siftlode/README.md

# Siftlode

**Your YouTube subscriptions, the way a feed should work.** Siftlode pulls every upload from the
channels you follow into one clean, filterable feed — no algorithm deciding what you see, and no
Shorts or livestream noise unless you want it. Self-hosted, multi-user, and private: your data
stays on your own server.

![Siftlode feed](frontend/public/welcome/feed.png)

Everything expensive (channels, videos, metadata) is fetched from YouTube once and stored locally,
so filtering, searching and sorting are instant and don't burn API quota. Click a video to watch it
in an in-app player that resumes where you left off — or open it on youtube.com so your own ad
blocker and SponsorBlock keep working.

## Features

- **A readable subscription feed** — sort and filter by channel, tag, language, topic, length,
  upload date or watch state; hide channels without unsubscribing; save filter setups as named views.
- **Search all of YouTube** from the feed — results play, save and add to playlists like any other
  video, and are materialised into your catalog.
- **Channel pages & a channel manager** — per-channel stats and uploads, priorities, and your own
  tags to slice the feed by.
- **Playlists with two-way YouTube sync** — build them locally, keep them in sync in both directions.
- **In-app player** with resume, plus keyboard/scroll controls.
- **Download Center** — save videos to the server with yt-dlp in a Plex-friendly layout (format
  presets, per-user storage quota), trim / crop / split & join them in a built-in editor, then save
  to your device, share with another user, or hand out a public watch link.
- **Multi-user** with per-user private state, a shared catalog, and a fair daily API-quota guard.
- **Self-hosted & private**, with a first-run web setup wizard and the interface in **English,
  Hungarian and German**.

## Quick start (self-hosting)

You don't need to build anything — Siftlode runs from a prebuilt public image, and all
configuration (your admin account, Google sign-in, email) happens in a **first-run web wizard**.
You need [Docker](https://docs.docker.com/get-docker/) with the Compose plugin.

**1. Get the files and run the installer:**

```sh
git clone https://forge.b1fr0st.eu/peter/siftlode.git
cd siftlode
./install.sh          # Windows (PowerShell):  ./install.ps1
```

The installer generates a private `.env` (secrets), pulls the image, starts the app + database, and
prints a one-time setup URL like `http://localhost:8080/setup?token=…`.

**2. Finish in your browser.** Open that URL and follow the wizard:

1. **Admin account** — the email + password you'll sign in with.
2. **Google sign-in** *(optional)* — paste a Google OAuth client to enable "Sign in with Google" and
   pulling your YouTube subscriptions. Skip it to use email + password only.
3. **Email / SMTP** *(optional)* — for verification/notification emails. Skip it and you (the admin)
   simply approve new accounts yourself.

Then sign in with your admin account. That's it. See **[docs/self-hosting.md](docs/self-hosting.md)**
for the full walkthrough.

> Just trying it out? Press Enter at the installer's URL prompt to run on `http://localhost:8080`.

## Build from source (alternative)

Prefer to build the image yourself instead of pulling it:

```sh
git clone https://forge.b1fr0st.eu/peter/siftlode.git
cd siftlode
cp .env.example .env
# generate the two secrets and paste them into .env:
python -c "import secrets;print('SECRET_KEY='+secrets.token_urlsafe(48))"
python -c "import base64,os;print('TOKEN_ENCRYPTION_KEY='+base64.urlsafe_b64encode(os.urandom(32)).decode())"
docker compose up --build -d      # builds from the included Dockerfile
```

Open `http://localhost:8080` and finish in the setup wizard as above. (Set a `POSTGRES_PASSWORD` in
`.env` too.)

## HTTPS / public access

Port `8080` over plain HTTP is fine for a LAN or a quick trial. For public access put a reverse
proxy (Caddy, Nginx, Traefik…) in front to terminate TLS, and set the **public URL** (the installer
prompt, or `OAUTH_REDIRECT_URL` in `.env`) to your `https://…` address — this also marks the session
cookie secure. Add that same `…/auth/callback` URL to your Google OAuth client's authorized redirect
URIs. Behind a proxy, also set `TRUSTED_PROXY_IPS` so the rate limiters see the real client IP and
can't be bypassed via a forged `X-Forwarded-For` — see [docs/self-hosting.md](docs/self-hosting.md#https--public-access).

## Updating & backups

```sh
docker compose -f docker-compose.selfhost.yml pull   # or: docker compose pull
docker compose -f docker-compose.selfhost.yml up -d
```

Database migrations run automatically on startup. Your data (accounts, subscriptions, playlists, the
video catalog) lives in a Postgres volume — back it up with `scripts/backup.sh` (or `backup.ps1` on
Windows) and restore with `scripts/restore.sh`.

## How it works

- **Shared catalog, private state.** Channels and videos are stored once and shared; each user's
  subscriptions, tags, playlists and watch/save/hide state are private.
- **Cheap by design.** Public reads are cached locally; a shared daily quota budget and a background
  scheduler keep unattended syncing within YouTube's free API limits. An optional API key lets
  backfill run without depending on a user's OAuth token.

## Tech

FastAPI + PostgreSQL (SQLAlchemy, Alembic) backend; React + Vite + Tailwind + TanStack Query
frontend; packaged as a single Docker image with Docker Compose.

## Note

This project is developed with AI assistance.