Cannot download from AO3

[AlexisNgyuen]

Hello! Sorry this may turn out to be because I'm very noob.... but I cannot download any stories from AO3 at all using fichub.net. I wonder if I'm using the wrong link format, but there's really no guidance on the website.

This is an example of a story I'm trying to download: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18348185/chapters/43440026

I've tried that link, as well as these links that also failed:

• https://archiveofourown.org/works/18348185
• https://archiveofourown.org/works/18348185?view_full_work=true

This is the error message I get:
msg: unable to find fic

{
"arg": "https:/archiveofourown.org/works/18348185/chapters/43440026",
"err": -1,
"msg": "unable to find fic",
"q": "https://archiveofourown.org/works/18348185/chapters/43440026",
"res": "",
"ret": -1000,
"upstream": true
}

May I check what else can I do to download the story, or is it a bug?

[AlexisNgyuen]

Hi sorry will close this ticket now! Seems it's more like an unstable performance problem, sometimes I can download from the link and sometimes I cannot. Refreshing a few times seems to help.

[iridescent-beacon]

Hey, glad it started working for you! Yes, right now fichub has an unusually high volume of traffic which is exacerbating timeout related errors which is what you were seeing -- the error messages need to be greatly improved.

For future reference, all three of the link formats you showed should work. Additionally, the link to a specific chapter or a specific work inside a collection should also work (but not the entire collection url).

I'm going to reopen this as a documentation issue.

If you still cannot download a fic after a few tries/waiting a bit, then please do report it if you have the time. Some very old fics, mostly on ffn and some other sites, have broken html or metadata that means they can't be exported until I do something about them. Problems with AO3 are almost certainly just a timeout or the fic being private though.

[AlexisNgyuen]

Hey, thanks for your reply! Yep the stability improved a lot over the last few days, I guess I was unlucky last week and tried the website when traffic was high. Now the AO3 requests work.

[Ariel-Schnee]

Hello! Sorry this may turn out to be because I'm very noob.... but I cannot download any stories from AO3 at all using fichub.net. I wonder if I'm using the wrong link format, but there's really no guidance on the website.

A03 has its own download option there. Just use it. It works good.