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transmission-api

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Transmission RPC reference covering JSON-RPC 2.0 transport, session token handling, torrent methods, session methods, and protocol versioning.

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Source SKILL.md: https://github.com/tympanix/Electorrent/blob/HEAD/.github/skills/transmission-api/SKILL.md

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Skill: Transmission API

Purpose

Use this skill when you need to integrate with Transmission's RPC API.

Protocol

  • Preferred transport: HTTP POST
  • Default endpoint: http://host:9091/transmission/rpc
  • Current spec: JSON-RPC 2.0
  • Request parameters must be an object in params
  • Response data is returned in result

Example request:

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "params": {
    "fields": ["version"]
  },
  "method": "session_get",
  "id": 1
}

Authentication and session token

CSRF token

Most servers require X-Transmission-Session-Id.

  • First request often gets 409 Conflict
  • The response includes the correct X-Transmission-Session-Id
  • Retry the same request with that header value

Authentication

  • Optional HTTP Basic Auth
  • Credentials are sent in Authorization: Basic ...

Method naming

  • Transmission 4.1.0+ (rpc_version_semver 6.0.0+) uses JSON-RPC 2.0 and snake_case
  • Older bespoke protocol and older kebab-case / camelCase strings are deprecated but still seen in existing clients

Torrent methods

Action methods

  • torrent_start
  • torrent_start_now
  • torrent_stop
  • torrent_verify
  • torrent_reannounce

Common parameter:

  • ids: integer id, array of ids/hashes, or "recently_active"

torrent_get

Request:

  • optional ids
  • required fields
  • optional format: objects or table

Important field families:

  • core status: id, hash_string, name, status, percent_done, eta, eta_idle
  • storage: download_dir, files, file_stats, wanted, priorities, piece_count, piece_size, pieces
  • transfer: rate_download, rate_upload, uploaded_ever, downloaded_ever, upload_ratio
  • peers/trackers: peers, peers_from, trackers, tracker_stats, webseeds_ex
  • queue and policy: queue_position, seed_ratio_limit, seed_idle_limit, labels, group, sequential_download

Status values:

ValueMeaning
0stopped
1queued to verify
2verifying
3queued to download
4downloading
5queued to seed
6seeding

torrent_set

Common mutators:

  • download_limit, download_limited
  • upload_limit, upload_limited
  • peer_limit
  • files_wanted, files_unwanted
  • priority_high, priority_normal, priority_low
  • location
  • queue_position
  • labels
  • group
  • seed_ratio_limit, seed_ratio_mode
  • seed_idle_limit, seed_idle_mode
  • sequential_download
  • sequential_download_from_piece
  • tracker_list

torrent_add

Supply either:

  • filename for URL or .torrent path
  • metainfo for base64-encoded .torrent bytes

Useful optional parameters:

  • download_dir
  • paused
  • labels
  • peer_limit
  • files_wanted, files_unwanted
  • priority_*
  • sequential_download
  • sequential_download_from_piece

Success returns torrent_added; duplicate adds return torrent_duplicate.

Other torrent methods

  • torrent_remove
    • params: ids, delete_local_data
  • torrent_set_location
    • params: ids, location, move
  • torrent_rename_path
    • params: ids (single torrent), path, name

Session methods

session_get / session_set

Important keys:

  • networking: peer_port, port_forwarding_enabled, preferred_transports, encryption
  • directories: download_dir, incomplete_dir, incomplete_dir_enabled
  • queues: download_queue_enabled, download_queue_size, seed_queue_enabled, seed_queue_size
  • speed limits: speed_limit_down, speed_limit_down_enabled, speed_limit_up, speed_limit_up_enabled
  • alternate speeds: alt_speed_*
  • seeding policy: seed_ratio_limit, seed_ratio_limited, idle_seeding_limit, idle_seeding_limit_enabled
  • versioning: rpc_version_semver, version

Other session methods

  • session_stats
  • blocklist_update
  • port_test
  • session_close
  • free_space
  • queue movement: queue_move_top, queue_move_up, queue_move_down, queue_move_bottom
  • bandwidth groups: group_set, group_get

Error object

JSON-RPC errors may include:

  • code
  • message
  • data.error_string
  • data.result

Versioning

  • Prefer rpc_version_semver for compatibility checks
  • rpc_version and rpc_version_minimum are deprecated
  • X-Transmission-Rpc-Version may be returned on HTTP 409 responses on newer servers

Electorrent usage

Electorrent currently talks to Transmission using the legacy method names:

  • session-get
  • torrent-get
  • torrent-add
  • torrent action methods such as start/stop/remove

That works on current Transmission releases, but new integrations should prefer the JSON-RPC 2.0 snake_case forms from this spec.

Reference