[PLUGIN] YouTube for Volumio

patrickkfkan · January 18, 2020, 7:31am

lously:

hi Patrickkfkan,

I have been using your last plugin update and MPD patches since days after you posted them last month.
After I applied the MPD update patch the I can search youtube for anything and never get an error anymore when
selecting an item to play… GREAT! after the MPD update youtube 2/3 playback issue appears to be resolved
However after the MPD update I am experiencing the same issue as the last poster. I can select any youtube item
for playback without error. However I am only having about a 50% success rate on what will now playback. The item
goes into my queue and shows everything correct in the playback center circle as far as title and time but it never starts
playing. when I pause and restart playback it will not play. If I select further along in track it still will not play.

Your patches are still a big success in my opinion because anything that does playback always completes 100% of the track.
THANK YOU

I saw an earlier post in the thread last month that stated the youtube plugin was under in development for a complete rewrite
and anxiously await the outcome of that effort.

You asked the previous poster for a log entry so I took a snap of mine to show you what a failed playback looks like. log messages
indicate invalid youtube video error but that can’t be valid because you can select the same video in any browser and it plays back just fine.

Hope this will help satisfy your curiosity, and thanks again for all your time and effort put in on everyone’s behalf and enjoyment.

…

Hmm… Did the problem show up only recently or has been around all the time?

I’ll have a look into this. Could you confirm that the plugin you’re using is 20191224? I’m asking because the earlier versions could produce the error you’re seeing in the logs.

qrumba · January 18, 2020, 9:55am

Till now there is no Video I can play. Volumio gives the message “Playbck started” but it never starts to play.
Maybe someone can tell me a video qwhich is working with Volumio. Many of the tried videos worked well before!

qrumba · January 18, 2020, 10:00am

Where do I find the logs in Volumio?

patrickkfkan · January 18, 2020, 11:17am

You need to ssh into your Volumio device and then issue the command:

sudo journalctl -f

Are you using the latest version I have uploaded? It should be this one

joew · January 18, 2020, 11:59pm

patrickkfkan:

Hello,

This may come a bit late but I have made some changes to the YouTube plugin to allow specifying your own API credentials in the plugin settings.

The API key used by the official YouTube plugin is broken as of this writing, so you cannot access YouTube without first granting Volumio to your YouTube account. However, even after granting such access, sometimes the plugin fails with Quota Exceeded errors. This is because the quotas associated with the API credentials used by the official YouTube plugin have exceeded due to too many requests (the credentials are shared by all users of the plugin). It is therefore ideal to instruct the plugin to use your own API credentials, which would mean all quotas are reserved only for you (whether or not you grant access to your YouTube account). The attached plugin caters for this.

Before using the plugin, you need to create the credentials in your Google Developer Console as follows:

Go to your Google Developer Console

Create a Project (click ‘Select a Project’, then ‘New Project’).

On the left menu, choose Library, then enter “YouTube Data API v3” in the search box. In the search results, click on the API and enable it.

Then choose Credentials on the left menu. This is the place where you will create your API credentials.

Click ‘Create Credentials’, choose ‘API Key’. An API Key will be created and you can optionally choose to restrict it to the YouTube Data API v3.

Then click ‘Create Credentials’ again and choose ‘OAuth client ID’.

You will be asked to configure the consent screen, so let’s do that. On the configuration page:

Set Application name (e.g. volumio-youtube-your-username). This name will be shown during the process where you grant Volumio access to your YouTube account

Click ‘Add scope’, then check the box for ‘YouTube Data API v3 …/auth/youtube.readonly’

Click Save.

b

You will be brought back to the Create OAuth Client ID page. Choose ‘Other’ for Application type and provide a name (e.g. volumio-youtube-client). Click Create.

Done! You have just created the API credentials needed for YouTube access. On the Credentials page, you will see the API key and Client ID. The Client Secret can be obtained by clicking the Edit icon corresponding to the Client ID.

To install the plugin:

If you have the official YouTube plugin installed, you should uninstall it first, followed by a Volumio restart. To restart Volumio, you can enter the following in the console:
volumio@volumio:~$ volumio vrestart
Download the attached zip file and place it in your Volumio home directory (/home/volumio)

In Volumio console, enter the following:
volumio@volumio:~$ cd /home/volumio
volumio@volumio:~$ mkdir volumio_youtube_install
volumio@volumio:~$ cd volumio_youtube_install
volumio@volumio:~/volumio_youtube_install$ miniunzip ../<name of zip file downloaded>
volumio@volumio:~/volumio_youtube_install$ volumio plugin install
You can delete the volumio_youtube_install directory after installation is complete
volumio@volumio:~/volumio_youtube_install$ cd ..
volumio@volumio:~$ rm -rf volumio_youtube_install
Using the API credentials with our plugin:

Open Volumio web interface in your browser, go to Plugins->Installed Plugins and enable the YouTube plugin. Then click Settings.

The default is to use the credentials provided by the official YouTube plugin. To change that:

Under API Settings, turn off the ‘Default’ switch.

In the corresponding fields that appear, enter the API key, Client ID and Client secret you created in your Google Developer Console.

Click Save.

A dialog will appear reminding you to use new Code for granting Volumio access to your YouTube account.

Note the change in the Code shown under Account Access. You may have to wait up to 10 seconds to see the change.

Use the new Code for granting access to your YouTube account. The process is the same as with the official YouTube plugin. Note that you might get a “This app isn’t verified” warning in the process. This is normal since you haven’t gone through the Google verification step after creating the OAuth Client ID, but it is nonetheless safe to proceed by clicking ‘Advanced’ and 'Go to '.

If you change the API settings again, you will need to grant / regrant access with new Code.

Please feel free to test it and point out any issues or suggestions. If this works well then maybe this can be merged into the official plugin…

These instructions seemed to have worked for me. I’m using the youtube-20191224.zip version of your plugin, with a Raspberry Pi 3B & Hifiberry AMP2.

Possibly a stupid question, but I was expecting the video itself to play, should it? Or does the plugin just grab the audio stream?

Thanks

lously · January 19, 2020, 3:27am

Hi patrickkfkan,

I verified in my archive library that your latest plugin zip is what I used.
The MPD update tarfile was also archived.
I started to doubt myself after rereading your mpd update instructions.
Thought maybe I had not done that correctly, so I started completely over this morning.
Steps in the following order:

Used the save setting plugin and created my volumio_data.tgz file
Downloaded the latest rasPi Version 2.698 from volumio.org
Installed V2.698 onto a new SD card.
Copied three files onto new card
volumio_data.tgz youtube-20191224.zip and mpd-0.21.16.arm-20191228-3v3jy.tar.gz
Started up Pi with v2.698
Restored my settings
Rebooted
made sure afterwards I could play music from my usb stick and webradio favorites
Installed your 20191224 plugin
Rebooted
Installed your mpd-0.21.16 update
Rebooted
Activated youtube plugin… I did not have to reauthorize with google as all my keys were
restored from my archived settings

tested afterwards:

searched youtube just fine.
played 20 items from youtube that I had documented as not working and random others.
Everything works perfect now, audio plays full track 100% every time.

THANK YOU

You deserve a nice beverage at the very least for all your help.
Respond back if there is a way that I can buy you a Beer…

patrickkfkan · January 19, 2020, 7:01am

When you click on a video, the plugin fetches the audio stream and plays it. The video itself is not played - Volumio is strictly audio

huyen82 · January 19, 2020, 1:51pm

You must be in the wrong place
volumio plugin install
volumio vrestart

lously · January 19, 2020, 3:46pm

Hi patrickkfkan,

Day 2 and the plugin still working great.
I hit the 10,000 limit quota last night and as expected and verified in the log
search results stopped working.
I am monitoring my quota limit now and after only 9 searches I have over
15000+ queries logged for today. I have plugin limits set to 20 items per page,
timer 3600 and cache size 400. I don’t ever login to youtube website so all the search
categories, activities, subscriptions, have no relevance to me. I only use the plugin
for general youtube searches and playback something from the results.
I assume the reason for the high query count is because youtube returns so many
“suggested” hits for each search Item I try as well as its predictive behavior of returning
results with each character I type into the search box. Waiting to search until I finish typing
would be more desirable in my opinion.

Any suggestions on how I can change plugin or youtube user account settings or develop a
different search method to reduce the query volume?

thanks LouSly

lously · January 19, 2020, 3:55pm

sorry typo
9 searches produced over 1500+ queries

patrickkfkan · January 20, 2020, 7:35am

Hmm… interesting and definitely looks serious. Let me check.

DId you do the search inside the plugin, or in the top page of Volumio?

lously · January 20, 2020, 4:11pm

patrickkfkan,

Not sure I understand your inside the plugin reference?
I operate volumio only one way. I use chrome browser on my PC.
navigate and search this way.

browse
select youtube from homepage
type all searches in the box at top right corner of screen.

for example i typed this string into the search box

Townes Van Zandt Dollar Bill Blues

After I got the results google developer page shows my quota # increased by 102.

attachment is a screen shot of when I did the search.

thanks

patrickkfkan · January 20, 2020, 7:45pm

The quota increase of 102 is actually normal. From Google’s documentation on the API search function:

(For now, let’s not be concerned with the extra 2 units consumed - that could be due to retrieving extra info from YouTube)

As you navigate through the pages of the search results, extra units will be consumed for non-cached pages (~100 each time). Interestingly, the quota cost is the same whether you are returning 20 hits or 50 hits (the max allowed) per page.

Different operations such as viewing a playlist, fetching video metadata or, as in this case, performing a search will have different quota costs. Google provides a quota cost calculator to give you a rough estimate of what to expect for different operations.

As far as searching goes, Volumio delays for a short while before actually commencing the search. This is a global “feature” provided by Volumio itself (applies to all music service plugins). You are correct in pointing out that multiple requests could have been made to YouTube if you type too slowly. I tried typing a 20-character string into the search box at a slow-enough speed, and that resulted in the plugin making 3 requests and costing me ~300 quota units. So, if you have a long string to search, I suggest you copy and paste it into the search box instead of typing it in. I don’t know if it would be a good idea to modify the code of Volumio UI to prolong the search delay, as this would affect all the other plugins as well…

I wonder if I’ve missed anything crucial in my explanation. Also, I don’t quite get why Google refers to quota units as “queries” in their Quotas section…

qrumba · January 20, 2020, 11:45pm

Thankyou patrickkfkan, you gave me the right hints. I used vers. 20191110, which did not work. Now with vers. 20191224 (a Christmas present?) everything is perfect! Btw there was / is no log to read! How can I start logging?
Thankyou again for your great job and help!

lously · January 21, 2020, 4:31am

Hi patrickkfkan,

your explanation was terrific. Lots of good information shared.
I will check out that link to the calculator later this evening…

Thank You

dippes · January 21, 2020, 12:48pm

I also installed the last unofficial version youtube-20191224.zip and used my own Api.
Unfortunately youtube cannot find any content, what am I doing wrong?

patrickkfkan · January 21, 2020, 2:10pm

The screenshot looks normal to me. Seems you have granted access to your YouTube account.

What do you mean by YouTube cannot find any content? E.g. do you get errors when doing a search?

dippes · January 21, 2020, 2:44pm

Yes, I have access to my account.

When searching I don’t get an error message.

But content is not shown.

dippes · January 21, 2020, 3:20pm

hmm it seems to be due to my API key. I get error messages with every query.

What’s going wrong?

patrickkfkan · January 21, 2020, 3:54pm

What are those error messages?

[PLUGIN] YouTube for Volumio

Not sure I understand your inside the plugin reference? I operate volumio only one way. I use chrome browser on my PC. navigate and search this way.

Not sure I understand your inside the plugin reference?
I operate volumio only one way. I use chrome browser on my PC.
navigate and search this way.