| Developer(s) | The SABnzbd Team |
|---|---|
| Initial release | 2006 |
| Stable release | 0.6.14 / 2011-12-10 |
| Preview release | n/a |
| Development status | Active |
| Written in | Python |
| Operating system | Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Unix |
| Available in | English, Dutch, French, German, Swedish, Danish, Romanian |
| Type | News client |
| License | GPL |
| Website | www.sabnzbd.org |
SABnzbd is a multi-platform open source news client targeted at efficient retrieval of Usenet binary posts. It's written in Python and works on Windows, Mac OS X and POSIX-compliant systems. It tries to offer maximum automation in downloading and post processing.
Contrary to conventional news readers, the program doesn't offer actual news reading. Instead it relies on the input of NZB files obtained from indexing sites. It's also able to automatically read and process RSS feeds from such indexing sites.
The program doesn't have a native GUI but functions as a web server, relying on the use of a web browser. This makes it suitable for usage on (headless) servers.
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In 2006 the Austrian developer Gregor Kaufmann (using the "handle" tdian on SourceForge.net) published a Python program called SABnzbd. While still in a primitive state, the program was picked up by Usenet fans tired of manually downloading, par-checking and unpacking Usenet material. About a year later, tdian announced that he stopped the project. A small team[1] took over the program and extended the automation features and engineered it into a product suitable for a less technically inclined audience.
There is some confusion about the name. When the current team forked[2] the original author's abandoned project, they had to pick a new name because the author kept the existing SourceForge project.[3] The new team picked SABnzbdPlus,[4] but refer to their software as SABnzbd in all other outings.
The team moved their source code hosting over from Assembla.com to Launchpad.net.[5]
"Official" support is on the developers forum.[6]
There's also a lively discussion on somethingawful.com.[7]
The program received a number of positive reviews in computer magazines[8] and websites.[9] What is primarily praised is the extent of automation (limiting the user's exposure to the actual GUI).
SABnzbd+ surpassed 2 million downloads via SourceForge in November 2010,[10] though the total numbers of downloads in unknown due to its availability in various distributions of Linux. The latest stable release has had about 340.000 downloads according to SourceForge's download statistics.[11]