Fetch Help > Concepts > Shortcut Documents

Shortcut documents are files that you can double-click in the Finder to tell Fetch to automatically download remote files or open remote folders.

While using a shortcut document is very similar to using shortcuts in Fetch, a shortcut document may save you more steps or may suit your workflow better. For instance, if there's a file you download repeatedly because someone you work with updates it regularly, you could create a shortcut document that refers to that file. Then you can just double-click the shortcut document in the Finder, enter your password if necessary, and Fetch will connect to the server where the file is stored and download the file.

If there's a remote folder you always connect to, you can instead create a droplet shortcut that refers to that folder. Then just double-click the droplet shortcut, enter a password if necessary, and you're there. No navigating is needed in either case.

You create shortcut documents using the Save Shortcut command, and droplet shortcuts with the Save Droplet Shortcut command.

To create a shortcut document or droplet shortcut:

1. Open a connection to the server where the file or folder is stored.
2. In the transfer window file list, select the file or folder by clicking it once.
3. Choose File > Save Shortcut (for a file) or File > Save Droplet Shortcut (for a folder).
4. Enter a name and choose a location for the shortcut document or droplet shortcut.

You can also select multiple files or folders and save a single shortcut document to all of them. When you open that shortcut document, all the files will be downloaded and all the folders will be opened.

To open a shortcut document, either double-click it in the Finder, or choose File > Open in Fetch and select the document. To open a droplet shortcut, double-click it in the Finder.

An additional feature of droplet shortcuts is that you can upload files or folders to the remote folder the droplet shortcut represents by dragging and dropping the files to the droplet shortcut's icon. You cannot drag and drop files to shortcut documents, because usually they represent remote files, and you cannot upload files to a file. For more information, see the droplet shortcut topic.

If the connection to the server opened by a shortcut document requires a password, you will be prompted for it when you open the shortcut document. If you do not want to be prompted for the password, you need to save the password for the connection in your keychain.

If you want to save a list of shortcuts to open later in Fetch, but don't want to automatically download or open what the shortcuts refer to, you can either create a shortcut that is added to the Fetch Shortcuts window, or create a shortcut list document from a shortcut list window.