I want to download files to a specific folder which can be inside a couple of other folders. How do I do this?
example:
main folder
-folder inside main folder
–folder inside above folder <—want to download directly here.
Thanks for helping!
—–
Debbie
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How Do I Download To a Specific Folder?
Comments: 12 Responses to “How Do I Download To a Specific Folder?”
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Which application is doing the download? Your web browser? Mail app? Something else?
I'll assume you mean from your web browser, and that browser is Safari.
You can choose any folder to use as a download folder in Safari. Just go to Safari, Preferences and click on General. Then look for Save Downloaded Files To. Select that and you can choose any folder you want.
Hi Gary,
Thanks for the super quick response! I am downloading from the web, forgot to mention that. What I want to know is if I can do a "save as" (first mac) when I'm downloading so the file goes directly into a specific folder which is normally 3 to 4 folders into a main folder. I may not be explaining this correctly... maybe a better example would be as follows; I have a folder named "books" in that folder I have a folder named "Patterson" and in the Patterson folder I have a folder named "Book 1" I'm wanting to download directly from the web to the "Book 1" folder. Is this possible?
Again, thanks so much for your help!
Debbie
Yes. Just choose that Book 1 folder in the Safari Preferences. Then download all of the files you want and they will all go into that folder.
But it would be just as easy to download to your regular downloads folder and then move them later.
But I don't think you are really asking that. Are you downloading a bunch of files and you want each to go into a specific folder? So some files go into Book 1 and others go into Book 2, etc?
There's no good way for your computer to know where each file goes without you telling it. If the site were to put them all into a compressed format, say a .zip file, then they could all be in folders already when you download them. But that would be up to the site.
If the site has chosen to give you a bunch of files to download individually, then you are just going to have to arrange them once you get them downloaded. Or, pick the exact location for each as you download them.
Hi Gary,
Ok, I guess the mac won't allow me to do what I normally do with my PC, that is what I was wondering.
Thank you again for the info!
Debbie
You could do this on Windows? I'm not sure how Windows would know where to put each file.
Change the Safari General Preference Save Downloaded files to: "Desktop" would be another option. I too doubt that Windows would know where to put individual files.
SJ Allan
Windows doesn't know where to put *anything* - let alone group-download files that need to go to different folders? ! My advice: download to "Downloads" (next to your trash basket at lower right - it's the default)- (file-by-file) then move to whatever folder you choose.
I guess I'm terrible at explaining this LOL. No, windows doesn't "know" where to put files, you have to tell it where. When I download a file with my PC I click the download link and go to "save as" then I go to the 1st folder, click open, in that folder I go to the 2nd folder, click open, etc... you can go as "deep" into one file folder as you like. This way I download "directly" into the destination folder instead of downloading all my files into the download folder and having to move everything.
Oh, I see. You want to specify where each file gets saved. I throughout you wanted to do that automatically.
To save a file to any location, simply Control+Click on the download link for the file and choose Download Linked File As...
I found how to "Download as", but I cannot do what I have always done under Windows or Linux:
Download as -> Dialog Popup to select folder -> *I doubleclick on a folder, it opens that folder, I might doubleclick again to go down another level and select a folder in there to download to.
ie: Under Mac, I know how to download as to favorites, last locations etc but not to subdirectories within those (W + L let you download to any level deep in subdirectories that you want)
Sure you can. I bet from what you describe that you are simply looking at the collapsed, simplified save dialog box. See that little triangle button on the right? Click that to expand the dialog box. See http://macmost.com/save-dialog-defaults.html
This was fun to read as I am a recent PC to Mac convert as well and had the same question. Thanks everyone for your input. It was humorous though to read as Debbie was speaking Windows and the rest of you all were speaking Mac. I knew exactly what she was talking about and am glad to finally learn that I can do a similar thing on my Mac - it will be a time saver.
Thanks all.