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I am a big iPod user (especially podcasts). I have used iPod touch, iPod classic and iPod nano. I noticed that iTunes stops downloading podcasts that you no longer listen to and stops downloading them. Is there a way to force iTunes to download all episodes of podcasts irrespective of whether you listen to them or not?

I am not interested in just clicking a episode to make iTunes think that I'm listening. I need some kind of programmatic work around or batch script that runs and updates all podcasts/episodes automatically.

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@Palantir, the belongs-on-superuser tag is unnecessary. – Brandon Oct 23 '09 at 14:14
Okay folks - I started a bounty on this one. Someone's gotta help solve this, because I'm sure @user15660 and I aren't the only ones with this problem. On iTunes for Windows (no applescript solutions!), how do you keep iTunes from discontinuing podcasts if it thinks you haven't listened to them. Often, there's a podcast like TAL that you have to get every week or you will miss that episode. – mattmc3 Jul 31 '10 at 11:39
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migrated from stackoverflow.com Oct 23 '09 at 14:14

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6 Answers

up vote 2 down vote
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As a workaround, you can select all items in the podcast list (Cmd-A on Mac, should be Ctrl-A on Windows), open the context menu and select "Update Podcast". This forces all podcasts to update, including the ones iTunes thinks you're no longer listening to.

See also here

If you're on Mac OS X, you can try using AppleScript. Open /Applications/Utilities/AppleScript Editor.app and enter the following:

tell application "iTunes" to updateAllPodcasts

This script will launch iTunes and update all podcasts.

You can save as script and e.g. execute this by running osascript scriptname.scpt in Terminal.

Alternatively, enable the Scripts menu for your menu bar in AppleScript Editor's preferences and execute from there whenever you're in iTunes, after you saved it in ~/Library/Scripts/Applications/iTunes.

Alternatively, you can save it as an application and run it manually, or put in in your Login Items in Accounts preference pane in System Preferences.

You can even use Automator and the Run AppleScript action to create a Service that executes the code above, which is placed in the Services menu. Select all applications or iTunes in Automator to determine in which applications' Services menu this script appears. You can then configure a keyboard shortcut in System Preferences » Keyboard » Keyboard Shortcuts » Services.

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Not bad. At the very least, I make this a (bad) habit every time I open iTunes. – mattmc3 Aug 4 '10 at 1:21
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up vote 1 down vote

From Apple's Spport Podcasting Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Q: In iTunes, when I selected the Podcasts setting, "When new episodes are available, download all," I didn't get any additional episodes. Why?

A: This setting only applies to new podcast subscriptions.

The answer may be then to apply the "download all" option to new podcast subscriptions, rather than to existing ones.

See also:
How to manually add missing podcast episodes so they show up correctly in iTunes

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up vote 1 down vote

By default, iTunes will only download the most recent new podcast. You can change this in the podcast settings ("Settings" button at the bottom of the Podcast view):

iTunes podcast settings window

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Comment from user15660: "Thank you for answering. I know about the drop down you mentioned long ago. but download all will not download everything once itunes finds that you are not listening to those podcasts. I have 25 to 50 podcasts and many of them don't fetch the latest episode from the server becasue of the apple itunes policy. I hope this makes my point very clear. thanks & please advice if you have any solution." – Gnoupi Aug 1 '10 at 6:47
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up vote 0 down vote

For Mac Users:

My new app Castmaster solves this problem by forcing iTunes to download all podcast episodes, even those that haven't been listened to recently.

It's available on the Mac App Store, Castmaster on the Mac App Store

To enable this, check "Keep Subscriptions Active" in the Settings window.

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up vote 0 down vote

http://dougscripts.com/itunes/scripts/download.php?sc=getavailableepisodes

does the same as castmaster - at least the bit on this thread, and is free. That site also has tonnes of great scripts

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up vote -1 down vote

Subscribe to your podcast. Go to your library tab on itunes---> click on "podcast" tab. Double click the subscribed podcast. Click "get all"

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You're not actually answering the issue here, as this won't affect future episodes at all. – Daniel Beck Jun 29 '11 at 10:48
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