fetch
Lyle Hanson (lhanson@cs.nmu.edu) (C) 2001
http://cs.nmu.edu/~lhanson/fetch/
================================================================================


ABOUT
=====
fetch is a simple, flexible download tool built on the HTTP Fetcher library.
There are other utilities out there that handle HTTP downloads (wget) but a lot
of them are intended more for mirroring websites and the like;  fetch allows
you to download a file at the command line by basically saying 'fetch URL'.

fetch also allows you to customize your HTTP request by changing the User Agent
and Referer shown to the webserver.  This is useful for a lot of different
reasons that I will leave up to your imagination.  You don't even have to
save the file you request; you can use fetch to simply generate a hit.

If you DO want to use fetch for larger transfers such as site mirrors, etc.,
you can currently do this by writing a shell script to run fetch as desired.
Soon I expect to add support to download images associated with a page, to
better simulate a web browser viewing the page (again, for reasons you may
or may not find useful/interesting).


DEPENDENCIES
============
fetch depends on the HTTP Fetcher library, found at
http://cs.nmu.edu/~lhanson/http_fetcher/.  Should run on most unix-like systems.


INSTALLATION
============
Read the INSTALL file for info on building and installing fetch.


USAGE
=====
Check out the manpage for fetch ('man fetch', if you have already have fetch
installed) or run 'fetch --help'.  The webpage is also bound to have recent
information.


LICENSE
=======
fetch is licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL)
version 2 or newer.  See the LICENSE file for full info.  Feel free to contact
me if you have any questions/concerns over licensing issues.


FEEDBACK
========
Drop me a line if you find this program useful or if you have any questions,
comments, requests, or bug reports.


TODO:
=====
Implement an option that will download (or simply hit) images on an HTML page
in order to better simulate a web browser viewing the page.


BUGS
====
None that I know of.  Let me know if you find any.
