What do you use to private watch YouTube?
from ComradeMiao@lemmy.world to selfhosted@lemmy.world on 15 Nov 16:02
https://lemmy.world/post/22058517

Moving away from Google. I just added my fav subs into my rss feed but that isn’t an enough to get good recs. What else can one do? Alternative front ends that work?

#selfhosted

threaded - newest

macstainless@discuss.tchncs.de on 15 Nov 16:26 next collapse

I use YT-DLP to scrip the download of vids I want to watch and it drops them into Plex for me. I set it to run every 4 hours.

robalees@lemmy.world on 15 Nov 16:39 collapse

Oooh, this is interesting! How do you get the script to get latest videos from your subscribers?

mosiacmango@lemm.ee on 15 Nov 16:43 next collapse

Can’t speak to his method, but the jellyfin media sever has a YouTube plugin called Fintube that uses the above downloader to integrate YouTube content.

robalees@lemmy.world on 15 Nov 16:45 next collapse

Interesting, wonder if I can do something similar with Plex

mosiacmango@lemm.ee on 15 Nov 16:53 collapse

I just moved over to jellyfin from plex. I highly recommend it. It’s way more streamlined and active than plex, with a seriously good plugin community. No investor based bloat.

The only issue I had was that jellyfin would crash on scanning my very old music library, where plex would not. To fix it, I used musicbrainz picard to correctly add idv3 tags and remove illegal characters from song names. Now, its smooth as silk.

Blxter@lemmy.zip on 15 Nov 17:06 collapse

All the plugin talk about jellyfin makes me want to switch wish Plex kept support for them. Jellyfin does seem to make way bigger strides than Plex these days

mosiacmango@lemm.ee on 15 Nov 18:25 collapse

Honestly, you should swap. They have tons of excellent plugins.. The intro skip alone is way better than Plex’s.

The end user clients are very solid too. Their kodi client alone is leagues ahead of the plex community one.

The only feature that plex has over jellyfin at this point in my mind is sharing content easy with people out of your home network. With Jellyfin you need to setup your own certs or reverse proxy like SWAG, or use something like tailscale.

Blxter@lemmy.zip on 15 Nov 20:16 collapse

Yea I also believe (could be wrong) the Sonic analysis for music and Plex amp is much better than what finamp provides

Edit: I did run both about a year ago just to see the differences so it would not be hard for me to spin it back up

Edit 2: prob going to because I want to test the YouTube and twitch plugins tbh

mosiacmango@lemm.ee on 15 Nov 22:29 collapse

Hmm, not using finamp. I’m pretty happy with Synfonuim.

Cant speak to that aspect.

Blxter@lemmy.zip on 16 Nov 16:27 collapse

Ok I’ve heard alot of good things from that according to this Reddit post it has most features minus the DJ witch is cool and I use but I like trying out new apps and it’s got a free trial and only a 5$ purchase so pretty cheap all things considered.

mosiacmango@lemm.ee on 16 Nov 17:06 collapse

Ohh yeah, it’s very slick. Really deep features, compatible with everything, great UI.

Its the same dev that made Yatze, the best kodi app remote, so it was a quick sell for me.

pirat@lemmy.world on 15 Nov 23:24 collapse

I just tried this on an Ultra.cc seedbox with yt-dlp installed, and the Fintube plugin configured to the right path for that, yet when I go to Dashboard > Fintube and click the Submit button to add a video to the download, nothing happens. Can’t figure out what’s wrong.

Maybe Jellyfin doesn’t have the necessary write permissions to write the file to that folder, but I’m not quite sure how to change those on such a seedbox, if that’s the case.

Any experience with this to share? Would the Submit button usually lead to a different view, or does it just stay on that video submission screen while the download happens silently in the background? The lack of action I experience when clicking it feels a bit awkward…

macstainless@discuss.tchncs.de on 15 Nov 19:16 collapse

So there’s 2 files that go along with the main script: a config file and a download list.

The download list file is literally a list of YT channel URLs and any time I want it to get new channels, I add to the list. Conversely if I get tired of watching a channel, I comment it out or just delete it. YT-DLP just traverses the list.

The config is where the magic happens. That dictates how the file is named, quality you download at, location it’s saved to, format, etc. You can incorporate SponsorBlock which is awesome and even DeArrow has an integration. I enjoy the logging feature so it doesn’t re-download vids it’s already snagged. Generally I’ll tell it to get every video from a channel that’s been posted in the last 15 days.

My destination for the files is a YouTube library folder I set up in Plex. Plex sees it just as another TV-like library and it pulls the metadata from the files, which are embedded by YT-DLP.

Hope this helps!

robalees@lemmy.world on 15 Nov 19:31 collapse

Very helpful! Thank you so much!

macstainless@discuss.tchncs.de on 15 Nov 19:50 collapse

You got it. Good luck!

Prunebutt@slrpnk.net on 15 Nov 16:32 next collapse

Freetube on Linux, newpipe on android and maybe a private invidious instance.

akilou@sh.itjust.works on 15 Nov 16:36 next collapse

Grayjay

blindbunny@lemmy.ml on 15 Nov 21:54 next collapse

Does it just stop playing sometimes? It’s the only thing I don’t like about it so far

possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip on 16 Nov 00:19 collapse

Not foss

akilou@sh.itjust.works on 16 Nov 00:49 collapse

I didn’t say it was, I’m just answering the dude’s question

Bishma@discuss.tchncs.de on 15 Nov 16:43 next collapse

I have a locally hosted invidious instance but increasingly I’m finding most of the creators I watch are on Nebula. I just recently discovered that Rifftrax has a presence there.

possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip on 16 Nov 00:18 collapse

Does Nebula have third party clients?

Bishma@discuss.tchncs.de on 16 Nov 02:42 next collapse

Not that I’m aware of, but it would be nice.

andyortlieb@lemmy.sdf.org on 16 Nov 02:59 collapse

Grayjay can stream nebula, so there must be a way.

pogodem0n@lemmy.world on 15 Nov 16:54 next collapse

NewPipe

KarnaSubarna@lemmy.ml on 15 Nov 17:55 next collapse

Self-hosted Invidious or public Invidious instances.

github.com/iv-org/invidious

Selfhoster1728@lemmy.world on 15 Nov 18:08 next collapse

Libretube with a vpn!

Retro_unlimited@lemmy.world on 15 Nov 18:11 next collapse

I use several of the suggestions above, but also for IOS (iPhone) I use “Firefox Focus” and it clears everything when I close it and I can watch ad free.

pe1uca@lemmy.pe1uca.dev on 15 Nov 18:10 next collapse

With invidious and in FreshRSS I use the youtube extension to use the embedded video player, you just need update this part of the code github.com/FreshRSS/Extensions/…/extension.php#L1…
It easy just to replace for this:

    public function getHtmlContentForLink(FreshRSS_Entry $entry, string $link): string
    {
        $domain = 'www.youtube.com';
        if ($this->useNoCookie) {
            $domain = 'www.youtube-nocookie.com';
        }
        $domain = 'invidious.personal.com';
        $params = 'quality=dash';
        $url = str_replace('//www.youtube.com/watch?v=', '//'.$domain.'/embed/', $link);
        $url = str_replace('http://', 'https://', $url);
        $url = $url . '?' . $params;

        return $this->getHtml($entry, $url);
    }

The only change is to use $domain = ‘invidious.personal.com’;
And add the parameter quality=dash

Seems there’s also this one github.com/tunbridgep/freshrss-invidious
but haven’t tried it

unrushed233@lemmings.world on 15 Nov 18:17 next collapse

youtube-local over a Mullvad (other services like Proton or IVPN are great as well) works really well for me

sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works on 15 Nov 18:19 next collapse

Grayjay on my Android phone. I like that it supports a lot of different services, and I have subs on Odysee, Rumble, and Nebula (I pay for a sub there). I sometimes download videos for offline use if I’m going to listen on my commute or something (no point in using up data if I don’t need to).

On my desktop/laptop, I just use YouTube directly w/ uBlock Origin on Firefox (to block ads) without logging in. I don’t watch much YouTube on my desktop/laptop, and when I do, I’ll just look for a specific video or whatever.

I also have NewPipe installed on my phone for when I want to find something specific (i.e. background music or something), because Grayjay’s search kind of sucks.

possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip on 16 Nov 00:18 collapse

Not Foss so if that’s something that matters to you I would recommend you look elsewhere

sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works on 16 Nov 04:50 collapse

Grayjay is source available, which is better than nothing. I’d prefer FOSS, but the features make up for the poor choice of license.

possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip on 16 Nov 04:53 collapse

So is Windows XP

That doesn’t mean much

sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works on 16 Nov 04:59 collapse

It’s really not. Windows XP had its source leaked, it’s not source available. Grayjay is source available, so I can see every new commit before it hits my phone. That’s a pretty big difference, and it’s the most important when it comes to public security audits.

possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip on 16 Nov 05:25 collapse

You aren’t legally allowed to do anything about a bad commit so it is meaningless

sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works on 16 Nov 15:21 collapse

That doesn’t follow. If there’s a bad commit in Windows 10 or 11, I won’t even know about it. If there’s a bad commit in Grayjay, I can:

  • not upgrade, or downgrade to an unaffected version
  • report the issue on their issue tracker
  • technically violate the license by patching it myself and building my own copy (probably fine provided I don’t distribute changes)

I can do exactly none of that with most proprietary software, so this source-available license is much better than those. Again, it’s not ideal, but considering it the same as every other proprietary software license is absurd.

bluelion@sh.itjust.works on 15 Nov 21:32 next collapse

I use a private Piped instance

decisoft@lemm.ee on 15 Nov 21:47 collapse

Can you show your docker-compose? I’ve tried several times without succeeding 🤧

_cryptagion@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 15 Nov 23:33 next collapse

You can’t just ask that. Not without at least taking them out to a fancy dinner first. Maybe a little dancing.

decisoft@lemm.ee on 16 Nov 09:58 collapse

My bad 😁

bluelion@sh.itjust.works on 15 Nov 23:38 collapse

Before anything, you’ll want to create a folder for the unix socket: mkdir /var/run/ytproxy and chown it to your reverse proxy’s user and group.

The Docker files:

compose.yml

___ services: piped-frontend: image: 1337kavin/piped-frontend:latest container_name: piped-frontend environment: BACKEND_HOSTNAME: $API_ENDPOINT depends_on: - piped restart: unless-stopped networks: - proxy piped-proxy: image: 1337kavin/piped-proxy:latest container_name: piped-proxy environment: - UDS=1 volumes: - /var/run/ytproxy:/app/socket # unix socket location user: 1000:1000 restart: unless-stopped networks: - proxy piped: image: 1337kavin/piped:latest container_name: piped-backend volumes: - ./piped/config/config.properties:/app/config.properties:ro depends_on: - piped-db restart: unless-stopped networks: - backend_piped - proxy piped-db: image: pgautoupgrade/pgautoupgrade:16-alpine container_name: piped-db environment: - POSTGRES_DB=$DB_NAME - POSTGRES_USER=$DB_USER - POSTGRES_PASSWORD=$DB_PASS volumes: - ./piped/pgdb:/var/lib/postgresql/data restart: unless-stopped networks: - backend_piped networks: backend_piped: proxy: external: true

.env

___ API_ENDPOINT= # no scheme prefix (ex. pipedapi.domain.example) DB_NAME= DB_USER= DB_PASS=

To configure the reverse proxy (I use nginx), you can use Piped’s recommended files with your domains. The linked repo also contains a template for the required config.properties.

Let me know if you run into issues, I’ll be glad to help 🙂

possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip on 16 Nov 00:17 next collapse

Newpipe or libretube

electric_nan@lemmy.ml on 16 Nov 02:32 next collapse

NewPipe or PipePipe.

PraiseTheSoup@lemm.ee on 16 Nov 05:54 collapse

Been using PipePipe for awhile now and love it. Unfortunately, recently it has not been able to load playlists 9/10 times. Very frustrating. Hopefully it gets a patch soon.

electric_nan@lemmy.ml on 16 Nov 07:30 collapse

Any problems I’ve had with these apps has usually been solved by reconnecting my VPN.

PraiseTheSoup@lemm.ee on 16 Nov 15:15 collapse

I don’t have a VPN.

mypasswordis1234@lemmy.world on 16 Nov 03:42 next collapse

I just watch it on youtube.com without logging in. Sacrificing convenience and using some frontend that only work if you pray hard is not something I want to do daily-drive

cyberwolfie@lemmy.ml on 16 Nov 07:48 next collapse

There are some periods where YouTube make changes frequently so that e.g. FreeTube stops working for some time, but for the most part it works reliably well. I would say it provides a much better convenience than watching on youtube.com logged out, as you have profiles, subscriptions, playlist and history. Including adblock, sponsorblock and dearrow, and granular control over what to show or not (comments, shorts, live etc.).

_cryptagion@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 16 Nov 19:26 collapse

I use containers on Firefox to sandbox YouTube, and then have a throwaway account that’s literally just for YouTube and nothing else. Everywhere else on the web, scripts from Google are blacklisted using uBO.

Asparagus0098@sh.itjust.works on 16 Nov 07:30 next collapse

NewPipe on my phone. I don’t have PC I can use rn but when I used to have one I’d just use my browser (mainly Firefox) with ublock origin to watch YouTube (without signing in).

Hadriscus@lemm.ee on 16 Nov 13:51 next collapse

Freetube on desktop works beautifully. They just added playlists too

ComradeMiao@lemmy.world on 16 Nov 15:03 collapse

This is awesome!

Hadriscus@lemm.ee on 16 Nov 17:08 collapse

on the minus side, it’s electron and it doesn’t have tabs, but it’s a rather minor inconvenience for me

ComradeMiao@lemmy.world on 16 Nov 20:22 collapse

Do your subscriptions load well? I just imported mine from freshrss and they’re loading slowly

Hadriscus@lemm.ee on 16 Nov 21:14 collapse

A couple seconds does it… I have 56 subscribed channels though, that’s not a lot, perhaps loading times scale with this number

ComradeMiao@lemmy.world on 16 Nov 23:36 collapse

Hmm maybe I’ll reinstall. Never loading for me. I can click individual but not all subs

Hadriscus@lemm.ee on 17 Nov 02:44 collapse

You can check the tracker for open issues, see if you’re encountering a known one

BrightCandle@lemmy.world on 16 Nov 15:46 next collapse

I sub to channels and use Youtubes recommendations and new for you to find additional channels etc but I don’t watch them I use Metube and a browser plugin and download the videos to a directory. I don’t get all the privacy but I also am not giving them much watch data and I can avoid the ads.

Yaky@slrpnk.net on 16 Nov 21:28 next collapse

I don’t watch a lot of youtube, but DuckDuckGo browser (on Android and Windows, at least) has a Duck Player that removes all of the cruft around videos and is private afaik.

erev@lemmy.world on 16 Nov 22:00 next collapse

grayjay, it’s an app developed by Louis Rossman to combine a lot of streaming platforms into one privacy and security respecting app. it does have billionaire backing tho if that yanks your chain

jjlinux@lemmy.ml on 16 Nov 22:57 next collapse

+1 on Grayjay. Also Tubular. FreeTube on PC and SmartTube on TV.

ComradeMiao@lemmy.world on 16 Nov 23:35 collapse

Thanks! I’ll check it out. Thanks for yanking my chain

erev@lemmy.world on 16 Nov 23:41 collapse

ofc!

net00@lemm.ee on 17 Nov 02:07 next collapse

I use a self-hosted invidious instance, and despite the recent issues with Google trying to block them mine works behind Mullvad VPN.

I use the web app on desktop, and Yattee client on my phone/ipad

bokherif@lemmy.world on 17 Nov 02:44 next collapse

On Android try NewPipe, but dont expect algorithm recommendations, just the main trending pages. Same for iOS use “unwatched”

tacogoon@lemmy.world on 17 Nov 21:20 collapse

yt-dlp Web UI

A nice docker friendly front end to yt-dlp. I use it to watch YouTube on iOS devices where ublock origin is not an option.