YouTube to Article Tool

AI-powered tool that transforms YouTube videos into deeply structured articles via yt-dlp + Google Gemini.

Language Versions

• English
• 繁體中文
• 简体中文
• 日本語

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At a Glance

What	How
Input	One or more YouTube URLs — supports messy paste (commas, spaces, line breaks)
Extract	Subtitle auto-detection with multi-language priority chain + VTT/SRT/JSON format fallback
Transform	Gemini Flash restructures spoken content into thematic blocks with H1/H2/H3 hierarchy
Output	Markdown — view, copy, or download in-browser
History	Last 50 conversions persisted locally, with delete support
UI	4 languages (TW, CN, EN, JA), auto-detect browser lang, 2 themes (dark/high-contrast), skeleton loading, unified toasts, tab keyboard nav, sticky header, time-grouped history, a11y-optimized

What's New

v3.5 (2026-05-02) — Complete UI/UX overhaul

• data-i18n attribute system: Replaced fragile DOM querySelector chain with data-i18n="key" — language switching now robust, fast, and scalable.
• Unified Toast system: Removed separate error display div. All notifications (info/success/error) use animated toasts with auto-dismiss progress bar + hover-pause.
• SVG icon replacement: All emoji (📝📜📄🔍📥🧹🤖) replaced with inline SVG icons — consistent rendering across platforms.
• Skeleton loading: Conversion area shows shimmer placeholders instead of blank space during processing.
• API key visibility toggle: Eye icon to show/hide the API key input.
• Tab keyboard navigation: Arrow keys, Home/End for multi-result tab switching with focus ring.
• Restructured config card: API Key, URL input, and language options in clearly separated sections.
• Sticky header with mobile language selector: Language picker moved to a sticky top bar, no longer overlaps content on mobile.
• Copy button feedback: Button turns green with "Copied ✓" for 1.5s after clicking.
• Back to top button: Floating button appears after scrolling 400px.
• Loading spinner: Convert button shows spinning animation + "Converting..." text while processing.
• Enter key submission: Press Enter in URL input to trigger conversion (no Ctrl needed).
• Theme system: 2 themes — Dark (default) and High Contrast. Persisted in localStorage.
• Time-grouped history: History organized as Today / Yesterday / This Week / Earlier.
• Auto-detect browser language: First visit automatically matches UI to navigator.language.
• Increased base font size: All text bumped up one size (xs→sm, sm→base, 10px→xs) for better readability.
• Download format selector removed: Simplified to single MD download button.

v3.4 (2026-05-01) — Resilient metadata extraction & cleanup

• Added retry for BrokenPipeError: --dump-json now has 3-attempt auto-retry with progressive backoff. Intermittent pipe breaks during large metadata downloads (118KB+) self-heal instead of failing.
• Guaranteed temp file cleanup: Moved cleanup into a finally block — no more leaked temp files on exceptions.
• Memory-efficient meta handling: Direct json.loads() on captured stdout instead of write-then-read-back.
• Unified run_with_retry(): All subprocess.run calls now go through a single retry wrapper — subtitle downloads also self-heal on pipe breaks.
• Wasted sleep removed: No more 3-second delay on terminal failures.

v3.3 (2026-05-01) — Subtitle extraction reliability

• Fixed BrokenPipeError: Replaced subprocess.run(stdout=open(...)) with capture_output=True to prevent [Errno 32] Broken pipe when yt-dlp outputs large JSON metadata.
• Fixed 429 batch failure: Added --ignore-errors to yt-dlp subtitle download. Previously, a single language returning HTTP 429 caused the entire batch to abort (return code 1, zero files on disk). Now successful languages proceed regardless.
• Language priority: Moved en to the front of the priority list — most videos are in English, and having en first minimizes the risk of auto-translated subtitle failures.

v3.2+ (Post-release improvements)

• Subtitle format expansion: Added SRT and JSON subtitle parsers alongside VTT. Automatically retries with --sub-langs all if the priority list fails.
• Custom confirm modal: Replaced native confirm() with a styled dark-theme modal (fade-in animation, backdrop click to dismiss).
• Deterministic progress bar: Realistic time-based simulation (fast start -> steady crawl -> capped at 85% until completion) instead of random number guessing.
• Inter font: Google Fonts-loaded Inter, paired with :root CSS custom properties for a consistent design system.
• Accessibility (a11y): aria-label, role="tab" + aria-selected, role="alert" on toasts, improved small-text contrast ratios.
• Mobile responsive: Language switcher repositions on small screens; action buttons with tighter padding.
• Copy feedback: Copy button briefly flashes green with "Copied" text before reverting.

How to Use

git clone https://github.com/lunkerchen/youtube-article-tool.git
cd youtube-article-tool
pip install yt-dlp fastapi uvicorn httpx python-multipart
export GEMINI_API_KEY="your-key-here"
bash start.sh
# Open http://127.0.0.1:8080

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English | 繁體中文 | 简体中文 | 日本語