Create Wrapper Scripts for youtube-dl

The excellent command-line video downloader youtube-dl can be made even more useful by wrapping it with a couple of batch scripts to handle the most common cases.

Installation

1. Download and install the Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable Package (x86).

2. Open the Start menu, type cmd to filter and select cmd to open a console window. Create a new folder C:\Programs\capture and download youtube-dl.

   C:\Windows\System32> mkdir C:\Programs\capture
   C:\Windows\System32> cd C:\Programs\capture
   C:\Programs\capture> explorer https://yt-dl.org/latest/youtube-dl.exe
   C:\Programs\capture> mv %USERPROFILE%\Downloads\youtube-dl.exe .
   C:\Programs\capture> start C:\Programs\capture

3. Download a recent Windows build of FFmpeg and open the downloaded file. Drill down the folder tree to find the bin directory, then copy ffmpeg.exe and ffprobe.exe to C:\Programs\capture.

   

Capture MP4 Video

1. Use Notepad to create a new batch file that will capture video.

   C:\Programs\capture> notepad capture-video.bat

2. Copy and paste the following code into the new file, then save and close Notepad.

   @echo off
   setlocal
   
   REM usage: capture-video.bat name url
   
   :update
   %~dp0\youtube-dl.exe --update | more
   
   :capture
   set output=%~dp0\capture.mp4\"%~1"
   mkdir %output% 2>nul
   pushd %output%
   %~dp0\youtube-dl.exe --format mp4 --merge-output-format mp4 --recode-video mp4 --prefer-ffmpeg --ffmpeg-location %~dp0 "%~2"
   popd
   
   :done
   endlocal
   exit /B %ERRORLEVEL%

3. Run the capture-video script from the command line, providing a name and url to capture, each surrounded by double-quotes.

   C:\Programs\capture> capture-video.bat "Franzoli Electronics" "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uf3ouaeB6UQ"
   youtube-dl is up-to-date (2021.06.06)
   [youtube] Uf3ouaeB6UQ: Downloading webpage
   [youtube] Uf3ouaeB6UQ: Downloading player a7cbbf24
   [download] Destination: Never Gonna SHOCK You Up-Uf3ouaeB6UQ.mp4
   [download] 100% of 29.24MiB in 00:05
   [ffmpeg] Not converting video file Never Gonna SHOCK You Up-Uf3ouaeB6UQ.mp4 - already is in target format mp4

4. Find the downloaded MP4 video file in C:\Programs\capture\capture.mp4.

   

Capture MP3 Audio

1. Use Notepad to create a new batch file that will capture audio.

   C:\Programs\capture> notepad capture-audio.bat

2. Copy and paste this code into the new file, then save and close Notepad.

   @echo off
   setlocal
   
   REM usage: capture-audio.bat name url
   
   :update
   %~dp0\youtube-dl.exe --update | more
   
   :capture
   set output=%~dp0\capture.mp3\"%~1"
   mkdir %output% 2>nul
   pushd %output%
   %~dp0\youtube-dl.exe -x --audio-format mp3 --audio-quality 0 --prefer-ffmpeg --ffmpeg-location %~dp0 "%~2"
   popd
   
   :done
   endlocal
   exit /B %ERRORLEVEL%

3. Run the capture-audio script from the command line, providing a name and url to capture, each surrounded by double-quotes.

   C:\Programs\capture> capture-audio.bat "Franzoli Electronics" "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uf3ouaeB6UQ"
   youtube-dl is up-to-date (2021.06.06)
   [youtube] Uf3ouaeB6UQ: Downloading webpage
   [youtube] Uf3ouaeB6UQ: Downloading player 2a6f5e06
   [download] Destination: Never Gonna SHOCK You Up-Uf3ouaeB6UQ.webm
   [download] 100% of 1.94MiB in 00:00
   [ffmpeg] Destination: Never Gonna SHOCK You Up-Uf3ouaeB6UQ.mp3
   Deleting original file Never Gonna SHOCK You Up-Uf3ouaeB6UQ.webm (pass -k to keep)

4. Find the downloaded MP3 audio file in C:\Programs\capture\capture.mp3.