Fetch Help > Commands > Get

The Get command downloads single or multiple files or folders from a server to your Macintosh.

This command is available:

- As the Get or Get Other command in the Remote menu
- As the Get button in the transfer window toolbar
- As the Get command in the file list contextual menu
- As the Get command in the shortcut list window contextual menu
- By dragging files from a Fetch file list to a Macintosh folder or disk

Typically you select the files or folders you want to download in the file list before choosing the command. Multiple items can be selected by holding down the Shift or Command keys while clicking the names.

If you hold down the Shift key while choosing this command, it changes to Get Other, and Fetch will prompt you for the name of a file or folder to download. This can be useful if the item you want to download is in a different folder.

You can also type or paste a Fetch address (URL) into the Get prompt. This lets you download a file or folder from any server, regardless of whether you are currently connected to that server. See the Uniform Resource Locators topic for more information on URLs.

You can also get files by dragging the selected items to a folder or disk on the Macintosh desktop (or to the desktop itself).

The names of the downloaded files will be set automatically, based on the names that the files have on the server. All format conversions will also be performed automatically, as specified by the download mode and the decoding settings in the Transfer Options pane.

The files will be downloaded to the folder specified by the Save downloaded files to preference in the Download Preferences pane (by default, the download folder is set to either the Downloads folder or the Desktop). If Save downloaded files to is set to Ask every time, you will be prompted to choose a folder on your Macintosh in which to save the files and folders.

You can temporarily override the Save downloaded files to preference by holding down the Option key while choosing Get. The command will change to Get As, and Fetch will prompt you to choose a folder on your Macintosh to which it should download the selected files and folders.

If a file with the same name as the file you are downloading exists in the folder you're downloading it to, Fetch will give the downloaded file a new name and leave the existing file alone, unless you turn on the Overwrite files with conflicting names preference in the Download Preferences pane, in which case the downloaded file will replace the existing one.

The progress of the file transfer, including the name of the file being transferred, is shown in the status pane of the transfer window. You can stop the transfer by choosing the Stop command in the View menu.

You can set files to open automatically after downloading using the Transfer Options pane of the info window. You can also change the application downloaded files will open with in the Transfer Options pane.

Additional preferences that affect downloading of files and folders can be found in the Download Preferences pane.

Fetch tries to detect stalls and network or server errors and automatically resume downloads for you, but you can also resume the download of a file manually if necessary.

Related commands and topics:

- Download modes
- Download Preferences
- Transfer Options
- Get As
- Put