Pad failed downloads with zeros

[charun]

An option to pad out the failed download parts of a file with zeros would be handy so that files can be checked properly by torrent programs. At the moment, one failed part offsets the rest of the file and causes any valid data afterwards looks corrupt.

This could be related to Ticket #226.

[shypike]

The par2 program doesn't require filling the missing parts with zero's.
I fail to see what torrent programs have to do with it.

[codingismy11to7]

Oh man, I wondered why this didn't work with SAB but works with all other nntp clients I've used.
This is VERY annoying, and I also don't understand why it's there - yDec has a file position, and in Unison and the NNTP client I wrote, after yDecoding it writes the data to the correct position in the file. This allows torrent clients to verify the data and resume the download and only fetch the broken blocks.
I don't know how par2 verifies the file, but torrent clients obviously do it differently.
In summary:
* download an NZB with pars, verify fails, needs X more repair blocks (but the download is mostly complete)
* find a torrent file with the exact same files
* add it to, say, Transmission, point the download to the NNTP download location, select Verify Data
* the torrent client only needs to download a little bit to finish repairing the files, as long as the nntp client wrote file data to the correct positions in the file

[codingismy11to7]

I wrote a patch for this, and it's working great. A broken 800MB download loaded into Transmission with 23MB remaining, and was quickly finished off

If this affects you too, you can consider going to https://bugs.launchpad.net/sabnzbd/+bug/615535 and selecting the "affects me" option.

[shypike]

SABnzbd and most other Usenet clients use par2 files to verify downloads
and to repair them. Without the need for a Torrent client.

Maybe I'm dense, but can you explain why (and how) you use a Torrent client to do Usenet repairs?