Using the CLI

Every command has a --help with the full list of options, and that help is the reference for your build. This page shows the common tasks.

Download

boltget get https://example.com/file.iso
boltget get https://example.com/file.iso -o D:\Downloads\
boltget get https://example.com/file.iso -o ubuntu.iso --overwrite

The connection count adapts by default: a download starts with 4 connections and adds more only while they make it faster, up to 16. --max-connections N changes that cap, and -c N fixes the count instead (1 to 32). When a connection finishes early, it takes over half of the largest remaining part, so all connections finish together.

--quiet prints only the final line. --json prints line-delimited JSON events instead of the progress display; see Exit codes and JSON.

Pause and resume

Every download started with boltget get is recorded under a numeric id. Progress is saved only once the bytes are on disk, so it survives Ctrl-C, a killed process and a power cut.

boltget list                  # ids, states and progress (also --json)
boltget resume 7              # continue where it stopped
boltget resume 7 --restart    # start again from the beginning
boltget remove 7 --delete-file

Ctrl-C pauses the running download (exit code 130). If the file changed on the server in the meantime, resume stops with an error instead of mixing two versions; --restart downloads it again.

The download list lives in %LOCALAPPDATA%\BoltGet on Windows and $XDG_DATA_HOME/boltget on Linux. --state <dir> or the BOLTGET_DATA_DIR variable choose another directory, and boltget get --no-state downloads without recording anything. One boltget at a time can use the list; boltget list works alongside.

Give an expired link a new one

Signed download links often expire. When that happens, the download waits as needs_new_link with its progress kept. Get a fresh link from the site and pass it on:

boltget refresh 7 https://example.com/new-signed-link

BoltGet checks that the new link is the same file (same size, and the same ETag or matching sample bytes) before it writes anything, then continues. A link to a different file is refused with the reason.

Limit the speed

boltget get https://example.com/file.iso --limit 5M    # this download
boltget config set limit 10M                           # all downloads
boltget config unset limit

Rates are bytes per second: 500K, 5M, 1.5M or a plain number (K = 1024). --limit off removes a download’s limit. Limits change without reconnecting.

Verify a checksum

boltget get https://example.com/file.iso --checksum sha256:<hex>

md5, sha1 and sha512 work too, or just the hex. Digests the server sends (such as Repr-Digest or x-amz-checksum-sha256) are checked as well unless you pass --no-server-digest. The file is hashed while it downloads. On a mismatch the file keeps its .boltget name and boltget exits with code 9; resume <id> --restart downloads it again and resume <id> --no-checksum keeps it.

Proxies, cookies and logins

boltget get <url> --proxy socks5://127.0.0.1:1080
boltget get <url> --cookie-file cookies.txt
boltget get <url> --cookie session=abc123
boltget get <url> --user name:password
boltget get <url> -H "Referer: https://example.com/"

Without --proxy, the http_proxy, https_proxy, all_proxy and no_proxy environment variables apply, as in curl; --no-proxy connects directly. A cookies.txt file is in the Netscape format that browser export extensions write, and only the cookies that match each request are sent.

Passwords, Authorization headers and --cookie values are never saved. Pass them again to resume.

Measure your own network

boltget bench runs repeated, interleaved downloads and reports the median, interquartile range, min to max and MiB/s. Files are deleted after each run.

boltget bench https://example.com/100mb.bin --runs 5 -c auto,8
boltget bench --targets bench/targets.toml --json

This is the tool behind the published benchmarks.