I've been considering uploading some how-to "Hacker" tutorials (nothing malicious, no security exploits). Figured I'd test the water with a simple one that everyone always wants - Video Downloads from Streaming Sites.
I was asked:
"How do I download a Video when there's no Download Button?" This was in relation to a 3rd party site (not YouTube) which had some instructional videos.
I will answer this,
but ask you not to abuse it by downloading paid content... This works on a number of paid sites who monetize by allowing free streaming, but paid downloads. Circumventing the pay gate is unethical and may get you blocked from a site. Use responsibly.
My hope is by teaching people how to do this, fewer will be duped into downloading some 3rd party program (usually containing malware).
• Use Google Chrome as your Web Browser.
• Go to the page with the Video, but don't press play yet.
• On your Keyboard, press the [F12] Key.
• In a moment, the "Inspector" window opens up at the bottom of the page.
• At the top of the inspector window, you will see a "Network" tab. Open that tab.
• Now press play on the Video. You'll see a long blue line or progress bar forming as it tracks which file on the page is using the bandwidth. Presumably, a streaming video will use more, so you'll see that line spreading across the timeline. That's the video file.
• Double click the name next to the growing blue line to open just the video (or audio) in a new tab.
• Once it's in this new tab, simply right-click the video and choose "Save Video As", and save it.
The catch: YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, Vimeo and Amazon will break the file into multiple streams, so you can't capture it all as one file. This will work on most small sites, not DRM protected commercial streamers.
