Open DOWNLOAD File

Information, tips and instructions

Open Incomplete DOWNLOAD File

The easiest way to open an incomplete download file is to try to resume it in the browser which started the download. In case of an incomplete download file with .DOWNLOAD file extension the responsible internet browser is Safari. If it is impossible to resume or restart the download (for example, if file is not available any more from the original download location) you can still try to open the file even though it is incomplete. Your success with opening it will depend on what type of content is inside the file and in which format this content is stored.

You will have the best luck with opening partial file if the content inside it is textual (TXT, XML, JSON files). In this case even if only part of the content was downloaded you will still be able to open the already downloaded file and view it. To do this just remove .DOWNLOAD file extension from the end of the filename and double click on the file in question. You should see you content open in a corresponding application. Certain textual files like JSON and XML can contain structured information which may require full file to be downloaded to display properly. Still it may be possible to get a lot of information from only part of the file. If JSON or XML file fails to open properly in a structured way you can try to open it in plain view by opening it with TextEdit or other text editors like Sublime Text, Notepad++, etc.

Video or audio content is another type of content which may be partially viewable in case of partial download. Depending on the file format video or audio file may open in a corresponding application when you remove .DOWNLOAD file extension from the end of the file name. Some file formats may be able to play up to the location where download was stopped but certain video and audio formats may contain forward data references which will fail to work in case of partially downloaded file.

Archive files may be partially recoverable in case of partial download. For example, TAR and TAR.GZ files contain multiple files concatenated into one file one after another. ZIP, RAR, 7Z, DMG, APP and other archive file formats also compress multiple files sequentially. Thus, even if part of the archive was downloaded you may still recover some files from it.

Executable, drivers, executable library files like DLL, EXE, LIB, SO, SYS, DRV typically contain complex structured information with forward and backward references and won’t open if partially downloaded. Still even partial download of the file could still be disassembled with disassembler application.

Learn how to RPMSG file and open ICS file.