]> jfr.im git - yt-dlp.git/blame - CONTRIBUTING.md
[ie/youtube] Fix comments extraction (#9775)
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8c6f4daa 1# CONTRIBUTING TO YT-DLP
2
3- [OPENING AN ISSUE](#opening-an-issue)
4 - [Is the description of the issue itself sufficient?](#is-the-description-of-the-issue-itself-sufficient)
5 - [Are you using the latest version?](#are-you-using-the-latest-version)
6 - [Is the issue already documented?](#is-the-issue-already-documented)
7 - [Why are existing options not enough?](#why-are-existing-options-not-enough)
8 - [Have you read and understood the changes, between youtube-dl and yt-dlp](#have-you-read-and-understood-the-changes-between-youtube-dl-and-yt-dlp)
9 - [Is there enough context in your bug report?](#is-there-enough-context-in-your-bug-report)
10 - [Does the issue involve one problem, and one problem only?](#does-the-issue-involve-one-problem-and-one-problem-only)
11 - [Is anyone going to need the feature?](#is-anyone-going-to-need-the-feature)
12 - [Is your question about yt-dlp?](#is-your-question-about-yt-dlp)
d80d98e7 13 - [Are you willing to share account details if needed?](#are-you-willing-to-share-account-details-if-needed)
08d30158 14 - [Is the website primarily used for piracy](#is-the-website-primarily-used-for-piracy)
8c6f4daa 15- [DEVELOPER INSTRUCTIONS](#developer-instructions)
16 - [Adding new feature or making overarching changes](#adding-new-feature-or-making-overarching-changes)
17 - [Adding support for a new site](#adding-support-for-a-new-site)
18 - [yt-dlp coding conventions](#yt-dlp-coding-conventions)
19 - [Mandatory and optional metafields](#mandatory-and-optional-metafields)
20 - [Provide fallbacks](#provide-fallbacks)
21 - [Regular expressions](#regular-expressions)
22 - [Long lines policy](#long-lines-policy)
fc5fa964 23 - [Quotes](#quotes)
8c6f4daa 24 - [Inline values](#inline-values)
25 - [Collapse fallbacks](#collapse-fallbacks)
26 - [Trailing parentheses](#trailing-parentheses)
27 - [Use convenience conversion and parsing functions](#use-convenience-conversion-and-parsing-functions)
08d30158 28 - [My pull request is labeled pending-fixes](#my-pull-request-is-labeled-pending-fixes)
8c6f4daa 29- [EMBEDDING YT-DLP](README.md#embedding-yt-dlp)
30
31
32
33# OPENING AN ISSUE
34
35Bugs and suggestions should be reported at: [yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues). Unless you were prompted to or there is another pertinent reason (e.g. GitHub fails to accept the bug report), please do not send bug reports via personal email. For discussions, join us in our [discord server](https://discord.gg/H5MNcFW63r).
36
fc5fa964 37**Please include the full output of yt-dlp when run with `-vU`**, i.e. **add** `-vU` flag to **your command line**, copy the **whole** output and post it in the issue body wrapped in \`\`\` for better formatting. It should look similar to this:
8c6f4daa 38```
fc5fa964 39$ yt-dlp -vU <your command line>
8c6f4daa 40[debug] Command-line config: ['-v', 'demo.com']
41[debug] Encodings: locale UTF-8, fs utf-8, out utf-8, pref UTF-8
42[debug] yt-dlp version 2021.09.25 (zip)
43[debug] Python version 3.8.10 (CPython 64bit) - Linux-5.4.0-74-generic-x86_64-with-glibc2.29
44[debug] exe versions: ffmpeg 4.2.4, ffprobe 4.2.4
86e8c894 45[debug] Proxy map: {}
8c6f4daa 46Current Build Hash 25cc412d1d3c0725a1f2f5b7e4682f6fb40e6d15f7024e96f7afd572e9919535
47yt-dlp is up to date (2021.09.25)
86e8c894
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48...
49```
bbd77068 50**Do not post screenshots of verbose logs; only plain text is acceptable.**
4c1a017e 51
8c6f4daa 52The output (including the first lines) contains important debugging information. Issues without the full output are often not reproducible and therefore will be closed as `incomplete`.
53
54The templates provided for the Issues, should be completed and **not removed**, this helps aide the resolution of the issue.
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55
56Please re-read your issue once again to avoid a couple of common mistakes (you can and should use this as a checklist):
57
58### Is the description of the issue itself sufficient?
59
8c6f4daa 60We often get issue reports that we cannot really decipher. While in most cases we eventually get the required information after asking back multiple times, this poses an unnecessary drain on our resources.
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61
62So please elaborate on what feature you are requesting, or what bug you want to be fixed. Make sure that it's obvious
63
64- What the problem is
65- How it could be fixed
66- How your proposed solution would look like
67
8c6f4daa 68If your report is shorter than two lines, it is almost certainly missing some of these, which makes it hard for us to respond to it. We're often too polite to close the issue outright, but the missing info makes misinterpretation likely. We often get frustrated by these issues, since the only possible way for us to move forward on them is to ask for clarification over and over.
e56190b3 69
fc5fa964 70For bug reports, this means that your report should contain the **complete** output of yt-dlp when called with the `-vU` flag. The error message you get for (most) bugs even says so, but you would not believe how many of our bug reports do not contain this information.
e56190b3 71
8c6f4daa 72If the error is `ERROR: Unable to extract ...` and you cannot reproduce it from multiple countries, add `--write-pages` and upload the `.dump` files you get [somewhere](https://gist.github.com).
f848215d 73
df235dbb 74**Site support requests must contain an example URL**. An example URL is a URL you might want to download, like `https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc`. There should be an obvious video present. Except under very special circumstances, the main page of a video service (e.g. `https://www.youtube.com/`) is *not* an example URL.
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75
76### Are you using the latest version?
77
8c6f4daa 78Before reporting any issue, type `yt-dlp -U`. This should report that you're up-to-date. This goes for feature requests as well.
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79
80### Is the issue already documented?
81
47ab66db 82Make sure that someone has not already opened the issue you're trying to open. Search at the top of the window or browse the [GitHub Issues](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/search?type=Issues) of this repository. If there is an issue, subscribe to it to be notified when there is any progress. Unless you have something useful to add to the conversation, please refrain from commenting.
8c6f4daa 83
84Additionally, it is also helpful to see if the issue has already been documented in the [youtube-dl issue tracker](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl/issues). If similar issues have already been reported in youtube-dl (but not in our issue tracker), links to them can be included in your issue report here.
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85
86### Why are existing options not enough?
87
8c6f4daa 88Before requesting a new feature, please have a quick peek at [the list of supported options](README.md#usage-and-options). Many feature requests are for features that actually exist already! Please, absolutely do show off your work in the issue report and detail how the existing similar options do *not* solve your problem.
89
90### Have you read and understood the changes, between youtube-dl and yt-dlp
91
92There are many changes between youtube-dl and yt-dlp [(changes to default behavior)](README.md#differences-in-default-behavior), and some of the options available have a different behaviour in yt-dlp, or have been removed all together [(list of changes to options)](README.md#deprecated-options). Make sure you have read and understand the differences in the options and how this may impact your downloads before opening an issue.
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93
94### Is there enough context in your bug report?
95
96People want to solve problems, and often think they do us a favor by breaking down their larger problems (e.g. wanting to skip already downloaded files) to a specific request (e.g. requesting us to look whether the file exists before downloading the info page). However, what often happens is that they break down the problem into two steps: One simple, and one impossible (or extremely complicated one).
97
98We are then presented with a very complicated request when the original problem could be solved far easier, e.g. by recording the downloaded video IDs in a separate file. To avoid this, you must include the greater context where it is non-obvious. In particular, every feature request that does not consist of adding support for a new site should contain a use case scenario that explains in what situation the missing feature would be useful.
99
100### Does the issue involve one problem, and one problem only?
101
102Some of our users seem to think there is a limit of issues they can or should open. There is no limit of issues they can or should open. While it may seem appealing to be able to dump all your issues into one ticket, that means that someone who solves one of your issues cannot mark the issue as closed. Typically, reporting a bunch of issues leads to the ticket lingering since nobody wants to attack that behemoth, until someone mercifully splits the issue into multiple ones.
103
8c6f4daa 104In particular, every site support request issue should only pertain to services at one site (generally under a common domain, but always using the same backend technology). Do not request support for vimeo user videos, White house podcasts, and Google Plus pages in the same issue. Also, make sure that you don't post bug reports alongside feature requests. As a rule of thumb, a feature request does not include outputs of yt-dlp that are not immediately related to the feature at hand. Do not post reports of a network error alongside the request for a new video service.
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105
106### Is anyone going to need the feature?
107
fdd6e18b 108Only post features that you (or an incapacitated friend you can personally talk to) require. Do not post features because they seem like a good idea. If they are really useful, they will be requested by someone who requires them.
e56190b3 109
8c6f4daa 110### Is your question about yt-dlp?
111
59a7a13e 112Some bug reports are completely unrelated to yt-dlp and relate to a different, or even the reporter's own, application. Please make sure that you are actually using yt-dlp. If you are using a UI for yt-dlp, report the bug to the maintainer of the actual application providing the UI. In general, if you are unable to provide the verbose log, you should not be opening the issue here.
8c6f4daa 113
114If the issue is with `youtube-dl` (the upstream fork of yt-dlp) and not with yt-dlp, the issue should be raised in the youtube-dl project.
115
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116### Are you willing to share account details if needed?
117
455a15e2 118The maintainers and potential contributors of the project often do not have an account for the website you are asking support for. So any developer interested in solving your issue may ask you for account details. It is your personal discretion whether you are willing to share the account in order for the developer to try and solve your issue. However, if you are unwilling or unable to provide details, they obviously cannot work on the issue and it cannot be solved unless some developer who both has an account and is willing/able to contribute decides to solve it.
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119
120By sharing an account with anyone, you agree to bear all risks associated with it. The maintainers and yt-dlp can't be held responsible for any misuse of the credentials.
121
122While these steps won't necessarily ensure that no misuse of the account takes place, these are still some good practices to follow.
123
59a7a13e 124- Look for people with `Member` (maintainers of the project) or `Contributor` (people who have previously contributed code) tag on their messages.
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125- Change the password before sharing the account to something random (use [this](https://passwordsgenerator.net/) if you don't have a random password generator).
126- Change the password after receiving the account back.
127
08d30158 128### Is the website primarily used for piracy?
129
5b28cef7 130We follow [youtube-dl's policy](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl#can-you-add-support-for-this-anime-video-site-or-site-which-shows-current-movies-for-free) to not support services that is primarily used for infringing copyright. Additionally, it has been decided to not to support porn sites that specialize in fakes. We also cannot support any service that serves only [DRM protected content](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_rights_management).
08d30158 131
8c6f4daa 132
e56190b3 133
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134
135# DEVELOPER INSTRUCTIONS
136
8c6f4daa 137Most users do not need to build yt-dlp and can [download the builds](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases) or get them via [the other installation methods](README.md#installation).
e56190b3 138
8c6f4daa 139To run yt-dlp as a developer, you don't need to build anything either. Simply execute
e56190b3 140
47ab66db 141 python3 -m yt_dlp
e56190b3 142
2d1d683a 143To run all the available core tests, use:
e56190b3 144
47ab66db 145 python3 devscripts/run_tests.py
e56190b3 146
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147See item 6 of [new extractor tutorial](#adding-support-for-a-new-site) for how to run extractor specific test cases.
148
8c6f4daa 149If you want to create a build of yt-dlp yourself, you can follow the instructions [here](README.md#compile).
e56190b3 150
e56190b3 151
8c6f4daa 152## Adding new feature or making overarching changes
e56190b3 153
47ab66db 154Before you start writing code for implementing a new feature, open an issue explaining your feature request and at least one use case. This allows the maintainers to decide whether such a feature is desired for the project in the first place, and will provide an avenue to discuss some implementation details. If you open a pull request for a new feature without discussing with us first, do not be surprised when we ask for large changes to the code, or even reject it outright.
8c6f4daa 155
0930b11f 156The same applies for changes to the documentation, code style, or overarching changes to the architecture
8c6f4daa 157
158
159## Adding support for a new site
160
17ffed18 161If you want to add support for a new site, first of all **make sure** this site is **not dedicated to [copyright infringement](#is-the-website-primarily-used-for-piracy)**. yt-dlp does **not support** such sites thus pull requests adding support for them **will be rejected**.
da665ddc 162
2021b650 163After you have ensured this site is distributing its content legally, you can follow this quick list (assuming your service is called `yourextractor`):
e56190b3 164
8c6f4daa 1651. [Fork this repository](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/fork)
1661. Check out the source code with:
bff98341 167
8c6f4daa 168 git clone git@github.com:YOUR_GITHUB_USERNAME/yt-dlp.git
bff98341 169
8c6f4daa 1701. Start a new git branch with
bff98341 171
8c6f4daa 172 cd yt-dlp
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173 git checkout -b yourextractor
174
8c6f4daa 1751. Start with this simple template and save it to `yt_dlp/extractor/yourextractor.py`:
bff98341 176
e56190b3 177 ```python
e56190b3 178 from .common import InfoExtractor
8c6f4daa 179
180
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181 class YourExtractorIE(InfoExtractor):
182 _VALID_URL = r'https?://(?:www\.)?yourextractor\.com/watch/(?P<id>[0-9]+)'
8c6f4daa 183 _TESTS = [{
df235dbb 184 'url': 'https://yourextractor.com/watch/42',
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185 'md5': 'TODO: md5 sum of the first 10241 bytes of the video file (use --test)',
186 'info_dict': {
2d1d683a 187 # For videos, only the 'id' and 'ext' fields are required to RUN the test:
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188 'id': '42',
189 'ext': 'mp4',
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190 # Then if the test run fails, it will output the missing/incorrect fields.
191 # Properties can be added as:
192 # * A value, e.g.
193 # 'title': 'Video title goes here',
194 # * MD5 checksum; start the string with 'md5:', e.g.
195 # 'description': 'md5:098f6bcd4621d373cade4e832627b4f6',
196 # * A regular expression; start the string with 're:', e.g.
197 # 'thumbnail': r're:^https?://.*\.jpg$',
198 # * A count of elements in a list; start the string with 'count:', e.g.
199 # 'tags': 'count:10',
200 # * Any Python type, e.g.
201 # 'view_count': int,
e56190b3 202 }
8c6f4daa 203 }]
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204
205 def _real_extract(self, url):
206 video_id = self._match_id(url)
207 webpage = self._download_webpage(url, video_id)
8c6f4daa 208
e56190b3 209 # TODO more code goes here, for example ...
ab03c0b4 210 title = self._html_search_regex(r'<h1>(.+?)</h1>', webpage, 'title')
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211
212 return {
213 'id': video_id,
214 'title': title,
215 'description': self._og_search_description(webpage),
ab03c0b4 216 'uploader': self._search_regex(r'<div[^>]+id="uploader"[^>]*>([^<]+)<', webpage, 'uploader', fatal=False),
8c6f4daa 217 # TODO more properties (see yt_dlp/extractor/common.py)
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218 }
219 ```
8aa0e7cd 2201. Add an import in [`yt_dlp/extractor/_extractors.py`](yt_dlp/extractor/_extractors.py). Note that the class name must end with `IE`.
47ab66db 2211. Run `python3 devscripts/run_tests.py YourExtractor`. This *may fail* at first, but you can continually re-run it until you're done. Upon failure, it will output the missing fields and/or correct values which you can copy. If you decide to add more than one test, the tests will then be named `YourExtractor`, `YourExtractor_1`, `YourExtractor_2`, etc. Note that tests with an `only_matching` key in the test's dict are not included in the count. You can also run all the tests in one go with `YourExtractor_all`
2d1d683a 2221. Make sure you have at least one test for your extractor. Even if all videos covered by the extractor are expected to be inaccessible for automated testing, tests should still be added with a `skip` parameter indicating why the particular test is disabled from running.
5ca095cb 2231. Have a look at [`yt_dlp/extractor/common.py`](yt_dlp/extractor/common.py) for possible helper methods and a [detailed description of what your extractor should and may return](yt_dlp/extractor/common.py#L119-L440). Add tests and code for as many as you want.
8c6f4daa 2241. Make sure your code follows [yt-dlp coding conventions](#yt-dlp-coding-conventions) and check the code with [flake8](https://flake8.pycqa.org/en/latest/index.html#quickstart):
9d9daed4 225
8c6f4daa 226 $ flake8 yt_dlp/extractor/yourextractor.py
9d9daed4 227
f4b95aca 2281. Make sure your code works under all [Python](https://www.python.org/) versions supported by yt-dlp, namely CPython and PyPy for Python 3.8 and above. Backward compatibility is not required for even older versions of Python.
8c6f4daa 2291. When the tests pass, [add](https://git-scm.com/docs/git-add) the new files, [commit](https://git-scm.com/docs/git-commit) them and [push](https://git-scm.com/docs/git-push) the result, like this:
e56190b3 230
8aa0e7cd 231 $ git add yt_dlp/extractor/_extractors.py
8c6f4daa 232 $ git add yt_dlp/extractor/yourextractor.py
233 $ git commit -m '[yourextractor] Add extractor'
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234 $ git push origin yourextractor
235
8c6f4daa 2361. Finally, [create a pull request](https://help.github.com/articles/creating-a-pull-request). We'll then review and merge it.
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237
238In any case, thank you very much for your contributions!
239
47ab66db 240**Tip:** To test extractors that require login information, create a file `test/local_parameters.json` and add `"usenetrc": true` or your `username`&`password` or `cookiefile`/`cookiesfrombrowser` in it:
b69fd25c 241```json
242{
243 "username": "your user name",
244 "password": "your password"
245}
246```
8c6f4daa 247
248## yt-dlp coding conventions
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249
250This section introduces a guide lines for writing idiomatic, robust and future-proof extractor code.
251
c8bc203f 252Extractors are very fragile by nature since they depend on the layout of the source data provided by 3rd party media hosters out of your control and this layout tends to change. As an extractor implementer your task is not only to write code that will extract media links and metadata correctly but also to minimize dependency on the source's layout and even to make the code foresee potential future changes and be ready for that. This is important because it will allow the extractor not to break on minor layout changes thus keeping old yt-dlp versions working. Even though this breakage issue may be easily fixed by a new version of yt-dlp, this could take some time, during which the extractor will remain broken.
8c6f4daa 253
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254
255### Mandatory and optional metafields
256
5ca095cb 257For extraction to work yt-dlp relies on metadata your extractor extracts and provides to yt-dlp expressed by an [information dictionary](yt_dlp/extractor/common.py#L119-L440) or simply *info dict*. Only the following meta fields in the *info dict* are considered mandatory for a successful extraction process by yt-dlp:
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258
259 - `id` (media identifier)
260 - `title` (media title)
261 - `url` (media download URL) or `formats`
262
fc08bdd6 263The aforementioned metafields are the critical data that the extraction does not make any sense without and if any of them fail to be extracted then the extractor is considered completely broken. While all extractors must return a `title`, they must also allow it's extraction to be non-fatal.
264
455a15e2 265For pornographic sites, appropriate `age_limit` must also be returned.
266
47ab66db 267The extractor is allowed to return the info dict without url or formats in some special cases if it allows the user to extract useful information with `--ignore-no-formats-error` - e.g. when the video is a live stream that has not started yet.
bff98341 268
8c6f4daa 269[Any field](yt_dlp/extractor/common.py#219-L426) apart from the aforementioned ones are considered **optional**. That means that extraction should be **tolerant** to situations when sources for these fields can potentially be unavailable (even if they are always available at the moment) and **future-proof** in order not to break the extraction of general purpose mandatory fields.
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270
271#### Example
272
273Say you have some source dictionary `meta` that you've fetched as JSON with HTTP request and it has a key `summary`:
274
275```python
276meta = self._download_json(url, video_id)
277```
278
279Assume at this point `meta`'s layout is:
280
281```python
282{
bff98341 283 "summary": "some fancy summary text",
8c6f4daa 284 "user": {
285 "name": "uploader name"
286 },
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287 ...
288}
289```
290
2021b650 291Assume you want to extract `summary` and put it into the resulting info dict as `description`. Since `description` is an optional meta field you should be ready that this key may be missing from the `meta` dict, so that you should extract it like:
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292
293```python
294description = meta.get('summary') # correct
295```
296
297and not like:
298
299```python
300description = meta['summary'] # incorrect
301```
302
bbd77068 303The latter will break extraction process with `KeyError` if `summary` disappears from `meta` at some later time but with the former approach extraction will just go ahead with `description` set to `None` which is perfectly fine (remember `None` is equivalent to the absence of data).
bff98341 304
8c6f4daa 305
8aa0e7cd 306If the data is nested, do not use `.get` chains, but instead make use of `traverse_obj`.
8c6f4daa 307
308Considering the above `meta` again, assume you want to extract `["user"]["name"]` and put it in the resulting info dict as `uploader`
309
8c6f4daa 310```python
311uploader = traverse_obj(meta, ('user', 'name')) # correct
312```
313
314and not like:
315
316```python
317uploader = meta['user']['name'] # incorrect
318```
319or
320```python
321uploader = meta.get('user', {}).get('name') # incorrect
322```
8aa0e7cd 323or
324```python
325uploader = try_get(meta, lambda x: x['user']['name']) # old utility
326```
8c6f4daa 327
328
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329Similarly, you should pass `fatal=False` when extracting optional data from a webpage with `_search_regex`, `_html_search_regex` or similar methods, for instance:
330
331```python
332description = self._search_regex(
333 r'<span[^>]+id="title"[^>]*>([^<]+)<',
334 webpage, 'description', fatal=False)
335```
336
337With `fatal` set to `False` if `_search_regex` fails to extract `description` it will emit a warning and continue extraction.
338
339You can also pass `default=<some fallback value>`, for example:
340
341```python
342description = self._search_regex(
343 r'<span[^>]+id="title"[^>]*>([^<]+)<',
344 webpage, 'description', default=None)
345```
346
bbd77068 347On failure this code will silently continue the extraction with `description` set to `None`. That is useful for metafields that may or may not be present.
8c6f4daa 348
349
350Another thing to remember is not to try to iterate over `None`
351
8aa0e7cd 352Say you extracted a list of thumbnails into `thumbnail_data` and want to iterate over them
8c6f4daa 353
354```python
8aa0e7cd 355thumbnail_data = data.get('thumbnails') or []
8c6f4daa 356thumbnails = [{
71df9b7f 357 'url': item['url'],
358 'height': item.get('h'),
359} for item in thumbnail_data if item.get('url')] # correct
8c6f4daa 360```
361
362and not like:
363
364```python
8aa0e7cd 365thumbnail_data = data.get('thumbnails')
8c6f4daa 366thumbnails = [{
71df9b7f 367 'url': item['url'],
368 'height': item.get('h'),
8c6f4daa 369} for item in thumbnail_data] # incorrect
370```
371
8aa0e7cd 372In this case, `thumbnail_data` will be `None` if the field was not found and this will cause the loop `for item in thumbnail_data` to raise a fatal error. Using `or []` avoids this error and results in setting an empty list in `thumbnails` instead.
8c6f4daa 373
71df9b7f 374Alternately, this can be further simplified by using `traverse_obj`
375
376```python
377thumbnails = [{
378 'url': item['url'],
379 'height': item.get('h'),
380} for item in traverse_obj(data, ('thumbnails', lambda _, v: v['url']))]
381```
382
383or, even better,
384
385```python
386thumbnails = traverse_obj(data, ('thumbnails', ..., {'url': 'url', 'height': 'h'}))
387```
8c6f4daa 388
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389### Provide fallbacks
390
bbd77068 391When extracting metadata try to do so from multiple sources. For example if `title` is present in several places, try extracting from at least some of them. This makes it more future-proof in case some of the sources become unavailable.
bff98341 392
8c6f4daa 393
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394#### Example
395
3d3bb168 396Say `meta` from the previous example has a `title` and you are about to extract it like:
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397
398```python
3d3bb168 399title = meta.get('title')
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400```
401
3d3bb168 402If `title` disappears from `meta` in future due to some changes on the hoster's side the title extraction would fail.
bff98341 403
3d3bb168 404Assume that you have some another source you can extract `title` from, for example `og:title` HTML meta of a `webpage`. In this case you can provide a fallback like:
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405
406```python
407title = meta.get('title') or self._og_search_title(webpage)
408```
409
3d3bb168 410This code will try to extract from `meta` first and if it fails it will try extracting `og:title` from a `webpage`, making the extractor more robust.
bff98341 411
8c6f4daa 412
d7c3af7a 413### Regular expressions
bff98341 414
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415#### Don't capture groups you don't use
416
417Capturing group must be an indication that it's used somewhere in the code. Any group that is not used must be non capturing.
418
419##### Example
420
421Don't capture id attribute name here since you can't use it for anything anyway.
422
423Correct:
424
425```python
426r'(?:id|ID)=(?P<id>\d+)'
427```
428
429Incorrect:
430```python
431r'(id|ID)=(?P<id>\d+)'
432```
433
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434#### Make regular expressions relaxed and flexible
435
436When using regular expressions try to write them fuzzy, relaxed and flexible, skipping insignificant parts that are more likely to change, allowing both single and double quotes for quoted values and so on.
8c6f4daa 437
d7c3af7a 438##### Example
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439
440Say you need to extract `title` from the following HTML code:
441
442```html
443<span style="position: absolute; left: 910px; width: 90px; float: right; z-index: 9999;" class="title">some fancy title</span>
444```
445
446The code for that task should look similar to:
447
448```python
8c6f4daa 449title = self._search_regex( # correct
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450 r'<span[^>]+class="title"[^>]*>([^<]+)', webpage, 'title')
451```
452
56ba69e4 453which tolerates potential changes in the `style` attribute's value. Or even better:
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454
455```python
8c6f4daa 456title = self._search_regex( # correct
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457 r'<span[^>]+class=(["\'])title\1[^>]*>(?P<title>[^<]+)',
458 webpage, 'title', group='title')
459```
460
56ba69e4 461which also handles both single quotes in addition to double quotes.
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462
463The code definitely should not look like:
464
465```python
8c6f4daa 466title = self._search_regex( # incorrect
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467 r'<span style="position: absolute; left: 910px; width: 90px; float: right; z-index: 9999;" class="title">(.*?)</span>',
468 webpage, 'title', group='title')
469```
470
8c6f4daa 471or even
472
473```python
474title = self._search_regex( # incorrect
475 r'<span style=".*?" class="title">(.*?)</span>',
476 webpage, 'title', group='title')
477```
478
962ffcf8 479Here the presence or absence of other attributes including `style` is irrelevant for the data we need, and so the regex must not depend on it
8c6f4daa 480
481
8aa0e7cd 482#### Keep the regular expressions as simple as possible, but no simpler
483
484Since many extractors deal with unstructured data provided by websites, we will often need to use very complex regular expressions. You should try to use the *simplest* regex that can accomplish what you want. In other words, each part of the regex must have a reason for existing. If you can take out a symbol and the functionality does not change, the symbol should not be there.
485
486##### Example
487
488Correct:
489
490```python
491_VALID_URL = r'https?://(?:www\.)?website\.com/(?:[^/]+/){3,4}(?P<display_id>[^/]+)_(?P<id>\d+)'
492```
493
494Incorrect:
495
496```python
497_VALID_URL = r'https?:\/\/(?:www\.)?website\.com\/[^\/]+/[^\/]+/[^\/]+(?:\/[^\/]+)?\/(?P<display_id>[^\/]+)_(?P<id>\d+)'
498```
499
500#### Do not misuse `.` and use the correct quantifiers (`+*?`)
501
502Avoid creating regexes that over-match because of wrong use of quantifiers. Also try to avoid non-greedy matching (`?`) where possible since they could easily result in [catastrophic backtracking](https://www.regular-expressions.info/catastrophic.html)
503
504Correct:
505
506```python
507title = self._search_regex(r'<span\b[^>]+class="title"[^>]*>([^<]+)', webpage, 'title')
508```
509
510Incorrect:
511
512```python
513title = self._search_regex(r'<span\b.*class="title".*>(.+?)<', webpage, 'title')
514```
515
516
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517### Long lines policy
518
fc5fa964 519There is a soft limit to keep lines of code under 100 characters long. This means it should be respected if possible and if it does not make readability and code maintenance worse. Sometimes, it may be reasonable to go upto 120 characters and sometimes even 80 can be unreadable. Keep in mind that this is not a hard limit and is just one of many tools to make the code more readable.
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520
521For example, you should **never** split long string literals like URLs or some other often copied entities over multiple lines to fit this limit:
522
962ffcf8 523Conversely, don't unnecessarily split small lines further. As a rule of thumb, if removing the line split keeps the code under 80 characters, it should be a single line.
fc5fa964 524
525##### Examples
526
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527Correct:
528
529```python
530'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqZTN594JQw&list=PLMYEtVRpaqY00V9W81Cwmzp6N6vZqfUKD4'
531```
532
533Incorrect:
534
535```python
536'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqZTN594JQw&list='
537'PLMYEtVRpaqY00V9W81Cwmzp6N6vZqfUKD4'
538```
539
fc5fa964 540Correct:
541
542```python
543uploader = traverse_obj(info, ('uploader', 'name'), ('author', 'fullname'))
544```
545
546Incorrect:
547
548```python
549uploader = traverse_obj(
550 info,
551 ('uploader', 'name'),
552 ('author', 'fullname'))
553```
554
555Correct:
556
557```python
558formats = self._extract_m3u8_formats(
559 m3u8_url, video_id, 'mp4', 'm3u8_native', m3u8_id='hls',
560 note='Downloading HD m3u8 information', errnote='Unable to download HD m3u8 information')
561```
562
563Incorrect:
564
565```python
566formats = self._extract_m3u8_formats(m3u8_url,
567 video_id,
568 'mp4',
569 'm3u8_native',
570 m3u8_id='hls',
571 note='Downloading HD m3u8 information',
572 errnote='Unable to download HD m3u8 information')
573```
574
575
576### Quotes
577
8aa0e7cd 578Always use single quotes for strings (even if the string has `'`) and double quotes for docstrings. Use `'''` only for multi-line strings. An exception can be made if a string has multiple single quotes in it and escaping makes it *significantly* harder to read. For f-strings, use you can use double quotes on the inside. But avoid f-strings that have too many quotes inside.
fc5fa964 579
580
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581### Inline values
582
583Extracting variables is acceptable for reducing code duplication and improving readability of complex expressions. However, you should avoid extracting variables used only once and moving them to opposite parts of the extractor file, which makes reading the linear flow difficult.
584
8aa0e7cd 585#### Examples
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586
587Correct:
588
589```python
8aa0e7cd 590return {
591 'title': self._html_search_regex(r'<h1>([^<]+)</h1>', webpage, 'title'),
592 # ...some lines of code...
593}
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594```
595
596Incorrect:
597
598```python
04f3fd2c 599TITLE_RE = r'<h1>([^<]+)</h1>'
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600# ...some lines of code...
601title = self._html_search_regex(TITLE_RE, webpage, 'title')
8aa0e7cd 602# ...some lines of code...
603return {
604 'title': title,
605 # ...some lines of code...
606}
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607```
608
8c6f4daa 609
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610### Collapse fallbacks
611
612Multiple fallback values can quickly become unwieldy. Collapse multiple fallback values into a single expression via a list of patterns.
613
614#### Example
615
616Good:
617
618```python
619description = self._html_search_meta(
620 ['og:description', 'description', 'twitter:description'],
621 webpage, 'description', default=None)
622```
623
624Unwieldy:
625
626```python
627description = (
628 self._og_search_description(webpage, default=None)
629 or self._html_search_meta('description', webpage, default=None)
630 or self._html_search_meta('twitter:description', webpage, default=None))
631```
632
633Methods supporting list of patterns are: `_search_regex`, `_html_search_regex`, `_og_search_property`, `_html_search_meta`.
634
8c6f4daa 635
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636### Trailing parentheses
637
8aa0e7cd 638Always move trailing parentheses used for grouping/functions after the last argument. On the other hand, multi-line literal list/tuple/dict/set should closed be in a new line. Generators and list/dict comprehensions may use either style
def849e0 639
fc5fa964 640#### Examples
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641
642Correct:
643
644```python
8aa0e7cd 645url = traverse_obj(info, (
646 'context', 'dispatcher', 'stores', 'VideoTitlePageStore', 'data', 'video', 0, 'VideoUrlSet', 'VideoUrl'), list)
def849e0 647```
fc5fa964 648Correct:
649
650```python
8aa0e7cd 651url = traverse_obj(
652 info,
653 ('context', 'dispatcher', 'stores', 'VideoTitlePageStore', 'data', 'video', 0, 'VideoUrlSet', 'VideoUrl'),
654 list)
fc5fa964 655```
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656
657Incorrect:
658
659```python
8aa0e7cd 660url = traverse_obj(
fc5fa964 661 info,
8aa0e7cd 662 ('context', 'dispatcher', 'stores', 'VideoTitlePageStore', 'data', 'video', 0, 'VideoUrlSet', 'VideoUrl'),
663 list
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664)
665```
666
fc5fa964 667Correct:
668
669```python
670f = {
671 'url': url,
672 'format_id': format_id,
673}
674```
675
676Incorrect:
677
678```python
679f = {'url': url,
680 'format_id': format_id}
681```
682
683Correct:
684
685```python
686formats = [process_formats(f) for f in format_data
687 if f.get('type') in ('hls', 'dash', 'direct') and f.get('downloadable')]
688```
689
690Correct:
691
692```python
693formats = [
694 process_formats(f) for f in format_data
695 if f.get('type') in ('hls', 'dash', 'direct') and f.get('downloadable')
696]
697```
698
8c6f4daa 699
e71be6ee 700### Use convenience conversion and parsing functions
bff98341 701
5ca095cb 702Wrap all extracted numeric data into safe functions from [`yt_dlp/utils/`](yt_dlp/utils/): `int_or_none`, `float_or_none`. Use them for string to number conversions as well.
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703
704Use `url_or_none` for safe URL processing.
705
c4f60dd7 706Use `traverse_obj` and `try_call` (superseeds `dict_get` and `try_get`) for safe metadata extraction from parsed JSON.
532782ad 707
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708Use `unified_strdate` for uniform `upload_date` or any `YYYYMMDD` meta field extraction, `unified_timestamp` for uniform `timestamp` extraction, `parse_filesize` for `filesize` extraction, `parse_count` for count meta fields extraction, `parse_resolution`, `parse_duration` for `duration` extraction, `parse_age_limit` for `age_limit` extraction.
709
5ca095cb 710Explore [`yt_dlp/utils/`](yt_dlp/utils/) for more useful convenience functions.
532782ad 711
8aa0e7cd 712#### Examples
532782ad 713
532782ad 714```python
8c6f4daa 715description = traverse_obj(response, ('result', 'video', 'summary'), expected_type=str)
8aa0e7cd 716thumbnails = traverse_obj(response, ('result', 'thumbnails', ..., 'url'), expected_type=url_or_none)
8c6f4daa 717video = traverse_obj(response, ('result', 'video', 0), default={}, expected_type=dict)
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718duration = float_or_none(video.get('durationMs'), scale=1000)
719view_count = int_or_none(video.get('views'))
720```
bff98341 721
8aa0e7cd 722
08d30158 723# My pull request is labeled pending-fixes
724
725The `pending-fixes` label is added when there are changes requested to a PR. When the necessary changes are made, the label should be removed. However, despite our best efforts, it may sometimes happen that the maintainer did not see the changes or forgot to remove the label. If your PR is still marked as `pending-fixes` a few days after all requested changes have been made, feel free to ping the maintainer who labeled your issue and ask them to re-review and remove the label.
726
8c6f4daa 727
728
729
730# EMBEDDING YT-DLP
731See [README.md#embedding-yt-dlp](README.md#embedding-yt-dlp) for instructions on how to embed yt-dlp in another Python program