yt-dl-service

A minimalistic wrapper for yt-dlp which is designed to run as a service and keep track of e.g. youtube channels. If there's a risk that certain channel can be taken down, this utility helps to keep up-to-date backup locally.

This is achieved by running yt-dlp in background for a list of links according to schedule.

DISCLAIMER: This is a personal project, tailored to my needs. The setup instructions are not very universal and there may be problems not known to me

Install on Arch Linux

1. Install package:

git clone https://github.com/modbrin/yt-dl-service
cd ./yt-dl-service
makepkg -si

2. Edit config in /usr/share/yt-dl-service/settings.json, for more details refer to settings chapter.
3. Enable boot service via systemctl enable yt-dl-service.timer
4. Start actual service systemctl start yt-dl-service.service
5. Check logs /usr/share/yt-dl-service/yt-dl-service.log and expected downloads to ensure it's working.
6. When modifying settings.json reload the service with systemctl restart yt-dl-service.service

Manual Installation

1. Get yt-dlp, depending on your platform. For example on Arch:

$ sudo pacman -S yt-dlp

As a result of installation, yt-dlp must be available in PATH - check by running yt-dlp --version.

2. Get rust toolchain if you don't have it already, usually this is done via rustup. For example on Arch:

$ sudo pacman -S rustup
$ rustup toolchain install stable

3. Build executable

$ cd yt-dl-service
$ cargo install --path . --root /usr

Binary yt-dl-service will be located in /usr/bin

4. Configure service

4.1 Copy necessary files

$ sudo mkdir /usr/share/yt-dl-service
$ sudo cp ./templates/settings.json /usr/share/yt-dl-service/
$ sudo cp ./templates/yt-dl-service.service /usr/lib/systemd/system/
$ sudo cp ./templates/yt-dl-service.timer /usr/lib/systemd/system/

4.2 Change username in service

$ sudo <YOUR FAVORITE EDITOR> /usr/lib/systemd/system/yt-dl-service.service

4.3 Customize settings, refer to settings chapter. At this point you want add desired time (UTC tz) in updateSchedule and add some channels to tasks.

$ sudo <YOUR FAVORITE EDITOR> /usr/share/yt-dl-service/settings.json

Also be sure to set "updateOnStart": true on first launch in order to perform initial download and check if everything is working ok. Don't forget to set it back to false once you've ensured it's working.

Alternatively, you can keep it always on. In that case channels will be updated on boot and when you restart the service.

WARNING: output files path shouldn't be bound to any user, as the service can start before user login. E.g. if output path is (an external) drive, which is mounted after login, service will attempt to write into inexistant drive, and after login actual drive would be mounted in different path. To solve this you can either add your drive in fstab to have permanent mount location or run the service with --user flag (additional changes to service file and its location are needed).

4.4 Enable systemd service

$ sudo systemctl enable --now yt-dl-service.timer

Additional timer service allows to offset start time of actual service by 1 min, this is likely unnecessary but other system components can properly load.

5. Summary

As a result, you should have:

• binary /usr/bin/yt-dl-service
• config /usr/share/yt-dl-service/settings.json
• log /usr/share/yt-dl-service/yt-dl-service.log
• systemd service /usr/lib/systemd/system/yt-dl-service.service
• systemd timer /usr/lib/systemd/system/yt-dl-service.timer

6. Adding new channels

Modify settings file and reload

sudo systemctl restart yt-dl-service.service

Settings

Configuration is done solely via settings.json file. Generally, it should look like this:

{
    "tasks": [
        {
            "url": "<YT CHANNEL URL A>",
            "outputPath": "/home/myusername/channels-backup/channel-a",
            "name": "This is A"
        },
        {
            "url": "<YT CHANNEL URL B>",
            "outputPath": "/home/myusername/channels-backup/channel-b",
            "name": "This is B"
        },
    ],
    "updateSchedule": [{"daily":"20:30"}],
    "updateOnStart": true,
    "setOwner": "myusername",
    "setGroup": "myusername" 
}

• tasks - list of tasks to be executed every update time
• updateSchedule - schedule when updates happen
• updateOnStart - if true, regardless of schedule the update will happen on program startup, e.g. on boot
• setOwner and setGroup - set owner and group for downloaded files, NOTE: this applies to all files in output dirs, not only new or produced by yt-dl-service

Example, make schedule:

Note that all time is in UTC, not your local time. Global setting, all tasks are executed at specified time(s). Can be either daily with single time or cron with custom time. In example below, it will execute daily at 12:00 and 18:30 UTC, also at 8:00 on mondays of year 2049. If you are not familiar with cron, refer here and directly to crate docs.

{
    "tasks": [
        ...
    ],
    "updateSchedule": [
        { "daily": "12:00" },
        { "daily": "18:30" },
        { "cron": "0 0 8 * * 1 2049" }
    ],
    ...
}

Example, download only audio:

Task-specific setting, if audioFormat field is not present, will default to mp3. Possible values for audioFormat are: mp3, aac, m4a, opus, vorbis, flac, alac, wav

"tasks": [
    {
        ...
        "audioOnly": true,
        "audioFormat": "wav"
    },
    ...
],

Example, limit video resolution:

Task-specific setting. Examples for maxResolution: 480, 720, 1080, 1440, 2160, 4320 ...

"tasks": [
    {
        ...
        "maxResolution": 720
    },
    ...
],

Example, limit download speed:

Task-specific setting. Examples for throttleSpeed: 3.5M, 300K ...

"tasks": [
    {
        ...
        "throttleSpeed": "500K"
    },
    ...
],

Example, custom yt-dlp flags:

Task-specific setting. Pass any flags supported by yt-dlp to achieve desired behavior.

"tasks": [
    {
        ...
        "customFlags": ["-f", "bestvideo[height=480]+bestaudio"]
    },
    ...
],