Request: Automated time-based iTunes downloads

[rgarber]

I have a monthly bandwidth cap of 25gb download capacity, because I live in a rural area and use the Exide satellite product.  As you might imagine, I'm extremely limited in my ability to download movies.

But... they give me unlimited bandwidth between midnight and 5am.

 

I'm in need of a workflow that could automate iTunes to download a particular movie name or movie name list, from the iTunes store, starting at midnight.

 

Is Alfred workflow capable of this level of control ?

 

Anyone who might be interested in building this for me, please get in touch.  I'm happy to pay you for your time and great support of my social life :-)

[dfay]

There are two tasks here: 1) is scheduling, 2) is telling iTunes to download a particular movie.

 

1) is easy to accomplish with launchd or a front end for it like Lingon, which lets you schedule scripts to run at particular times.

 

2) isn't possible with iTunes existing Applescript dictionary.  It *might* be possible using UI scripting but that would involve a whole lot of simulating mouse clicks and menu selections that would probably need to be customized for each movie or else you might end up buying & downloading stuff you don't want.

[vitor]

This is not a good job for Alfred. I’d recommend posting the question to StackOverflow or AskDifferent, to widen the reach of users who might reply with a solution. That said, it should be possible in some way or another, depending on your level of pickiness.

iTunes’ applescript dictionary does have specific options to update and download podcasts, but not store purchases. It seems like your best bet would be some variation of making iTunes autodownload content; buying said content and closing iTunes; opening iTunes at the scheduled time. This post suggests it as a working idea. This script is also a possible consideration. It seems to be simply opening a specific url, so even if this exact solution doesn’t work for you, you may be able to find the url you need.