youtubeDLFrontEnd

youtubeDLFrontEnd_v1.2.2 Readme

This application is a Windows front-end (GUI) for the amazing youtube-dl.
Youtube-dl is a command line tool that lets you download videos from many sites. This front-end adds organization, multiple simultaneous downloads, and download priorities.

Usage Notes

Version 4 or better of the .net framework is recommended. Get it from Microsoft.

Make sure you have the .exe version of youtube-dl, this program is just a wrapper for that tool. It may also need ffmpeg/avconv/ffprobe for certain features. The user is assumed to have used it before.

No installation; just unpack and run. A settings file and ancillary files may be created in the program folder.

Instructions:

First go into settings (button at the bottom left) to configure the tool: Make sure the path to youtube-dl.exe is correct. (Do note that, once it's there, you can also update youtube-dl.exe from this settings window.) Also set up any other arguments you want sent to youtube-dl. Mine look like this:

-i --write-description -o "%(extractor)s\%(uploader)s.%(upload_date)s.%(title)s-%(id)s.%(ext)s"

Those args will download a description and put downloaded items into semi-organized folders. Click the help link in the settings window to see how to use args.

Then start adding videos! Once you hit ''Add URL(s)' downloading will start automatically. To add videos in the 'paused' state, set the default priority to 0 before hitting the 'Add URL(s)' button.

Adding items:

1. Paste video page URLs in the textbox in the bottom half of the program; or enable 'capture links from clipboard' for quick collection.
2. Optionally set the priority of added items in the box below the 'Add URL(s)' button. Higher priority downloads will be started first. (Downloads that have already been started are never paused automatically, even if higher priority items are added later)
3. Then click 'Add URL(s)' or hit ctrl+d on the keyboard to add them to the download list. Downloading will start automatically.

The download list can be manipulated via a right click menu; there are also some keyboard commands:

• Enter: Tries to play the selected items in the default media player. (There's a safety check that prevents more than 10 files from being launched at once)
• Ctrl+C: Copies the URL's of the selected items to the clipboard
• Ctrl+L: shows the selected items logs.
• Delete/Backspace: Removes the selected items from the list (deleted something important? check the log)
• Digits 0-9: Changes the selected items priority to the pressed digit.
• Ctrl+R: randomizes the selected items priority.
• Pause: Pauses the selected items.
• Escape: Hides the app (send to tray)

Notes about the list columns:

• P: Priority, items with higher numbers get downloaded first. Set this by pressing a number key, or right click->'Set Priority'.
• URL: always the original url sent to youtube-dl; pressing ctrl+c on the listview will copy this value for the selected items.
• Status: The latest status from youtubeDL. View the item's log for a full list of status updates. If errors or warnings are encountered, a counter will be appended, eg: [1W2E] means there is 1 warning and 2 errors in the log.
• DL'ed: The total data this item has downloaded, summing merged audio/video streams and multiple downloads from play-lists.
• Destination: the last file created by youtubeDL. There may be a note appended to count how many total files have been created. Separated files that will be merged are not counted.

Final note: The windows start menu / desktop shortcuts can be used to provide hotkey functionality. If you want that: go into settings and check the 'Add Shortcut to Start Menu' box, then click the edit link. You can add a hotkey there (under 'shortcut key').

Command Line Usage:

• -startHidden If an instance of the program is not already running, starts the program and immediately hides it.

ChangeLog

• v1.2.2; 2017-04-22

  • ADDED: Duration column added. Fill it in via the context menu, or have it auto-filled via a setting. Note that duration can't always be retrieved, and creates extra traffic.
  • ADDED: New ways to set priority: Select the downloads you want to set, then ctrl or alt-click a column header to prioritize by that column. For example: alt-click the duration column to download the shortest videos first, control-click it to prioritize the longest videos.
  • ADDED: "Additional args" setting now has a default location filled in to give guidance in new installs.
  • CHANGED: Icon now white-outlined to show on dark backgrounds.
  • CHANGED: Help links loads youtube-dl help page instead of showing the command line reference.
  • FIXED: Misc bugs fixed.

• v1.2.1; 2017-04-01

  • FIXED: Clipboard monitor enable regression. Ungh, no more late night releases.

• v1.2; 2017-03-31

  • ADDED: Help to download youtube-dl if it isn't found, including an auto-download function.
  • ADDED: Links added to the settings->about box.
  • ADDED: We now never auto-start items with a priority <=0 (pause them instead)
  • FIXED: Window would flicker before hiding itself when started with windows.
  • FIXED: Better restoring of flaky downloads (now tries to restore even if a download has an invalid url)
  • FIXED: More code put in a background loader for faster start.
  • FIXED: Better clipboard watcher code.

• v1.1; 2016-06-27

  • ADDED: 'Remember Downloads' setting. This does two things when enabled: [1] It maintains a list of every url ever added. (The file 'addedURLs.txt' is created for this purpose.) If a duplicate URL is later added it will be paused with a status of 'previously added'; resuming the download will force-start it. This helps prevent downloading duplicate content. AND [2] It remembers the downloads currently in the list. (The folder 'dl_history' is populated for this purpose.) This is done to preserve downloads across program/system restarts.
  • ADDED: Priorities; Ctrl+r now randomizes selected downloads. Also added a 'decrementing' check-box in the 'set priority' dialog.
  • ADDED: 'Date added' Column. (column order can be changed by dragging the headers, columns can be effectively hidden by sizing them to 0 - this setting is remembered)
  • ADDED: Check-box in settings to control start-menu shortcut creation.
  • Some minor UI tweaks.

• v1.0; 2015-12-11

  • ADDED: in settings, button to create a start menu shortcut.
  • Minor UI tweaks/bugfixes.

• Beta 9; 2015-11-29

  • Reworked the UI to remove splitContainer panels & save some space. Splitcontianers are hard to use and have poor DPI scaling support (thanks Microsoft). Bottom add-urls textbox is now fixed in size.
  • ADDED: Context menu for url add textbox.

• Beta 8; 2015-10-30

  • FIXED: Removed Visual basic power pack requirement, cause nobody has it.

• Beta 7; 2015-10-27

  • ADDED: 'Incrementing' checkbox in the Set Priority dialogue. If checked, it will increment (by 1) the priority of each selected item, starting at the base priority you set. Usefull if you set a column sort and want that to be the exact order of download; just select all and set the priorty with incrementing checked.
  • CHANGED: Right CLick->'Open File Location' now selects the destination file in explorer if it exists.

• Beta 6; 2015-10-18

  • Initial Release.

Known Issues

• "Run Destination File" and "Open Destination Folder" will not work if the download file-name contains unicode. This is due to a limitation in the youtubedl.exe standard output, so I can't fix it. The '--restrict-filenames' option may be a workaround.

License Information

This software includes code or resources from the following sources:

• Host icon grabber routine by Sergey Stoyan
  Licensed under the terms of: The Code Project Open License (CPOL) 1.02

• Additional icon code by Steve McMahon
  Licensed under the terms of: vbAccelerator Software License

• Priority Queue code by BlueRaja
  Licensed under the terms of: The MIT License (MIT)

• Application icon by Yannick Lung
  Licensed under the terms of: "You are free to use Hawcons for commercial and personal purposes without attribution..."

This software is distributed as-is, without any representations or warranties of any kind.
The author of this software imposes no additional license terms or limits upon its use or redistribution.

Feedback/Bugs

Send to utils@cresstoehne.com
App Website

DocumentId: 1b1cb5dcc5da452f2313c0c903c966ba8ecd02f6
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