Once we have the client software installed, we just need to get ourselves a torrent file (a type of descriptor for the file package you're downloading) and start the client downloading the torrent. I like to use the ncurses (cool text GUI [TUI]) version of the client (btdownloadcurses) because it gives you some good feedback on the download status. Now one thing I caution you about is that by default, when you're downloading the file, you're also sharing the file (uploading it) to others. This can present a problem if you don't throttle your upload speed. Most internet connections via cable modem or DSL have a pretty big download rate, but they tend to have a much smaller upload rate. The problem comes in the fact that if you soak (use up) your upload bandwidth, it'll also degrade your download speed severely. To prevent this, we need to give the command line switch "--max_upload_rate 5" to the client to limit the upload rate. This limits the upload rate to 5 kilobytes per second, which works for me. So we end up with the command

btdownloadcurses --max_upload_rate fedora_core_6_beta_3.torrent

Now this will start the torrent downloading, but when it is finished downloading, by default the client will stay connected serving up the file to others attached to that torrent. I'm sure you can provide some command-line switch to tell the client to quit after download, but it doesn't hurt to leave it on for a little while to share with others if you limit your upload like we have. After the file is downloaded, you should have a directory named similar to the torrent file that contains the file or files that make up the torrent.