Quick and dirty script to download all the files from a Basecamp account.

download-basecamp-files.rb

require "nokogiri"
require "time"
require "fileutils"

url = "https://whatever.basecamphq.com"
api_key = YOUR_API_KEY

curl_options = "-u #{api_key}:X -H 'Accept: application/xml' -H 'Content-Type: application/xml'"

def sanitize(s)
  s.downcase.gsub(/[^a-z0-9\.]+/, "_")
end

xml = `curl #{curl_options} #{url}/projects.xml`
doc = Nokogiri::XML(xml)
projects = doc.xpath("//project").map{ |project|
  [project.xpath("id").first.text, project.xpath("name").first.text]
}

projects.each do |project, pname|
  dir = sanitize(pname)
  puts dir
  FileUtils.mkdir_p dir
  Dir.chdir dir do
    offset = 0
    loop do
      xml = `curl #{curl_options} #{url}/projects/#{project}/attachments.xml?n=#{offset}`
      doc = Nokogiri::XML(xml)
      attachments = doc.xpath("//attachment")
      attachments.each do |attachment|
        datetime = Time.parse(attachment.xpath("created-on").first.text)
        name = attachment.xpath("name").first.text
        download = attachment.xpath("download-url").first.text
        filename = sanitize(name)
        puts filename
        system %{curl #{curl_options} -o "#{filename}" "#{download}"}
      end
      if attachments.any?
        offset += attachments.length
      else
        break
      end
    end
  end
end

Excellent script, I just needed to add in the rubygems requirement and add quotes around the API key. Thanks much!

require "rubygems"
...
api_key = "YOUR_API_KEY"

I'm getting the following error. Any idea?

basecamp.rb:15:in ``': No such file or directory - curl -u [api_key]:X -H 'Accept: application/xml' -H 'Content-Type: application/xml' [url] (Errno::ENOENT)
from basecamp.rb:15:in`

'

Do you have curl installed?

doh. installed curl. but not having ssl host issues.

curl: (6) Could not resolve host: 'Accept; No data record of requested type
curl: (6) Could not resolve host: application; Host not found
curl: (6) Could not resolve host: 'Content-Type; No data record of requested type
curl: (6) Could not resolve host: application; Host not found

not a huge deal. just trying to save some right click save silliness.