connection is lost, these programs will pick up where they left off,
avoiding losing the 50% of a large file that vanishes when the Windows downloader
loses its connection.
Opera Browser This is one of the smallest and safest web browsers out
there. Its not perfect then either are any of the others. Available here: Opera Browser
File Joining Tools:
Many items uploaded to the web are split into parts, to reverse this process and join
them some application is needed. A good program to do this is
MasterSplitter which lets you Join split files. MasterSplitter is a
simple to use program that allows the use of a batch file which can be used to
automatically join the parts together again. Download and install it from here. MasterSplitter
Extraction Tools:
Two programs that allow you to extract or inflate files that have been compressed
and possibly password protected are:
You can download and install WinZip from here WinZip
You can view a WinRar download faq here.
Decryption Tools:
The industry standard for distributed file encryption is PGP. This allows you to
decrypt any password protected files that you have downloaded from the web. You
can download and install PGP from here MIT's pgp
distribution.
3. Connecting:-
Step 1: Anonymize your browser or downloader either via
SocksCap32 or some web based proxy and check that you are anonymous!
Step 2:
Using your browser, link to the upload page, or paste it from the textfile into your
browsers addressbar. This should display either the contents of a folder or an
individual file. If the file is a picture it will be shown directly, similarly with movies
they can play automatically, but it is better if you use a downloader for these. With
files such as compressed .zip files the Windows downloader will automatically start
downloading. Once you have the file then you can right click the
picture or zip and save it to disk.
or
Paste your link into your Downloader url box as illustrated next with GetRight.
GetRight will itemize the page and present all the files to you in a dialog, then you
can pick the ones you wish to download and either proceed to download immediately
or schedule it for downloading later.
GetRight has as a proxy field option that can be switched on or off, so if you wish to
download anonymously enter a proxy (ftp or http etc) and switch it on.
4. Joining :-
How files are joined depends on the method used by the person who uploaded them
initially.
Files that are intended to be joined using another program tend to have
digits appended to the filename ie filename.mpg.001.pgp, filename.mpg.002.pgp etc,
and in some cases an additional extension is evident due to another operation being
applied, here its .pgp since each part has been encrypted. Occassionally files
are renamed and their extension altered, say from file.mpg to file.txt
because the Host has banned .mpg uploads.
So once all the articles have been retrieved, some common operations which can be
performed to complete a download are Decryption, Joining, and/or
Decompression and Renaming.
The Join Sequence:
This is normally determined by the reverse order of the file extensions on the target
parts, running from right to left. And one or more of the following operations are
normally used.
- Decryption
- Decompression
- Joining
- Renaming
So for a set of files that started with one named hanson.mp3.001.pgp
Then running from right to left the Joining Sequence would be:
- Decrypt all the file parts using PGP
- Join all the files
Example Join Sequence:
Step 1. Decrypting the parts:
Highlight all the parts, then right click, selecting PGP using the Decrypt
option.
The PGP password box should appear so just enter your password.
Step 2. Joining the parts:
Run Mastersplitter and select the Join tab then using the "Browse" button
search for the file with the .000 sequence number, here we search for
"Hanson.mp3.000". Then click on the Join button to complete the file join.
Now for a set of files that started with one named hanson.mp3.001.zip
Then running from right to left the Joining Sequence would be:
- Decompress all the file parts using WinZip
- Join all the files
For a set of files that started with one named hanson.mp3.001.rar
Then running from right to left the Joining Sequence would be:
- Decompress all the file parts using WinRAR
- Join all the files
A variation on this theme is for the poster to Encrypt or Compress
the file first, then to Split the file into parts.
The simple case is that of a file being Split followed by Encryption.
So for a set of files that started with one named hanson.mp3.pgp.001
Then running from right to left the Joining Sequence would be:
- Join all the files
- Decrypt the resulting file using PGP
Now for a set of files that started with one named hanson.mp3.zip.001
Then running from right to left the Joining Sequence would be:
- Join all the files
- Decompress the resulting file using WinZip
For a set of files that started with one named hanson.mp3.rar.001
Then running from right to left the Joining Sequence would be:
- Join all the files
- Decompress the resulting file using WinRar
Renamed Parts:
You can Rename all the files to eliminate the numerical suffix. An example
might be hanson.mp3.pgp.001 renamed to hanson001.mp3.pgp. So
for a set of re-named files that started with one named as
hanson001.mp3.pgp Then running from right to left the Joining
Sequence would be:
- Rename all the files in ascending numerical order i.e. from .pgp.001
- Join all the file parts
- Decrypt the resulting file using PGP
And for a set of files that started with one named hanson001.mp3.rar
Then running from right to left the Joining Sequence would be:
- Rename all the files in ascending numerical order i.e. from .rar.001
- Join all the file parts
- Decrypt the resulting file using WinRAR
Finally for a set of files that started with one named hanson001.mp3.zip
Then running from right to left the Joining Sequence would be:
- Rename all the files in ascending numerical order i.e. from .zip.001
- Join all the file parts
- Decrypt the resulting file using WinZip
Batch File Join:
Files posted in parts, are sometimes accompanied by a .bat file. This method allows
you to join files without using a joining program.
As before download and save all the parts to a named folder on your hard disk. After
identifying the Join Sequence . One of the files will have the file extension
.bat. Highlight and Double-click on the .bat icon. A DOS window will open
and the file will start to be joined. A message will appear in the DOS window once
joining has been completed. Just close the DOS window. Apply any further Join
Sequence operations, then all you need do is check that your file is working fine
then you can delete the parts.
Custom Join:
Custom join usually applies when the first file, a .bat file, or possibly even the joining
program is not available!
Use Another Splitter
The simplest solution is to download a copy of a splitter program. Then select an
arbitrary file that is similar in size to the sum of the splitted parts. Next Copy and
Paste this file renaming it with the same name as your splitted file. Then run the split
program inputting your "copied and renamed" file as the file to split, select the same
number of parts and request that a .bat file should be created. Now delete all the file
parts and the copied file then use the resulting filename.bat to
join your file parts.
Rename Another .BAT File
Alternatively use an ascii type editor to edit and change an already existing
.bat file, Notepad is fine here, but one with a "search and replace" command
is better. First rename the .bat file to one with a .txt extension i.e.
"filename.dat.bat.txt" then open it with your ascii editor.
Add Join Lines
Now check that the .bat file contains the required number of join lines. If not then
use simple copying and pasting of lines followed by a sequential renumbering till you
have the required total.
Rename The Original File
Then if the name of the file within the unedited .bat file is say
filename.dat.001 and your split file name is filename.mp3.001, then
use the search and replace facility to replace "filename.dat" with
"filename.mp3".
Save and Join
Check to see that everything looks ok, then save your filename.dat.bat.txt,
next rename it to filename.mp3.bat, now run it to join all your parts, verify
your file works then clean up before deleting all the parts, but keep your
filename.mp3.bat, since this can be used in some future join excercise.
Manual Join:
Manual join usually applies when you have a list of uu encoded files, or encoded using
some other method, usually from news, which refuse to be auto-joined or have
syntax problems.
First try using Fastcode32 or WinZip which both allow the decoding of files encoded
using mime, uu, binhex, etc. This helps sort out the valid parts.
Click on the MS-DOS Prompt shorcut or menu option and navigate to the folder
containing the file parts. Now you can use the COPY command as in the following
example:
COPY /B File1+File2+File3+FileN DestFile.ext
Where DestFile.ext is the name of the destination file name with the
appropriate extension (.MPG for MPEG movies, .MP3 for MP3 audio files,
.JPG or .GIF for pictures, etc )
The option /B is necessary because you are joining Binary files. If you
try to join binary files without the /B option, they will be treated as
ASCII (pure text) files, and the copy process will end as soon as the
computer will meet a byte with a value of 0, because it will consider
it as an End-Of-File (EOF) marker.
If you have several chunks and you can't put all of their names in a
single MS-DOS command line (there's a limit of 127 characters for a
single command line), you'd better join them in larger chunks first,
as in the following example:
COPY /B File1+File2+File3+File4+File5 File1-5
COPY /B File6+File7+File8+File9+File10+File11+File12 File6-12
Then ...
COPY /B File1-5+File6-12 Track.mp3
Missing Parts? A quick fix for this is to nominate the previous file as
the next
file to be joined. So if filename.mp3.009 is missing then first copy
filename.mp3.008 renaming it to filename.mp3.009 if neccessary,
then join and verify as before.
Viewing Files :-
Playing:
Microsoft Windows MediaPlayer handles most audio/video
formats, such as MPEG, AVI etc. Be sure to have the latest version installed.
Sound:
If the file is an MP3 you may want to use a specific
player as WinAmp.
Pictures:
Pictures in almost any format can be opened with ACD-See32 (shareware) that will
work from inside forte agent as your picture viewer of choice.
For a larger selection of graphic formats you can try a professional application such
as Corel PhotoPaint. PhotoPaint will allow you can to edit pictures and adjust colors,
contrast, or sharpness.
In this case you should save the file with the same name, but adding an
"r" as a suffix to the file name: is a good rule to never change the
name of a picture, especially if it's part of a series.
6. Resources:-
Proxy Lists:
Proxy Checkers
Country Check
Cracks:-
Programs:
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