For some reason this post has been nuked by my blog :(

I have not had a chance to fix it so, for now, here is the link to the latest version of iPlayer Grabber v2.

download iPlayer Grabber (OS X, Windows and Linux)

Please note that you will need Ruby installed (and to be on the safe side I would stick with 1.8.x for now). Ruby comes with OS X, so Mac users should be fine, on Linux you can grab it via your package manager. For windows I would suggest http://rubyinstaller.org/ 

This post is a little Howto guide to allow you to download serveral programs at once and also allow you to us a different proxy for each download therefore hopefully allowing you to better utilise your internet connection.

I have reader Peter Register to thank for giving me the inspiration to dream up this hack after reading his helpful comments on the main post for iPlayer Grabber. Peter then went and proved this method actually works (from a non UK country using proxies) and then was kind enough to give me the screen grabs and other info to do this post. So a big thank you to Peter!

Firstly, I am assuming you have 'Grabber if you not head over here and download it and come back.

Right lets get started.

1) Extract the iPlayer Grabber zip archive on to your desktop (or where ever)

2) Make a copy of the iPlayer Grabber application bundle that you just extracted (cmd+c then cmd+v)

3) Rename the copy you just made, to do this single click on the iPlayer Grabber icon and then press the return key and type a new name, lets use 'iPlayer Grabber 1'

NOTE: If you just want to download multiple programs at once using the same preferences for each copy of iPlayer Grabber you can stop here (Probably the case if you are in the UK). If you want to use different preferences (i.e. proxies) for each copy then read on...

4) ctrl+click on the iPlayer Grabber 1 icon, you should see a menu similar to the image below (click on the image to enlage), select 'Show Package Contents' 

5) A finder window will open, click the folder called 'Contents' (see image below)

6) In the Contents folder locate Info.plist and double click it (see image below)

7) your Info..plist file should look like the one on the left in the image below. Replace any occurance of 'iPlayer_Grabber' with 'iPlayer_Grabber_1' (without quotes) so the file looks like the one on the right.

8) Save Info.plist

9) Repeat this as many times as you like replacing 'iPlayer_Grabber_1' with 2,3,4 etc. (you can use whatever you like as long as each one is unique)

You can now run each copy you have made individually and each will store their own preferences. All you need now are some working proxies... Good luck and thanks once more to Peter for the help in creating this post!

A new version if iPlayer Grabber is now available - see this post for more

THIS VERSION OF IPLAYER GRABBER WILL NO LONGER BE MAINTAINED IF YOU ARE HAVING PROBLEMS TRY THE NEWER VERSION HERE

iPlayer Grabber is a freeware application based on opensource technology for downloading programs from the BBC's iPlayer on Mac OS X.

iPlayer Grabber is based on the excellent work of Paul Battley who produced the opensource iplayer-dl ruby script which forms the heart of iPlayer Grabber. It does all the heavy lifting involved with actually downloading programs from the iPlayer site. What iPlayer Grabber gives you is a simple, native, Mac OS X interface to make using Paul's script much easier for non geeks and the lazy amoung us (me). The main feature that iPlayer Grabber adds is it's integrated iPlayer browser, use the app to browse around the iPlayer site, click a program you would like to save and you are prompted to download. Programs are saved as Quicktime .mov files (they are actually encoded using h.264, often referred to as MP4) and can be kept for posterity and later watched on your Mac or video capable iPod (or a Windows or Linux pc for that matter).

Features

• Lets you download and save programs from the BBC's iPlayer
• Integrated browser for easy program selection, no cutting, pasting or extracting PIDs.
• Growl notifications - get a nice alert when your download completes (requires Growl to be installed, get it here).
• Experimental proxy support (since version 0.92).
• It's free (as in beer).
  

Requirements

A Mac with OS X 10.5 Leopard (Sorry Tiger users).

Installation

Download, extract from the zip and run. Super simple. If you don't like it, trash it. iPlayer Grabber doesn't leave any junk around (except the programs you downloaded :P )

Feedback

if you have any thing to say about iPlayer Grabber or find a bug, hit me up via the comments.

Download

Current version: 0.95.5 (Updated 20 Dec 2009) - iPlayer Grabber.zip (124.90 kb)

Donate

Not to me, but to charity! A few people have asked me why I don't put in a donate button and ask for some cash money for my work. Well, I just don't feel like it. Personally I don't think I should have had to have made iPlayer Grabber, the facility should be available with my TV license.

Anyway, after some thought I decided a nice thing to do would be to allow people to donate to a selected charity. I have chosen cancer research as people close to me have been affected by cancer, so if you feel like donating to me, please give it to charity. If you have a preferred charity then by all means give to that.

CLICK HERE TO DONATE TO CANCER RESEARCH 

I have no way of tracking these donations so I will just have to take your word for it (if anyone knows of a better donation service then please let me know). 

Version History

0.91 - Initial release

0.92 - Add proxy support (can be set via preferences), fixed bug setting user defaults when app loads.

0.93 - Fixed bug with default download path field in the preferences sheet not updating.

0.94 - Fixed bug with download location sheet not always being set up correctly. This meant that when using 'icon view' it was not possible to select a download location to save the file.

0.95 - Fixed search and added credits to about panel.

0.95.1 - Rolled in iplayer-dl 0.1.14 to fix recent problems with downloading

0.95.2 - Rolled in iplayer-dl 0.1.15 to fix problems with downloading (Mar 2009) 

0.95.3 - Rolled in iplayer-dl 0.1.16 to fix problems with downloading (Oct 2009) 

0.95.4 - Rolled in iplayer-dl 0.1.17 to fix problems with downloading (Late Dec 2009)  

0.95.5 - Rolled in iplayer-dl 0.1.18 to fix missed problems missed in 0.1.17 (Even later Dec 2009)   

Tips and tricks

I have posted a Howto guide to running multiple instances of iPlayer Grabber. Why? because then you can download multiple programs at once and also go through different proxies which means you will get more, quicker. Check it out.