Tartube

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MAJOR NEW FEATURES
- Tartube is now confirmed to work on MacOS. See the README file for
installation instructions
- Tartube can now handle video thumbnails in the .webp format, as long as
FFmpeg is installed. Thumbnails are automatically converted to .jpg (either
by youtube-dl, or by Tartube itself, as appropriate). This only affects new
downloads. If you want to convert .webp thumbnails you've already
downloaded, click Operations > Tidy up files..., select 'Convert .webp
thumbnails to .jpg using FFmpeg', and click OK. (This procedure may take a
while if there are thousands of thumbnails to convert) (Git 155 and
others)
- Thumbnails, video description, metadata and annotation files can now be
downloaded into a sub-directory, rather than being stored in the same
directory as their videos. Thumbnails are stored in /.thumbs, and the
others are stored in /.data. On Linux/BSD, those sub-directories are
normally invisible by default (typically, pressing CTRL+H will reveal
them). This new feature is disabled by default. To enable it, click Edit >
Download options... > Files > Write/move files, and select one or more of
the checkboxes. The new feature only affects new downloads. If you want to
move files you've already downloaded, click Operations > Tidy up files...,
select 'Move thumbnails into own folder' and/or 'Move other metadata files
into own folder', and click OK (Git 139)
- You can now select one or more videos, and process them with FFmpeg directly
(in other words, after downloads have finished, and without involving
youtube-dl). This will be useful if you want to convert one video format to
another, change the frame rate, or with countless other tasks. Just select
the video(s), right-click them and select 'Process with FFmpeg...'. Since
many FFmpeg procedures require a different output filename, you can specify
that, too. Note that FFmpeg sometimes takes a very long time; you should
test a procedure with a single video, before trying to process hundreds of
them (Git 153)
- Tartube can now use forks of youtube-dl, such as youtube-dlc. (Tartube
assumes that a fork is still very similar to the original). A fork can be
specified in Edit > System preferences... > youtube-dl (Git 158)
- New installations of Tartube will now auto-detect the location of youtube-dl,
if it is already installed on your system. This will benefit users of the
.DEB and .RPM packages, who until now were expected to know how to set the
youtube-dl path manually (Git 152)
- FFmpeg and AVConv will now also be auto-detected. If you have installed them
in unusual locations, you should specify those locations in Edit >
System preferences... > youtube-dl > FFmpeg / AVConv. If not, there is no
need to specify either location; just leave the boxes empty. (None of this
applies to MS Windows users)
- When Tartube shuts down unexpectedly, it doesn't have time to mark the
database as no longer being in use (i.e. doesn't remove the lockfile). The
next time Tartube runs, users were prompted to remove the lockfile, then
restart Tartube. Many users were unhappy with this situation, so it has
been improved. You will still be prompted to remove the lockfile, but there
is no longer any need to restart Tartube

MINOR NEW FEATURES
- FFmpeg is now required for a lot of Tartube functionality. On new
installations, users who have not yet installed FFmpeg will see some
additional nag-boxes, and various hints in other configuration windows
(Git 155)
- If users downloadd a video, but only its audio, the video appeared in
Tartube's database as downloaded. However, when the user clicked on the
'Player' label, the audio file was not opened in the system's media player.
Tartube now checks for an audio file (as well as video files in different
formats), if the video file it was expecting does not exist
- When the user clicks Operations > Update youtube-dl, Tartube now
automatically makes the Output tab visible. Hopefully this will avoid
confusion for new users, who do not notice that the Check all/Download all
buttons have been greyed out. This behaviour can be disabled, if required:
click Edit > System preferences... > Output > Output tab, and deselect
'During an update operation, automatically switch to the Output tab'
(Git 149)
- The invidio.us website has closed. There are many mirrors available. Tartube
now uses invidious.site as its default mirror. To specify a different
mirror, click Edit > System preferences... > Operations > Downloads
- YouTube phased out video annotations in 2019. The Tartube code was unable to
download annotation files during a simulated download (for example, with
the 'Check all' button). Now that there is no way of testing any fix, the
feature has been removed entirely
- You can now add automatic custom downloads on a schedule (normal downloads
were already available). Click Edit > System preferences... > Scheduling
(Git 154)
- Reduced the compulsory delay at the end of many types of operation. The
delay time is not the same for all types of operation
- Tartube debug messages are visible in the terminal window (if open). Before,
the user had to edit the source code to enable debug messages. They can
now be enabled from within Tartube itself: click Edit > System
preferences... > General > Debugging. These settings are not saved, so when
Tartube restarts, you will have to re-enable debug messages again
- In the Progress and Classic Mode tabs, the name of the incoming file (and
other similar columns) are no longer artificially shortened (Git 161)

MAJOR FIXES
- When one channel downloads into videos into another channel's directory,
and the other channel is then deleted, the Tartube database did not update
itself properly. Fixed
- Fixed some issues when using the refresh operation to import videos, that had
been downloaded by youtube-dl (without Tartube's) help, into Tartube's
database (Git 142)
- Tartube can now download videos using the youtube-dl archive file, even when
missing video detection is turned on (Git 154)
- Tartube sometimes froze on shutdown, after youtube-dl had been updated.
Applied the existing MS Windows fix to all operating systems

MINOR FIXES
- Fixed issues when importing a JSON export file on MS Windows, and a different
issue error when importing it on Linux
- We were not able to fix export issues reported in Git 143, but we have
updated the dialogue window, which should give more information about what
is causing the error
- System folders cannot be deleted. The 'Delete folder' popup menu item is now
greyed out. (Nothing happened, even when it was clickable)
- Warnings about broken Gtk have been removed (probably permanently)

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MAJOR FIXES
- Checking videos (e.g. by clicking the Check All button) was broken. Fixed
- Fixed a very rare freeze/crash when handling temporary directories

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MAJOR NEW FEATURES
- Tartube can now detect videos that were downloaded by the user, and have
since been removed by the original uploader. To enable this functionality,
click 'Edit > System preferences... > youtube-dl > Preferences' and then
click 'Add videos which have been removed from a channel/playlist to the
Missing Videos Folder' to select it. Note that youtube-dl's archive file
(if enabled) is ignored when missing video detection is enabled (Git 140)

MINOR NEW FEATURES
- Schedules download times can now be specified in any time unit (for example,
minutes), rather than in days only (Git 129)
- The Tartube version number is no longer displayed in the main window's title
bar (this was only supposed to be a temporary feature)

MAJOR FIXES
- In the Classic Mode tab, the video/audio format selector was broken. It was
not possible to change the video/audio format from here. Fixed (Git 124)
- It was not possible to perform a custom download by right-clicking a channel
or playlist. Fixed (Git 134)

MINOR FIXES
- Added .ICO file for the Tartube logo, for MS Windows users (Git 122)
- The first entry box in the download options window was editable. Fixed

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ATTENTION YOUTUBE USERS
- You may be wondering why Tartube cannot display video thumbnails from
newly-uploaded videos. YouTube has changed its video thumbnails to a new
format, .webp. The Gtk graphics libraries don't support this format. A
future release of youtube-dl will convert .webp thumbnails to .jpg, but the
feature is not available yet. When it becomes available, you might need to
install FFmpeg on your system, if you haven't already done so (see the
README file)

MAJOR NEW FEATURES
- For MS Windows users, there is now a portable edition of Tartube, as well as
the usual installer. Use the portable edition if you want to run Tartube
from removable media, such as a USB drive
- After clicking the main 'Check all' button, it was not possible to right-
click a video to download it. After clicking the main 'Download all'
button, it was not possible to right-click a video to check it. Both of
these actions are now allowed
- Closing Tartube to the system tray is now disabled by default (only affects
new installations). This is for the benefit of users whose systems do not
have a system tray, or for whom the Tartube icon is not visible for some
reason (Git 98)

MINOR NEW FEATURES
- The latest releases of Tartube's graphics library, Gtk, still do not fix the
many stability issues we've been reporting for some years. As a consequence
the workarounds that stop Tartube from crashing every two minutes are now
completely optional (i.e. Tartube no longer applies them regardless of your
wishes). If you enjoy watching Tartube crash, feel free to disable the
workarounds by clicking 'Edit > System preferences... > General
> Stability' and then clicking 'Disable some cosmetic features...' to
deselect it
- When checking the status of livestreams (which happens every few minutes,
by default), the Tartube icon in the system tray now looks different. (The
checks for livestream status were otherwise silent)
- Various alternative front-ends to YouTube exist. Tartube already recognises
HookTube and Invidious. You can now specify any alternative you like;
perhaps one the several Invidious clones that are currently available.
Click 'Edit > System preferences... > Operations > Custom' to open the
correct tab. More complete instructions have been added to the README
- In the Classic Mode tab, the buttons in the top-right corner have been
replaced with a popup menu
- A separate set of download options are now applied to downloads in the
Classic Mode tab. These download options are applied by default, even on
existing installations. To disable/re-enable them, click the menu in the
top-right corner of the tab, and select 'Use classic download options' or
'Use general download options'
- If download options are applied to the Classic Mode tab, then a video's
description, metadata (etc) files are not downloaded in that tab, by
default (Git 77)
- The youtube-dl archive file is no longer created in downloads from the
Classic Mode tab, by default. To re-enable this functionality, click 'Edit
> System preferences... > youtube-dl', and select both 'Allow youtube-dl to
create its own arhive file...' and 'Also create an archive file when
downloading from the Classic Mode tab...'. This change affects new
installations; users with earlier versions of Tartube installed on their
system must remove an existing archive file manually, if they don't want
it (Git 77)
- In the Classic Mode tab, added a button to show the contents of the download
directory/folder
- In the system preferences window, the 'When Tartube starts, automatically
open the Classic Mode tab' setting has been moved to a more logical place
(Windows > Tabs)
- The toolbar at the top of the Videos tab can now be hidden, if you don't
like it. Click 'Edit > System preferences... > Windows > Main window', and
click 'Don't show the main window toolbar' to select it
- In the Videos tab, you can now add the URL of a video, channel or playlist to
the Classic Mode tab by right-clicking it, and then selecting an item in
the popup menu. The original video/channel/playlist is not removed from
Tartube's database
- Tidy operations can now remove .webp thumbnails. Once the youtube-dl fix
mentioned above has been released, you can remove the thumbnails, then
click 'Check all' to re-download them in .jpg format
- Some users have reported that some icons in Tartube's main window are
invisible on their system. These are stock icons which should be available
on all systems (but which, apparently, are not). For the benefit of those
users, an extra set of icons have been created. To enable them, click
'Edit > System preferences... > Windows > Main window > Replace stock icons
with custom icons...' (Git 118)
- In the Temporary Videos folder, you can now see which channel/playlist/folder
the video originally belonged to (where appropriate). The video's original
name and description are also now visible, when known
- The URL for a channel or playlist can now be modified (Git 117)

MAJOR FIXES
- Installation via PyPI was broken, because the gi package had been removed.
This is now fixed
- Installation using the DEB package will now automatically install
python3-pip (if not already installed), so that youtube-dl can be
installed/updated straight away
- When closing Tartube using the X button (usually) in the top-right corner of
the window, and assuming that closing to the system tray is disabled,
neither the config file nor Tartube's database file were saved. Fixed
- Adding a preferred media format in one download options window added the
same format in all download options windows. Fixed (Git 119)
- A custom location for the FFmpeg executable can be set in 'Edit > System
preferences... > youtube-dl'. This did not work on any operationg system
for various reasons, all of which have been fixed (Git 90)
- After checking/downloading videos, Tartube checks for livestreams, after
which it occasionally crashes. This crash has now been fixed
- Some videos were continually re-marked as livestreams, even after the
livestream had finished broadcasting (and even after the user manually
marked the video as not a livestream). Fixed
- Some livestream videos were continually re-added to Tartube's database,
creating a number of duplicate copies of the same video. The problem has
been fixed; you can delete the duplicates at your leisure
- When videos are checked, Tartube no longer supplies youtube-dl with a
preferred media format. If you have specified a rarely-used media format,
this change will prevent a great many useless error messages being
generated
- When detecting livestreams, Tartube generated many 'Add livestream failed
sanity check' errors. The underlying cause has been fixed, which should
improve livestream detection a little

MINOR FIXES
- Fixed failure to recognise that a config file exists in the Tartube source
code directory (which forces Tartube to use that location for its config
file rather than the system's default location, even if the config file is
empty or unreadable)
- Fixed rare problems in updating old Tartube database files to make videos
work as livestreams. The database integrity check ('Edit >
System preferences... > Filesystem > DB Errors') now checks for such
problems
- In the download options window, the 'If a merge is required after post-
processing, output to this format' option will not work if the specified
media format doesn't also appear in the preferred format list. Moved the
two onto the same tab, and added a dialogue window to warn the user that a
media format must be added twice
- Also fixed the format selection combobox in the Classic Mode tab, so that
the preferred media format and the 'If a merge is required after post-
processing...' options are set to the same value
- In the system preferences window, the 'When Tartube starts, automatically
open the Classic Mode tab' setting was not working properly; fixed it
- For downloads in the Classic Mode tab, an error was displayed in the
Errors/Warnings tab using the video name 'Dummy Video'; changed that to
the standard text for videos whose name is not known
- Fixed python errors generated when playing a sound effect, on a system for
which the python playsound module hasn't been installed
- Fixed a python error generated when shutting down Tartube suddenly, while
livestreams are being detected
- For reasons not understood, Tartube might (on extremely rare occasions)
create a (red) system folder called 'downloads_2'. This folder could not be
deleted. Until the cause can be found, such invalid system folders can now
now be deleted, and are deleted automatically during a database integrity
check
- In the system preferences window, Operations > Livestreams tab, there are two
checkbuttons enabling/disabling livestream detection. The second one could
be enabled even when the first was disabled; this has been fixed, and
should remove some unexpected behaviour
- When updating youtube-dl, the warning 'The script youtube-dl is installed...'
is now intercepted, and is no longer interpreted as a failure

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MAJOR NEW FEATURES
- For everyone who wants a simpler way to download videos, a new Classic Mode
tab has been added, emulating the look and feel of youtube-dl-gui. Videos
downloaded in this tab can be downloaded to any location, and are not added
to Tartube's database
- Tartube can now detect livestreams, and alert you when they start. This
feature is EXPERIMENTAL, has only been tested on YouTube, and may not be
reliable. It does not work at all on the 32-bit MS Windows installer
- Added internationalisation. If you can contribute a translation to this
project, please see the ../docs/translate.rst file. As a proof of concept,
Tartube can now be used with either British or American spelling
- You can now specify unlimited numbers of video/audio formats (the limit was
previously three). You can also specify that youtube-dl should try to
download each video in each of your preferred formats, rather than in one
or all available formats (as was the case before)

MINOR NEW FEATURES
- Made minor improvements to the look of various dialogue windows
- Slightly improved the functionality of buttons in the system preference
window's database tab
- If a database can't be loaded (but an alternative database can), an
explanatory messages is now added to the Errors/Warnings tab. If an
alternative database can't be loaded (or only one database has been added
to Tartube's list), then the dialogue window seen by the user is now
slightly more helpful
- Some startup errors, which were invisible to users not running Tartube from a
terminal window, now produce a visible dialogue window
- The code to force renamig of channels/playlists/folders (when required) has
been adjusted so it creates a name like 'Folder_3' rather than
'Folder_2_2_2_2'
- Instructions for Tartube installations have been updated generally. The
MS Windows batch/shell files used to start Tartube have been tweaked

MAJOR FIXES
- The MS Windows installers have been updated to use Python 3.8. This may fix
some stability issues for a few users
- For systems with a broken Gtk library (or if the user has disabled minor
cosmetic features anyway), the list of videos in the Videos tab is no
longer updated during a download operation. This should resolve some
lingering stability issues. (You can manually update the list by selecting
a different channel/playlist/folder, then selecting the original one again)
- In the Video Catalogue, new videos are sometimes added to the last page,
rather than to the first one. Rewrote the code yet again to resolve this
issue; hopefully this should be the last rewrite
- The Python setup file now explicitly mentions more dependencies; this should
assist with installation issues for PyPI, DEB and RPM packages
- The RPM package, which did not work at all on Tartube v2.0.016, is now
working again

MINOR FIXES
- In the general download options window, in the Files tab, there was a
duplicate set of template options. Remove the duplicate set, replacing it
with a larger set of options
- Info/Tidy operations complained that they couldn't start while an edit/
preference window is open, and then started anyway. Fixed
- In the Progress List, a video's name is updated as soon as it is known
(before, the name was only updated in the Results List)
- The start of a download operation is now (slightly) quicker, because the
setup code is no longer called (incorrectly) for every single video
- Download operations scheduled to begin when Tartube starts now begin after
a few seconds, rather than immediately (for aesthetic reasons)

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MINOR NEW FEATURES
- Tartube's config file is stored in a standard location for your system, by
default. For testing purposes, you can copy a config file into Tartube's
installation directory (the one containing this file). If you do so,
Tartube will load and later save that config file, rather than the one in
the standard location
- Tartube no longer creates a youtube-dl archive file in its 'Unsorted Videos'
and 'Temporary Videos' folders. Any existing archive files in those folders
are automatically deleted. Other folders are not affected (Git 64)
- In the Videos tab, you can expand the tree on the left-hand side of the
window by clicking on a folder (if this behaviour has been enabled). This
behaviour has now been modified slightly. Clicking on a folder will also
collapse the tree, if already expanded. You can tell Tartube to expand the
whole tree, not just the folder itself. The settings can be specified by
selecting the checkbuttons in Edit > System preferences > Windows >
Main window

MINOR FIXES
- The system preferences window didn't show the correct location for the
loaded config file. Fixed
- The DEB package has been improved to generate fewer Lintian error messages
- Tartube was unable to switch between databases, if the main 'Download all'
button had been disabled. Fixed
- After deleting a folder, clicking the 'Add a new folder' button generated an
error. Fixed
- If the internet connection goes down during a check operation, Tartube is
now less likely to freeze
- The 'Apply changes without closing the window' button at the bottom of many
edit windows did not work as intended. Fixed
- Video descriptions are no longer editable in a video's 'Video Properties'
window