So Long.... Youtube-DL

 A couple of years ago, I decided to write a quick script called ytdl, short for 'youtube downloader'.  I wrote it as a wrapper for the youtube-dl application, as I was tired of always trying to remember the options that I used when downloading either a video or a song (in audio format only) from youtube. 

Recently, I revisited the application as I needed to grab a couple of things off of youtube, and found that when running it, the downloads were CRAZY slow!  By CRAZY slow, I mean in the area of only getting between 25k and 50k max as a download speed.  I was looking at 1-2 hours to download each of the videos I was wanting to grab.  Considering in the past it would only have taken me a few minutes to download the videos I wanted (in total), I decided to use my Google Foo and see what was up. 

Sure enough, it appears that:

1. youtube.com was throttling the youtube-dl application.  This was confirmed by the plethora of complaints from the community that uses(used) it.  

2. I discovered that youtube-dl was no longer being maintained, and that the last version (from december of last year), was the final version. 

Well, that's not good.  But, what is good, is that there was a replacement...... yt-dlp!!!  Excellent, a successor.  So, I proceeded to download yt-dlp and incorporate it into my script, utterly replacing the old, useless youtube-dl.  

After some tweaking to get the downloaded files the way I like them, I can happily say that I am now seeing download speeds in the megabytes!!!  (7-13Mb, just on the dl's I did today).  

So, I have updated all the download types in the script and pushed up a new version.  If you haven't played with it, please feel free to give it a go.  And, if you have any download sites that you'd like added to the script (that are supported by it), please feel free to open an issue for an improvement.

Here is a link to my ytdl project.  Enjoy!

Removing Tag(s) From A Git Repository

 If you work on a team that is constantly developing their code, then you are probably dealing with at least one repository that gets periodically tagged (such as when a code release is performed).  If that is the case, then you have probably (or not) had to deal with setting the tags that get applied to the repository.  

If so, then you would be able to see the tags on a repository with the following command:

   $ git tag

If you are looking for a tag, but you only know part of it, you can certainly use grep to weed through the potentially large list of tags that will be presented to you.  Now, if you happen to set a tag incorrectly, or apply it to the wrong repository (or branch of that repository, for instance), you are not stuck.  You can remove it.  Here are the steps:

1. First, ensure you are in the repository in question and in the correct branch, then do a 'git pull' to ensure you are at the latest change
2. Run 'git tag | grep <tag>' to get the tag name you need to remove
3. Run 'git tag -d <tag_name>'        <--- This will remove the tag in your local repository
4. Run 'git push --delete origin <tag_name>'    <--- This will remove the tag from the remote repo
5. Run 'git pull'

From here, you will need to run the 'git tag' command in step 2 and verify that the tag has been removed locally.  You can also then go up to GitHub, Gitlab, etc, and check the repository and ensure that the tag has been removed there as well.   

Read Medium Articles For Free

 There is nothing more annoying to someone who is just trying to read about something they are trying to learn about, than to have a site say, "Hey, you've reached your 'free' limit!".  That is exactly what medium.com does with its articles.  You need to log in to read further (so it says), and then, when you do, they STILL won't let you go any further until you pay for the right to read their articles.  Call me cheap, but I believe in the freedom of information.  

So, a little Google-foo and I discovered that there is a workaround for this that works in Chrome/Brave:

- Load up the article you want to read

- In the URL bar at the top, click the little padlock (the one that indicates that the site is secured)

- In there, it will tell you how many cookies there are.  Click on "Cookies".  It will bring up a window similar to this:

- Click on 'medium.com' and click 'Block' down below, and then Done.

Chrome/Brave will then ask you to reload the page.  Once you do, you should be able to read the article without the annoying message telling you that you haven't paid them for the privilege yet.  

Enjoy! 

**UPDATE:  I know its been quite a while since I posted this, but it is worth noting that this fix is truly only a temporary fix.  I tend to browse using a VPN, and find that the fix only works for a little while.   Once it runs out, I just switch to a different vpn location and voila, I can browse a little while longer.  Its not perfect, but the Scottish in me doesn't want to pay for Medium at the moment.  

Also, if you have this cookie block in place and you try to sign up for membership on Medium, the link they send you will hang indefinitely.  You'll have to remove the block, retry the link, and things should work.  Just noting.  

Installing Dependencies for dpkg Software Installation

Let's say you download any of the plethora of '.deb' packages that exist out there, and want to install it on your Ubuntu system (or the like).  You would use something similar to the following to do that installation:

    sudo dpkg -i imager_1.7.2_amd64.deb

Now, let's say you run that, but are then presented with output stating that there are a bunch of unmet dependencies.  Disconcerting, sure, but its not the end of the world, for sure.  For example:

$ sudo dpkg -i imager_1.7.2_amd64.deb 

Selecting previously unselected package rpi-imager.

(Reading database ... 195449 files and directories currently installed.)

Preparing to unpack imager_1.7.2_amd64.deb ...

Unpacking rpi-imager (1.7.2) ...

dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of rpi-imager:

 rpi-imager depends on libqt5qml5 (>= 5.10.0); however:

  Package libqt5qml5 is not installed.

 rpi-imager depends on qml-module-qtquick2; however:

  Package qml-module-qtquick2 is not installed.

 rpi-imager depends on qml-module-qtquick-controls2; however:

  Package qml-module-qtquick-controls2 is not installed.

 rpi-imager depends on qml-module-qtquick-layouts; however:

  Package qml-module-qtquick-layouts is not installed.

 rpi-imager depends on qml-module-qtquick-templates2; however:

  Package qml-module-qtquick-templates2 is not installed.

 rpi-imager depends on qml-module-qtquick-window2; however:

  Package qml-module-qtquick-window2 is not installed.

 rpi-imager depends on qml-module-qtgraphicaleffects; however:

  Package qml-module-qtgraphicaleffects is not installed.

dpkg: error processing package rpi-imager (--install):

 dependency problems - leaving unconfigured

Processing triggers for mailcap (3.69ubuntu1) ...

Processing triggers for gnome-menus (3.36.0-1ubuntu1) ...

Processing triggers for desktop-file-utils (0.26-1ubuntu2) ...

Processing triggers for hicolor-icon-theme (0.17-2) ...

Errors were encountered while processing:

 rpi-imager

I know that is a lot of output, sorry about that.  But I left it that way for effect and to give a full example.  Now, what you will need to do in this case, is run the following:

        sudo apt -f install -y

That will take and install any dependencies that were found during the previous software installation attempt, and install them.  After that is done, you can re-run the dpkg command to install your software, and it "should" just work and install your software.  ( I say should in quotes, as nothing is guaranteed. )