Transmission BitTorrent Setup
Installation
Install transmission packages from terminal enter:
sudo apt install transmission-cli transmission-common transmission-daemon
Configuration
Trasmission stop
Make sure the Transmission daemon is not running when changing the config file otherwise your changes will be over written.
sudo service transmission-daemon stop
edit /var/lib/transmission-daemon/info/settings.json
sudo nano /var/lib/transmission-daemon/info/settings.json
Username and Password
The default rpc-username and password is transmission
Change if increased security is required.
Change it to whatever you want (any password will work). After next restart the password will be rewritten in SHA1 encrypted format for security reasons.
"rpc-password": "{62b16db87b89a91dd49a5110a7cafc06d20eb4f2wtK6kqPj",
"rpc-username": "transmission",
Whitelist
This must be changed for remote access
rpc-whitelist defines access to transmission. Localhost (127.0.0.1) is defined by default. I added ,192.268.*.* to allow any machine on my LAN access.
"rpc-whitelist": "127.0.0.1,192.168.*.*",
umask parameter
You will also have to set the "umask" parameter in Transmission’s settings file to “2” (default is 18) for the account user to have full access to files/folders created by Transmission.
"umask": 2,
Transmission Restart
After configuration change, restart transmission
sudo service transmission-daemon start
Default File Directory
Place a torrent file in this directory for automatic file download
/var/lib/transmission-daemon/downloads/
Configure Users and Permissions
It is recommended that Transmission runs under it’s own username for security reasons. This creates a few issues with file and folder access by Transmission as well as your account (let us assume it is user).
Add the username user to the group debian-transmission:
sudo usermod -a -G debian-transmission user
Change "user" to you own Ubuntu user login name.
Note
When adding a user to a new group, the user must log out and log back in for it to take affect. A reboot will also accomplish this.
Web Interface
With your browser you can now add torrents, download and seed. You can also configure many transmission settings.
http://<server-ip>:9091
Command Line Interface
With a headless server full control of Transmission requires CLI
Transmission Create
Create a torrent file with transmission CLI. Torrent files can be generated from either a single file or directories. The example below is a directory example
transmission-create -o /var/lib/transmission-daemon/downloads/files.torrent -c "My comments" -t udp://tracker.openbittorrent.com:80 -t udp://open.demonii.com:1337 -t udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969 -t udp://tracker.leechers-paradise.org:6969 ~/torrent/complete/
Breakdown of options used..
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
| -o /var/lib/transmission-daemon/downloads/files.torrent | New torrent name and where to store the torrent |
| -c "My comments" | Any comments to be attached to the file |
| -t udp://tracker.openbittorrent.com:80 | |
| -t udp://open.demonii.com:1337 | |
| -t udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969 | |
| -t udp://tracker.leechers-paradise.org:6969 | Trackers for the torrents, more than one tracker is recommended in case one or more goes down. |
| ~/torrent/complete/ | Directory to be made into a torrent. If a single file is required use this format /var/lib/transmission-daemon/downloads/MyFile.txt |
For more information about "transmission-create" - transmission-create -h
Add a Torrent
To add a torrent to the daemon, use this command:
transmission-remote -a [path to file].torrent
transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -a /var/lib/transmission-daemon/downloads/files.torrent
Torrent Information
Display information about torrent's being downloaded
| Description | Command |
|---|---|
| Help information | transmission-remote -h |
| List all torrents | transmission-remote -n 'username:password' -l |
| Basic Stats All Torrents | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -st |
| Full Stats All Torrents | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -si |
| Torrent #3 Full Stats | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -t 3 -f |
| Torrent #3 Summary Stats | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -t 3 -i |
Note
Authentication is required. Here transmission:transmission refers to username:password set to transmission
Transmission Control
| Description | Command |
|---|---|
| Start all torrents | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -s |
| Stop all torrents | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -S |
| Start a specific torrent | transmission-remote -s [hash] |
| transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -s -t 3 | |
| Stop a specific torrent | transmission-remote -S [hash] |
| transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -S -t 3 | |
| Remove all torrents | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -r |
| Remove a specific torrent | transmission-remote -r [hash] |
| transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -r -t 3 | |
| Get hashes for all torrents | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -i |
| Quit the daemon | transmission-remote -n 'transmission:transmission' -q |