A Plex YouTube agent that works closely with yt-dlp info files and require no internet connection.

What is the required directory structure?

The required structure for the agent to work is the following

Channel/Playlist name [id]
- Channel/Playlist name [id].jpg
- Channel/Playlist name [id].info.json
- Season XXXX
-- YYYYMMDD title [id].mp4
-- YYYYMMDD title [id].jpg
-- YYYYMMDD title [id].info.json

The id can be in the following format [youtube-(id)] or [(id)]. This agent does not support multiple playlists in single parent directory. While the id is REQUIRED on the main channel/playlist directory, you can omit them for the video files themselves, however we suggest to keep them.

This agent only tested with the jp_scanner.py as a scanner.

How to download channel / play list info.json?

$ yt-dlp -I0 --write-info-json --write-thumbnail --convert-thumbnails jpg -o "%(title)s [%(id)s]/%(title).180B [%(id)s].%(ext)s" --paths /media/youtube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRF6lN9YOQrtDQCi-rOlP7g

Change /media/youtube to root of your YouTube library. And https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRF6lN9YOQrtDQCi-rOlP7g to the channel/playlist URL. You only need to do this once, However to get updated metadata/photo from the channel you need to run the command again. to replace the old data. and refresh metadata from plex.

What does this agent do differently compared to the other YouTube agents?

This local only agent, and as such it does not suffer from missing metadata if the video files are deleted from YouTube. I Also mainly developed this plugin to be in use with my other project arabcoders/watchstate. which is used to sync play state between media servers. And i have similar agent for both Jellyfin and Emby.

Video files naming?

This agent only cares about the info.json file, and the .jpg file. which should be named the same as the video file, However to get the scanner to work and have best results. The files should be in the following naming format YYYYMMDD title [id] with both info.json and .jpg file. which is somewhat is required for jp_scanner.py to work. You can use the following command which i personally use

$ yt-dlp -I0 --write-info-json --write-thumbnail --convert-thumbnails jpg -o "%(title)s [%(id)s]/Season %(release_date>%Y,upload_date>%Y|Unknown)s/%(release_date>%Y%m%d,upload_date>%Y%m%d)s - %(title).180B [%(extractor)s-%(id)s].%(ext)s" --paths /media/youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_pVmR_0p0E

Or simply use YTPTube which has pre-made preset to work with this agent.

Is other photo extensions supported?

Yes, the following format are supported. ".jpg", ".jpeg", ".webp", ".png", ".tiff", ".gif", ".jp2".

Installation

This agent has been tested to work with the jp_scanner.py only. Check the page out for installation instructions. The agent probably should still be able to work with the default scanner, but i have not tested it and i have no plans to support other scanners.

1. Go to the release page and download latest version.
2. Unzip the file and rename the main directory to be ytinforeader.bundle Make sure the Contents directory is directly underneath ytinforeader.bundle.
3. Move the folder into the "Plug-ins" folder in your Plex Media Server installation (Wait where?)
4. Create a new (or update an existing) library and select "TV Show"
5. Click on the "Advanced" tab and select
   1. Scanner: jp_scanner
   2. Agent: yt-dlp info reader agent.

Now you are done. At first Plex will scan for all the files, when this is done the agent will attempt to find the metadata associated with the videos.