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Getting Started

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Adam Greenwell edited this page Aug 19, 2026 · 3 revisions

Getting Started

Installing

Packaged builds are not published yet. The release pipeline lands in Phase 3 (#15). Until then, build from source — see Development-Setup.

When releases are available:

Platform File Notes
macOS 12+ Flume_x.y.z.dmg Unsigned builds need a Gatekeeper bypass
Windows 10/11 Flume_x.y.z.msi or .exe SmartScreen may warn on unsigned builds
Debian 12+ / Ubuntu 22.04+ flume_x.y.z_amd64.deb sudo apt install ./flume_*.deb
Fedora 38+ / RHEL 9.4+ flume-x.y.z.rpm sudo dnf install ./flume-*.rpm

See Platform-Notes for the unsigned-build workarounds.

First run

On first launch Flume:

  1. Opens its window immediately.
  2. Starts a torrent session in the background — this is why the status indicator briefly reads Starting, then Connecting.
  3. Bootstraps the DHT. Once the routing table has enough nodes, the indicator reads Ready and magnet links will resolve. This normally takes a few seconds.

The status indicator means:

State Meaning
Starting The engine has not bound a listening port yet
Connecting Listening; DHT still bootstrapping
Ready Peer discovery is working
Degraded Running, but DHT is off — magnet links will not resolve

Defaults

Setting Default
Download folder Your OS Downloads folder
Listen port 42221 (TCP)
DHT Enabled
UPnP port forwarding Enabled

Session state lives in your OS application-data directory:

  • macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/io.github.adamgreenwell.Flume
  • Windows: %APPDATA%\io.github.adamgreenwell.Flume
  • Linux: ~/.local/share/io.github.adamgreenwell.Flume (or $XDG_DATA_HOME)

Firewall

For good download speeds and any seeding, allow inbound TCP on port 42221. UPnP attempts this automatically when your router permits it. If your router has UPnP disabled — a reasonable security posture — forward the port manually.

You can still download without an open port; you will just connect to fewer peers.

Troubleshooting

Stuck on "Starting". Usually another process holds port 42221. Check the terminal output if running from source.

Stuck on "Connecting". The DHT cannot reach its bootstrap nodes. Check that outbound UDP is not blocked.

"Degraded". DHT is disabled. Magnet links need it; .torrent files with working trackers will still function.

Flume — Apache-2.0. This wiki is generated from docs/ by wiki-sync.yml; edits made here are overwritten on the next sync, so change the source instead and it gets reviewed with the code. The same pages, laid out for reading, are at flume.adamgreenwell.com/docs.

Flume

Using Flume

Developing

Project

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