Changing firefox default download directory daily

Question

Okey, this may sound a little weird.

I download some files every day, and there is some importance over when the files were downloaded. So, I make the directory with a date like this yyyy-mm-dd and download it in it.

But the problem is that some days I forget to change the directory (I tend to forget a lot of things before my morning tea :-|, and then I have to manually fiure out which belong where. So I thought, is it possible to make firefox switch default directories upon starting.

Making them isn't a problem - a script does that, but the second part is.

Any ideas ?

Answer 1

I suggest you use an automated file organizer for this purpose. If you are using Windows, you can check out Belvedere, if on Mac, then Hazel. If on Linux, try cron jobs with a good script.

Set up the rules as such for Belvedere or Hazel to monitor a single download folder, then anytime a file drops in, it is moved to the day's folder.

Your objective is to make the second problem of forgetting to change download directories non-existent even. In short, you should not be changing download directories, letting automation take care of sorting out the files for you.

Answer 2

If you have a script that creates the download directory for you, it should not be a problem to let the script edit your Firefox preferences as well (of course, you'd have to do that before starting Firefox).

Simply find your Firefox profile directory which should contain a file named 'prefs.js'. This line:

user_pref("browser.download.dir", "/foo");

Would set the download dir to 'foo'. All you script needs to do is change that line each day.