Fetch Help > Commands > Format submenu

The Format submenu lets you choose the format Fetch will use when putting or uploading files.

This command is available as:

- The Format submenu in the Remote menu
- The Format button pop-up menu in the transfer window toolbar, if you've added it

When you put or upload a Macintosh file to a server, the best format to use depends on whether the file contains special Macintosh information, and whether the file is a text or binary file. Fetch's default upload format is Automatic, which examines each file and chooses the best format for it. Automatic works well almost all of the time, however, in some cases you may need to explicitly choose another format if the Automatic setting is not doing what you want or expect. See the upload formats help topic for a detailed discussion of which format to use when.

When you choose an upload format from the Format menu, it applies only to the active transfer window until you close it. Different transfer windows may have different format settings. The initial upload format for new transfer windows is specified by the Default upload format preference in the Upload Preferences pane.

The Put files and folders prompt also has a Format menu. The format you choose in the Put prompt only applies for that one upload, and does not change the setting of any transfer windows.

Upload formats are related to, but different from download modes. Download modes tell Fetch how to transfer files from a server (as text or binary), they do not tell Fetch anything about what format the files are in. Upload formats tell Fetch what format to use when storing files on a server and how to transfer them to the server.

Related topics:

- Upload formats
- Download modes