ytdl: An Emacs interface for youtube-dl

ytdl is an Emacs-based interface for youtube-dl, written in emacs-lisp.

youtube-dl is a command-line program to download videos from YouTube.com and a few more sites. More information here.

Motivation

Command-line tools can be challenging to use (many arguments, need to use the "--help" command or the man page before actually using the tool, etc.). Those challenges (or leaning curves) can prevent many potential users from using the tool.

The idea of ytdl is to provide an intuitive and flexible Emacs interface for youtube-dl. ytdl leads to considerable gains in efficiency and comfort, especially when used with exwm.

Usage

Add the following line to your init.el:

(require 'ytdl)

Six interactive functions are available:

• ytdl-download-eshell, ytdl-download and ytdl-download-open that can be used to download a media file from an url.
• ytdl-download-playlist to download a playlist.
• ytdl-open-last-downloaded-file to open the last file downloaded with ytdl in the configured media player.
• ytdl-show-list to show the dowload list.

Note that ytdl-download, ytdl-download-open and ytdl-download-playlist add the file in the ytdl download list that can be visualized with ytdl-show-list. ytdl-download-eshell does not.

URL

ytdl pre-fills the mini-buffer with the URL at point if thing at point is an URL or the first entry in the kill ring. Users have to confim by pressing Enter.

Download List

When calling ytdl-show-list, ytdl dowload list is shown in a new buffer. This list contains information about files already downloaded and files currently being downloaded.

Several actions can be carried out within the download list buffer:

• ?: Show the help menu with all the commands.
• g: Refresh the list
• o: Open the file in media player
• O: Open all marked files in media player
• k: Remove item(s) at point from the list (the file will not be affected)
• K: Remove item(s) at point from the list and delete the associated file from the disk
• y: Copy path to file into clipboard
• m: mMrk item(s) at point
• M: Mark all items
• u: Unmark item(s) at point
• U: Unmark all items
• ^: Mark items matching a regexp (to be entered in the mini-buffer)
• e: Show eventual error(s)
• r: Relaunch item at point
• R: Relaunch all items with error(s)
• d: remove mark item(s)
• D: Remove mark item(s) and associated files
• c: Clear downloaded items from list
• C: Clear list

Demo

Download a video

Download a playlist

Inspiration from Skeeto's youtube-dl.el

Skeeto's interface was a source of inspiration for the development of the download list of ytdl. His original source code can be found here.

Configuration

Download Types

By default, there are three download types:

1. Downloads ytdl-download-folder can be customized to change the destination folder. By default it is set to "~/Downloads". No extra arguments are given by default, see ytdl-download-extra-args.

2. Videos ytdl-video-folder can be customized to change the destination folder. By default it is set to nil. No extra arguments are given by default, see ytdl-video-extra-args.

3. Music ytdl-music-folder can be customized to change the destination folder. By default it is set to "nil. By default, the extra arguments used for this download type are: '("-x" "--audio-format" "mp3"), meaning that audio will be extracted from the media file and eventually converted into mp3.

To add a new download type, use ytdl-add-field-in-download-type-list. This function takes four arguments:

• field-name: the name displayed in the mini-buffer;
• keyboard-shortcut: keyboard shortcut to select this download type in the mini-buffer;
• path-to-folder: absolute path to destination folder;
• extra-args: eventual extra arguments to ytdl for this download type.

Example: Add a podcast download type

To add a new download type called "podcasts", add this to the configuration file:

(ytdl-add-field-in-download-type-list "podcasts"
                                       "p"
                                       (expand-file-name "~/podcasts")
                                       nil)

Additional Customization

• By default, ytdl does not query the default filename fom the web server.

This behavior can be changed by changing ytdl-always-query-default-filename to:

• 'never (default behavior)
• 'yes-confirm: query default filenme from teh web server and ask confirmation
• 'yes: query default filenme from teh web server and use it without confirmation.

(setq ytdl-always-query-default-filename nil)

• Set the media player (used by ytdl-download-open) by changing the variable ytdl-media-player. Default value is mpv.

• Change the beginning of ytdl mini-buffer messages by changing ytdl-message-start. Default value is [ytdl].

• Hide the ytdl information in the global mode line by setting ytdl-mode-line to nil.

• By default, ytdl queries the download type using read-char-choice. If the list of download types is longer than a certain value (ytdl-max-mini-buffer-download-type-entries), then the download type is queried thtough completing-read (enabling users to use helm). To always use completing-read, set ytdl-max-mini-buffer-download-type-entries to 0.

• Change ytdl download list buffer name with ytdl-dl-buffer-name. Default value is *ytdl-list*.

• Change the item title column width with ytdl-title-column-width. Default value is 35.

Example of configuration

Here is an example of configuration you can add to your init.el:

(require 'ytdl)

(setq ytdl-music-folder (expand-file-name "~/music")
      ytdl-video-folder (expand-file-name "~/videos")
      ytdl-always-query-default-filename 'never)

(ytdl-add-field-in-download-type-list "podcasts"
                                       "p"
                                       (expand-file-name "~/podcasts")
                                       nil)

Changelog

v.1.3.6

FEATURE:

• Add ytdl-download-finished-hook defcustom. (by Damien Cassou)

BUG:

• Show ytdl-list when launching a new download. (by Arnaud Hoffmann)
• Remove emulations from keyword list. (by Arnaud Hoffmann)

v.1.3.5

FEATURE:

• Add ytdl-command defcustom. (by Pierre Neidhardt)

INTERNAL:

• Replace ytdl-message-start by ytdl--concat. (by Pierre Neidhardt)

STYLE:

• Use error instead of (concat ... "ERROR:" ...). (by Pierre Neidhardt)
• Fix syntax and docstring typos. (by Pierre Neidhardt)