What does Transmission do?
Transmission is a BitTorrent client. It is used for peer to peer filesharing over the internet. BitTorrent is a fast way of transferring files, because everyone who downloads must also upload to others, thus creating much more bandwidth than a single server offering the file may have been able to provide.
How do I use it?
You'll need to download a torrent file (extension .torrent). This is a file which contains information about the actual file you want to download (eg a movie). Once you have the torrent file, open it in Transmission.
It is good etiquette to 'seed' the file for a while (ie leave it uploading) once your download is complete. You can set a default ratio to automatically seed to in either the Transfers pane of Transmission's preferences or the action menu.
Why is my download so slow?
Make sure Transmission's port is forwarded. If this is not done, others cannot connect to you, and thus your speed will be hampered.
You also need to ensure you cap your upload speed to about 60-70% of its maximum. eg if your upload connection is 256 Kilobits/sec, then you should enter 21 ((256 /8) * 0.66). This can be adjusted in the Bandwidth pane of Transmission's preferences or the action menu.
Ultimately, the speed you get depends on the quality of the peers you are downloading from. If they have dial up connections, you are only going to be able to download at dial up speeds. Furthermore, if there are few seeds and many peers, more people will be fighting for the same scarce pieces and thus will slow things down. Best results are achieved when the torrent has more seeds than peers. Finally, you can only download what others are willing to send to you, and if they don't have it, they can't send it.
Why isn't my torrent downloading at all?
Normally this is because the tracker is down, and thus Transmission is unable to interact with other peers. DHT (trackerless torrents) is not a feature at the moment, however is slated for a future release. Torrents take a while to get going and so may not download much (if at all) initially. Most torrents are downloading at some rate after 15 or so minutes.
Why can I only connect to around 60 peers?
This is a constraint imposed on Transmission, as more than this number is unnecessary. A global limit is set at 200 peers.
What is Growl?
Growl is a notification system. Lots of applications can interface with it.
http://growl.info
What do the colours mean in the advanced progress bar?
Black: we have this piece
Red: no connected peer has this piece
Blue: connected peers have this piece (the darker the blue is, the more they are)
The fine, dark blue line on top of the bar shows the global progression, while the green line following it shows how much of the remaining download is actually available.
Green: we are seeding the file
What are seeds/peers?
Peers are people you are connected to. If they have the whole file and are only uploading, they are referred to as a 'seeder'. If they only have part of the torrent, and are downloading and uploading, they are referred to as a 'leecher'.
What is the ratio shown during seeding?
This shows your upload/download ratio - 1.00 means you have uploaded as much as you have downloaded, 2.00 means you have uploaded twice the amount you have downloaded, etc.
Transmission crashed, what should I do?
Post the crash log on the support forums so that the issue can be fixed as quickly as possible. Crash logs are held in ~/Library/Logs/CrashReporter/
What are 'nightlies'?
'Nightlies' are releases on the bleeding edge of development. They normally contain new features and bugfixes, and are fairly stable to use. You can try one out here.
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