guide sign

Guide ©Josh Archer and licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Some edits applied.

How to download signed versions of programmes

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UPDATE - 23.06.2015 - It is currently not possible to search for audiodescribed or signed versions of TV programmes using get_iplayer as the BBC has removed that information from their feeds.

You can still download audiodescribed versions, but you'll have to search for them on the iPlayer site to find the PIDs.

For more information, read the get_iplayer version 2.93-2.94 release notes.

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  Downloading a signed programme with get_iplayer is almost identical to downloading a standard show. Make sure you view the TV Download Guide to get an understanding of the basics of downloading a programme.

Using the --versions command

From the Options wiki page we see that in order to obtain signed versions of TV programmes we need to use the --versions command. get_iplayer doesn't download these versions of the show by default, so we need to manually tell it to do so.

With this command you then use the argument 'signed' in order to tell get_iplayer to download the signed version of the programme. It doesn't really matter where in the full download command you place this --versions command and its arguements but I usually place it at the end.

Lets look at an example:

get_iplayer --get 123 --versions=signed

Common Errors

If there is no signed version available you will likely see the following error:

WARNING: No programmes are available for this pid with version(s): signed (available versions: default)

This is not get_player's fault - there simply isn't a signed version of this programme available from the BBC.