Bookmark Storage & Inaccessible Resources (Mac)

Updated by George Cox

Overview

Downcast uses a bookmarking feature of Mac OS to store bookmarks for downloaded and imported content. This allows Downcast to maintain persistent access to your content even if you move or rename it.

Though bookmarks are a major improvement over storing static paths, they still have limitations (described below), that can be resolved using a resource resolution tool we've added to Downcast. 

Limitations

Downcast can only access content in locations it has permission to access

This is a limitation caused by Apple's sandboxing. When a resource is moved or renamed, Downcast needs to generate a new bookmark in order to keep accessing that content. This isn't possible if the content is moved to a location Downcast doesn't have permission to access. By default, Downcast only has permission to access resources located inside of its container folder (~/Library/Containers/com.jamawkinaw.downcast.mac). If you change your media library's location in Preferences, Downcast also has permission to access that location. 


To resolve this, we recommend that you grant Downcast permission to access any volume you will store media files on. This allows Downcast to automatically restore access to moved or renamed files. However, you can also resolve problems individually if you wish. For both options, you'll use the resource resolution tool (File -> Resource Resolution). 

Bookmarks cannot be renewed when content is moved to a different volume

This is a limitation of the bookmarking feature of Mac OS. When a file is moved from one volume to another, the bookmark has for that file becomes unusable. This prevents Downcast from maintaining access to the file even if you've granted it permission to access the volume the file was moved to.


To resolve this, you will need to tell Downcast where to search for your relocated content. Any content that Downcast manages is marked with a special attribute. Downcast uses this attribute to restore access to the relocated content. To do this, you'll use the resource resolution tool (File -> Resource Resolution).


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