Installation:

Simply double-click the file named “Automatic.prefPane” contained in the zip file you
downloaded. This launches System Preferences, asking where to install Automatic:

This selection does not affect the way Automatic works. In both cases, subscriptions are
user-specific. Click “Installʼ.

Setup:
After Automatic is loaded, you are presented with the general info tab:

If desired, change the refresh time: shorter intervals mean Automatic will check for new
items more often, but this puts a larger strain on the servers offering the feed; 30 minutes
or 1 hour is recommended.
Tip: You can force a refresh by toggling Automatic off/on (click the “Stop/Start” button twice).

Also specify a download path for the enclosures within the feed items.
Note: If you are using a torrent application with the ability to automatically add torrents from a
specific folder (such as Transmission), then it is recommended to set Automatic to download
enclosures to that folder.

Click on the Subscriptions tab. If this is the first time running Automatic, the subscription
list will be empty:

Click the “Add” button in the bottom left corner to add a new subscription:

Enter a descriptive name, such as “Prison Break”. In the filter feed, enter the regular
expression that will be used to determine whether an item should be downloaded by this
subscription; in this case, enter “prison.break”. For more information on how to construct
and use regular expressions, see the “Regular Expression Tips” section at the end of this
document.
Note: The filter is case insensitive; “prison.break” is the same as “Prison.Break”.
Note: Regular expressions are matched against the title element of the RSS items.

If this is the first subscription being set up, there will be no feeds specified; click the “Add“
button to add a new feed:

Enter a descriptive name, such as “tvRSS EZTV”. Specify the URL, which in this case is
“http://tvrss.net/feed/eztv/”. You can also specify an expression that will be matched
against every item in the feed; if the “Invert” checkbox is checked, a logical NOT is applied
to the expression.
Note: The feed filter field is provided as an easy way to filter out large numbers of items from the
feed. For example, if a feed provides HD versions of TV show episodes along with the SD
versions, you could specify that Automatic download only the HD versions by using this feed filter:
“(720|1080|HR)” - without the brackets. This means that any TV show subscriptions using this feed
as their source will only match items tagged as 720, 1080 or HR. Conversely, if you want only the
SD versions, click the “Invert” checkbox; this will tell Automatic to match only items that arenʼt
tagged as 720, 1080 or HR. You can also use this feature to discriminate based on release group,
language, etc. For more information on how to construct and use regular expressions, see the
“Regular Expression Tips” section at the end of this document.

Click “OK” to save the feed and finish setting up the subscription. Notice that the new feed
is available to select as a source:
Click on the “On” checkbox for the “tvRSS EZTV” feed and then click “OK”.

If you want to add additional subscriptions, click the “Add” button again:
Notice that the feed you added previously is available, so just check the box if you want to
use it for this subscription. Enter “Fringe” in the description field and “fringe” in the filter -
both without brackets. Click “OK.

Youʼve now setup 2 subscriptions, one for “Prison Break” and the another for “Fringe”.
Both will be downloaded from the “tvRSS EZTV” feed. Go back to the “General” tab and
click the “Start” button to get Automatic running. Now every time a new episode is
released, it will be automatically downloaded!

Regular Expression Tips

This is a very quick guide to constructing regular expressions for Automatic; for detailed
information on how regular expressions work, visit http://www.regular-expressions.info/.

A regular expression is a special text string for describing a search pattern. This special
string is compared against items in the feeds to determine if they match the pattern.
Regular expressions are very powerful, and can be used to describe fairly complex
patterns, but you only need to know a few things to use them in Automatic.

Basics tips:
• In general, simply write out the keywords, substituting spaces for periods: “prison.break”
in the case of “Prison Break”.
• If keywords are separated by more than just a space, use “.*” (period + asterisk) instead
of plain “.” (period): “Greyʼs Anatomy” will match “grey.*anatomy”; so will “Greys
Anatomy” and “Grey Anatomy”. If youʼre unsure about how exactly a keyword will show
up, use “.*”
• Use parentheses along with “&” (AND) or “|” (OR) for compound statements.
To sum up:
I. For the vast majority of TV shows, simply substitute spaces for periods (if any).

Examples:
“desperate.housewives” for “Desperate Housewives”
“fringe” for “Fringe”
“big.bang.theory” for “The Big Bang Theory”.

II. For feeds, you can use parentheses to form compound statements.

Examples:
“(720&french)” with match only HD 720p episodes in french.
“(720|1080|HR)” with invert selected will discard any HD or HR episodes, leaving only
SD.

Special cases:
There are very few cases of shows which require more complex expressions; most are
listed below:

Show Expression

House, M.D. ^house

24 ^24

CSI csi.(?!miami|new|ny|\bn\.y\.)

CSI Miami csi.+miami

CSI New York csi.+(new|ny|\bn\.y\.(?!miami))

ER (\ber\b|\be\.r\.)

Law & Order law.(\+|&|and|&).order:?(\.|\s)(?!special|svu|s\.v\.u\.|

criminal|\bci\b|c\.i\.)

Law & Order CI law.(\+|&|and|&).order:?(\.|\s)(criminal|\bci\b|c\.i\.)

Law & Order SVU law.(\+|&|and|&).order:?(\.|\s)(special|svu|s\.v\.u\.)