The Plex watch import inserted plex_states via per-row ORM add against a pre-read 'existing' set,
which is not safe when the enable call fires more than once while the multi-second import runs (the
toggle wasn't disabled during it): overlapping imports raced to INSERT the same (user_id, item_id)
rows and all but the first hit a UniqueViolation -> 500 (seen on prod). Rewrite the write path as a
chunked PostgreSQL UPSERT (on_conflict_do_update, rows de-duped by item_id) — idempotent and
concurrency-safe, Plex still wins on the intersection and Siftlode-only states are untouched.
Also disable the Settings toggle (and ignore its onChange) while a sync mutation is pending, so it
can't be fired repeatedly; adds a reusable 'disabled' prop to the Switch primitive.
Plex records watch state per Plex account; Siftlode per user in plex_states. A new plex_link table
maps a Siftlode user to a Plex account; for the owner (MVP) the row uses the server admin token
(uses_admin=True), so no separate Plex login. app/plex/watch_sync.py reads the owner account's
viewCount/viewOffset/lastViewedAt (already present in the catalog mirror's section listing) and
upserts them into the owner's plex_states — 'Plex is master' on this first import, but only where
Plex has a watch record (Siftlode-only states are preserved; union on the intersection). Idempotent.
Admin routes: GET/POST /api/plex/watch/link (status + enable/disable; first enable runs the import)
and POST /api/plex/watch/import (re-run). Migration 0051_plex_link. Two-way push (Phase B) and the
incremental Plex→Siftlode reconcile (Phase C) build on this in later ships.
The YouTubeClient issued httpx requests directly, so a network/transport
failure (egress proxy unreachable, DNS, timeout, connection reset) escaped
as a raw httpx.ConnectError. Callers only guard against YouTubeError, so such
a fault propagated uncaught and surfaced as a 500 — e.g. opening an
un-enriched channel's page (GET /api/channels/{id} lazily enriches About
data) popped a blocking "Server error (500)" modal whenever the fixed-IP
egress proxy was down.
Route all client HTTP through a _send() helper that wraps httpx.HTTPError in
YouTubeError, so every existing 'except YouTubeError' degrades gracefully:
channel detail returns un-enriched (200), explore returns 422 (quiet), and
scheduler jobs log-and-continue instead of crashing.
- Multi-audio items now ship every audio track as an HLS rendition in one session
(stream.py var_stream_map -> master.m3u8), so hls.js switches audio CLIENT-SIDE with
no ffmpeg restart, same timeline, no gap/drift. /session gains ?multi=1 (forces HLS
even for direct-playable multi-audio files); K is probed from the video variant seg.
- Restore the selected audio track on AUDIO_TRACKS_UPDATED, not MANIFEST_PARSED (the
renditions aren't parsed yet on MANIFEST_PARSED, so the set was dropped -> after F5 the
UI showed the restored track but playback stayed on the default).
- Resume position now survives F5: a pagehide keepalive beacon (plexProgressBeacon)
saves the current position on reload/close/navigate, since React effect cleanup does
not run on a full reload; seekTo writes the target into absRef immediately so a save
right after a seek is accurate.
Streaming / subtitle sync (the core fix):
- stream.py: add -copyts so HLS segments carry the true absolute PTS, and measure
the real keyframe start K from seg_0 (ffprobe) -> return it as the session start.
Fixes the seconds-long subtitle lead caused by using the requested seek offset
instead of the keyframe ffmpeg actually lands on with video stream-copy.
- Add -noaccurate_seek so the re-encoded audio starts at the same keyframe as the
video (was starting (X-K)s later -> seconds of silence after each seek/audio switch).
- Compensate the fixed ~1.0s lag hls.js introduces for non-zero-start copyts streams,
folded into the session start so the clock, seeking and the subtitle shift are all
content-accurate.
- /subtitle gains an offset param; _shift_vtt shifts absolute cues onto the session's
zero-based clock and DROPS fully-past cue blocks (collapsing them to 0->0 made every
past cue active at currentTime 0 on resume -> a pile-up until playback advanced).
Audio:
- /session + stream.py gain an audio A/V-sync offset (-itsoffset, full +/-, second
input only when non-zero).
Player settings & personalization (per-account, persisted -> survive F5):
- storage.ts: useAccountPersistedObject (per-account JSON prefs blob).
- PlexPlayer: volume/mute, audio+subtitle language (index-based match, fixes the F5
audio-revert), sync offsets, seek steps, subtitle style, auto-hide, play intent.
- Hotkeys A (cycle audio) / S (cycle subtitle), mouse-wheel volume, Ctrl+arrow fine
seek, per-user plain/fine seek-step + auto-hide toggle.
- Subtitle appearance: size / colour / vertical position / background via ::cue + line.
- UI: split into a Tracks quick-menu + a tabbed gear panel (Sync | Playback | Subtitle);
both dismiss on outside-click; edge-aware control tooltips.
- i18n en/hu/de for all new strings.
A remote thumbnail as og:image is unreliable for the crawler — Facebook's signed
CDN URL expires (so an old shared link's image later vanishes) and cross-origin
hotlinking is flaky. Record a self-hosted poster for EVERY download (ensure_poster
returns the existing <base>.jpg thumbnail sidecar, or cuts a frame) and point
og:image at our own /api/public/watch/{token}/poster.jpg. Backfill now fills
poster_path for all existing downloads, not just thumbnail-less ones.
Two visual gaps for non-catalog downloads:
- Channel link: YouTube already exposes channel_url; Facebook exposes none but a
numeric uploader_id that resolves at facebook.com/<id>. `_uploader_url` derives
it so the auto-detected channel renders as a real clickable link.
- Poster: a source with no thumbnail (e.g. a direct reddit HLS URL) showed a
blank image box. The worker now cuts a representative frame with ffmpeg
(`ensure_poster`) into the `<base>.jpg` sidecar and records `poster_path`
(migration 0050). The card, the public watch page (<video poster> + og:image),
and link previews fall back to it via new authed + public poster endpoints.
Adds `app.downloads.backfill` (one-off, re-run-safe) to fill uploader_url
(re-extract YouTube/Facebook metadata) and posters for pre-existing downloads.
A download whose source title exceeded 255 chars (e.g. a recipe baked into a
Facebook video's title) failed with a StringDataRightTruncation: the worker
auto-fills an empty display_name from the title, which overflows the 255-char
column. Clip the title to 255 at every point it flows into display_name (worker
completion paths + enqueue); the full title is untouched on the asset. Pre-existing
latent bug, surfaced by an unusually long title.
Release v0.31.1.
A shared /watch/{token} link is a client-rendered SPA, so a social crawler only
saw the generic index.html — a blank link card. The server now injects per-video
Open Graph / Twitter tags (title, channel, thumbnail) into the served HTML for
that route, so links unfurl richly in Messenger and other chat apps; real
browsers ignore the extra tags and hydrate the page as usual. Password /
expired / invalid links fall back to the generic card with no metadata leak.
Also shortens the generic site description used for search engines and link
previews.
The edit (pencil) action now edits a download's full display metadata — title,
channel name, channel link and any number of extra reference URLs — instead of
just the name. The channel and links render as clickable links on the library
card, and the channel link is auto-filled from the source (yt-dlp channel_url)
when available. Shared watch pages resolve the same per-download overrides, so a
rename/channel/link edit is reflected on the public /watch page too, with every
link clickable.
Adds migration 0049 (media_assets.uploader_url; download_jobs.display_uploader,
display_uploader_url, extra_links) and generalizes the rename endpoint into a
metadata update with URL validation. EN/HU/DE strings included.
Add POST /playlists/{id}/items/bulk and /items/remove-bulk so a whole
season or show can be added/removed in one call (input order preserved,
duplicates skipped). Extend GET /playlists with contains_group=<rk,rk,…>
returning per-playlist group_in + a top-level group_size for the bulk
add-to-playlist dialog. Include the show's rating_key (show_id) on
playlist episode cards so the client can group a playlist by show/season.
Personal ordered lists of Plex items, kept in Siftlode's own DB (works for users
without a Plex account, like watch-state) — the "your own lists" counterpart to
shared collections. Plex-direction sync is a later phase (plex_rating_key
reserved).
Backend: migration 0048 (plex_playlists + plex_playlist_items with position),
PlexPlaylist/PlexPlaylistItem models, and per-user CRUD endpoints under
/api/plex/playlists (list [+?contains for the add dialog], create [seeded],
detail [ordered cards], rename, delete, add/remove item, reorder). _leaf_card
handles the movie/episode mix. Frontend: "Add to playlist" dialog from the movie
info page (all users), a Playlists section in PlexSidebar (list + create),
PlexPlaylistView (reorder up/down, remove, rename, delete, Play all), and
PlexPlayer gained an optional `queue` so play-through follows the list order
(prev/next + auto-advance). i18n en/hu/de. Verified end-to-end on localdev
(backend CRUD + the create→add→view→play-through UI flow).
Admins can curate Plex collections from a movie's info page ("Collections"
button → PlexCollectionEditor dialog): create a collection (seeded with the
movie), add/remove the movie to/from editable collections, delete a collection,
and "take over" an existing plain Plex collection (mark it editable). All writes
go to Plex (POST/PUT/DELETE via new PlexClient methods) and are reflected on
every client; a targeted single-collection re-sync (sync.resync_collection /
delete_collection_local) updates the local mirror without the full ~4-min sync.
Gating (per the design decisions): editing is ADMIN-ONLY (collections are shared
library-wide); only plain manual collections are editable — smart + external
auto-lists (IMDb/TMDb/…) are always read-only (can_edit = editable && !smart &&
source=="collection"). New admin endpoints under /api/plex/collections
(create/items add+remove/rename/delete/editable). Verified end-to-end incl. the
live Plex write API (create/add/rename/remove/delete all 200, self-cleaned) and
the editor UI (create + delete with confirm) on localdev.
Selecting a subtitle restarted the HLS session with `-map 0:s:{ord}`, assuming an
EMBEDDED stream. Films whose subs are external sidecar .srt files (Plex reports
them, but they aren't in the mkv) matched no stream; the master-playlist's
declared subtitle group then made ffmpeg fail → "Playback couldn't start".
Subtitles now go through a new GET /api/plex/subtitle/{rk}/{ord} → text/vtt
(external subs fetched from Plex via the stream key + SRT→VTT; embedded text subs
extracted with ffmpeg; image subs → 415), served as native <video><track> that
the browser overlays. So choosing/switching a subtitle is instant with NO session
restart, and stream.py drops all subtitle muxing (`-sn`, no master playlist).
Image-based subs (PGS/VobSub) are marked text=false and hidden in the picker.
Verified on prod's Nymphomaniac Vol. II: HU sidecar → 1693 WebVTT cues, no crash.
Posters/art were proxied at full resolution (many 1-7MB, some 9.5MB) into ≤176px
grid/info cells — heavy to fetch + decode, so fast scrolling lagged 1-2s even
with a warm cache (the cache removed the Plex round-trip, not the image weight).
Now PlexClient.image_bytes optionally hits Plex's /photo/:/transcode to resize
server-side; the /image endpoint requests thumb=400x600, art=1280x720 and keys
the cache by width (old full-size files orphaned, re-cached small). Measured:
a poster 5.5MB->50KB, art 8.1MB->137KB, at 400x600 (crisp on 2x DPR). Grid
scroll is near-instant and the disk cache shrinks ~8x.
A collections page fires 100+ concurrent poster requests. Both image proxies
(/image and /person-image) authenticated via current_user + Depends(get_db),
holding a pooled DB connection for the whole request — including the slow Plex/
CDN fetch. Under the burst, the 15-connection pool was exhausted → QueuePool
checkout timeouts → 502s → slow, partially-loaded grids on prod.
Fix: authenticate these two high-fan-out endpoints with a signed-session check
(no DB user-load), serve disk-cache hits with zero DB access, and on a cold miss
open a short session only to resolve the image key + Plex config, releasing it
BEFORE the fetch (image_bytes uses no DB). Also raise the pool (20 + 30 overflow)
as headroom above the sync-endpoint threadpool.
Derive a `source` bucket per collection from the already-synced title + smart
flag (no schema change, no re-sync): external list providers (IMDb/TMDb/TVDb/
Trakt) by leading token, Plex smart lists via the smart flag, everything else a
genuine "collection". Returned on each info-page collection strip so the client
can show/hide each type independently. Adds the stripSource labels (en/hu/de).
Backend (migration 0047_plex_collections): a plex_collections table mirrors every Plex
collection (card metadata + smart flag + an editable flag reserved for Phase 2); membership
is stored as GIN-indexed collection_keys on member movies (plex_items) and shows (plex_shows).
The background sync (plex_sync) now fetches each library's collections + their children and
rebuilds membership — so ALL reads are local (Plex's dual-language collection queries are slow;
this trades a ~4-min background sync for instant reads). New /api/plex/collections endpoint;
/browse gains a combinable filter; item_detail returns the movie's collection
'strips' (sibling titles as playable cards, smallest/most-specific collection first) — all pure
local lookups.
Frontend: PlexSidebar gains a searchable Collection picker + an active-collection chip;
PlexInfo renders the collection strips (playable posters + 'Browse collection' → sets the
filter); the collection is part of PlexFilters (persisted). i18n en/hu/de.
Phase 2 (create/edit collections with write-back to Plex) is separate.
Backend (migration 0046_plex_people_search): a new people_text column (cast +
director names, de-duped) is folded into the generated search_vector at weight B,
so the top search box finds titles by an actor/director name and ranks them above
summary-only mentions. New /api/plex/people endpoint returns the cast/crew matching
the term (name prefix or word-start) with a film count + a headshot (pulled from one
representative film's live metadata; image bytes disk-cached).
Frontend: PlexBrowse shows matching people as virtual cards above the grid; clicking
one adds them to the actor/director filter (multi-value, from the C1 work) and clears
the search box so you land on exactly that person's films. Answers the 'why does
"drew" match Rambo?' confusion — it was matching the word in the synopsis; now names
are searchable. i18n en/hu/de.
⚠️ Prod needs a Plex re-sync after deploy to populate people_text (search_vector
regenerates automatically once the column has data).
UAT follow-ups on the Plex filter epic:
- Sort now has an asc/desc toggle (sort_dir), applied to any sort field.
- Genre multi-select gains an Any/All mode (genre_mode: OR vs AND containment).
- Director/actor/studio become multi-value: people AND (titles featuring all selected),
studios OR; clicking them on the info page stacks (unions) instead of replacing, and
the sidebar shows each as a removable 'Active' chip.
- fix(history): clicking a metadata filter on the info page now pushes a fresh grid
entry instead of history.back(), so browser Back returns to the info page rather than
leaving the Plex module.
- fix(player): fully tear down the <video> + hls on unmount and guard late play() calls,
so backing out of a just-started video no longer leaves audio playing in the background.
i18n en/hu/de (match any/all, sort direction).
Backend (migration 0045_plex_filter_meta): plex_items gains rating (audienceRating
~IMDb), content_rating, studio, originally_available_at, and GIN-indexed genres /
directors / cast_names — all mirrored from the cheap section listing (no per-item API
calls; they also seed a future watch-habit recommender). /browse gains genre / content-
rating / year / rating / duration / added-within / director / actor / studio filters
(@> containment, GIN) + sort by year|rating|duration|release; new /facets endpoint
returns available genres+ratings (with counts) and the year/rating/duration bounds. A
thin on-disk image cache (.plex-img-cache) serves posters/art/cast photos from local
disk after first fetch (~7-14x faster repeat loads).
Frontend: PlexSidebar grows the full filter set (facet-driven genre/age chips, rating
steps, year range inputs, duration buckets, added-within, active people/studio chips,
clear-all); filters persist per-account as one JSON blob. PlexInfo metadata (year,
genre, director, cast, studio, IMDb score) is clickable → sets the matching filter and
returns to the filtered grid (page variant only; the in-player overlay stays read-only
so a stray click can't stop playback). i18n en/hu/de.
Backend (no migration): item_detail now also returns IMDb score + id/url (from the
Plex Rating/Guid arrays), content rating, genres, director(s), studio, tagline, and
cast as {name, role, photo}. New host-whitelisted /person-image proxy serves cast
photos from Plex's public metadata CDN (keeps third-party requests off the browser).
Frontend: reusable PlexInfo component in two forms — a full info page opened from a
card's 'i' button (history subview, art backdrop, Play/Resume + watch controls) and a
lean overlay in the player toggled with 'I' (video keeps playing). Two per-user view
prefs (faint backdrop, cast row) persisted in preferences. Mark-unwatched / clear-resume
cover the watched-reset gap. i18n en/hu/de.
Extend admin POST /api/plex/test to resolve one real media file through the
local mount (a mirrored sample, else a single leaf fetched from Plex) and report
whether it is readable. A missing media bind-mount or a wrong plex_path_map is
now caught at Test time rather than only surfacing later as a dead player.
Backend: item detail returns audio_streams + subtitle_streams (from Plex Part.Stream
ordinals). The HLS session accepts audio/subtitle stream ordinals — the selected audio
is mapped (transcoded to AAC), a selected subtitle is muxed in as a WebVTT rendition
via a MASTER playlist (-master_pl_name + -var_stream_map sgroup:subs) so ffmpeg keeps
it in sync per-session. Selecting a track forces the HLS path (even for direct files).
Generic /stream/{rk}/hls/{filename} endpoint serves the master/media/vtt/ts artifacts.
Frontend: gear menu lists real audio + subtitle tracks; changing one restarts the
session at the current position (seek-restart mechanism). hls.js subtitle enabled on
SUBTITLE_TRACKS_UPDATED (not just MANIFEST_PARSED, else the VTT is never fetched).
Cues auto-nudged to line 88% (the full-height <video> clips a default bottom-edge cue).
Controls no longer auto-hide while the menu is open. plex.player.* i18n en/hu/de.
Verified in a real browser (2 Broke Girls S1E1, 2 audio + 2 subs): menu shows the real
tracks, enabling English subtitles renders them correctly positioned; backend master
playlist + vtt segments validated over HTTP.
- Player: control tooltips now open ABOVE the button (no downward viewport clip);
keyboard use also reveals the auto-hidden controls (wake() on keydown); added a
Download button that downloads the ORIGINAL physical file (no re-encode/repackage,
Content-Disposition attachment via GET /stream/{rk}/file?download=1).
- Plex cards: hover affordance shows what a click does (Play / Resume / Open show)
+ a quick watched/unwatched toggle (stopPropagation, no playback) — mirrors the
YT-feed card quick-actions. New plex i18n keys en/hu/de.
- Verified in a real browser: card hover Play overlay + watched toggle (marks watched
without opening), player download button present, tooltip-above, keyboard reveals
controls, correct durations (Enola Holmes 3 = 1:48:04).
- NOTE: 'The Three Diablos' showing 13:05 was NOT a bug — it is a 13-min short (file
ffprobe = 785s); the 1h42m film is 'The Last Wish'.
- backend: GET /api/plex/item/{rk} detail (metadata, cast + intro/credit markers
from Plex, episode prev/next, per-user resume+status); POST /item/{rk}/progress
(resume checkpoint, near-end→watched) + /state (new|watched|hidden).
- frontend PlexPlayer.tsx (lazy, pulls hls.js): full-page player over the Plex
module. Direct files stream raw <video>; remux via hls.js on the seek-restart
session — custom controls map the ABSOLUTE timeline over the session offset, and a
seek beyond the loaded region restarts the session at the target. Play/pause/resume
/restart, ±10s seek, prev/next episode (Shift+←/→), volume, windowed/fullscreen,
full keyboard, Skip intro/Skip credits from markers (shaded on the seekbar),
auto-advance + watched-on-end, resume from saved position, 10s progress checkpoints.
- PlexBrowse: card/episode click opens the player as a history subview (browser Back
returns to the grid/show). api client (plexItem/plexSession/plexProgress/plexSetState)
+ types; plex.player.* i18n en/hu/de. hls.js@^1.6.16.
- Verified over HTTP: detail w/ markers+cast+episode-nav, progress persist. Video
playback itself is pending browser UAT. Subtitle/audio track SELECTION deferred.
Validated end-to-end on a real remux file (h264+ac3 mkv). The riskiest part of the
Plex epic — on-the-fly playback from the local file — now proven.
- app/plex/stream.py: seek-restart HLS session model (one ffmpeg per item, restarted
at a seek offset via -ss). Video stream-COPY (I/O-bound, CPU-light — fine on the
GPU-less prod host) + audio→aac only when not already aac. Maps first video+audio,
drops subtitles (no VTT rendition clutter). Session cap + idle reaper.
- routes: POST /stream/{rk}/session?start= (direct→raw url, remux→HLS session,
transcode→501 P3), GET /stream/{rk}/file (206 range, direct), /index.m3u8, /seg_n.ts.
- KEY FINDINGS (hard-won): (1) ffmpeg -hls_playlist_type VOD does NOT write the
playlist mid-run (only at finalize) → use EVENT (append-only, appears immediately),
which suits the seek-restart model; (2) naive per-segment copy + keyframe-indexed
extraction are both unreliable (non-uniform/imprecise segments) — ffmpeg's own HLS
muxer is the only correct segmenter; (3) dev slowness was the Windows /downloads
bind-mount write + SMB read → PLEX_HLS_DIR env points scratch at fast container-local
/var/tmp on dev (prod keeps download_root, fast local disk).
Per user feedback: promote Plex from a hidden feed-Source option to a first-class
left-nav module, with its own filter sidebar and the shared top search box.
- Plex is now a nav-rail module (page='plex', gated on me.plex_enabled) — its own
page → correct browser Back/Forward; removed the Feed Source-dropdown 'plex' hack.
- PlexSidebar.tsx: left filter column (library scope, watch-state for movies:
all/unwatched/in_progress/watched, sort) — per-account persisted (App state).
- Header search box now also serves the Plex page (integrated search); the live
YouTube-search escalation stays feed-only.
- PlexBrowse.tsx reworked: infinite scroll (IntersectionObserver, no 'Load more'),
content-visibility for smoother long-list scroll, show drill-down rides history
(useHistorySubview) so Back returns to the grid; dropped the stray 'YouTube feed'
button on the show page.
- backend /browse gains a per-user watch-state filter (show=, movies only).
- plex i18n (navLabel + filter.*) en/hu/de.
Note: episode-title 'Episode N' on some shows (e.g. Westworld) is Plex-side
(unmatched show) — we mirror what Plex has; Match/Refresh in Plex + re-sync fixes it.
- PlexBrowse.tsx: self-contained Plex mode (library scope tabs, own search +
sort, poster-card grid with watch state + playability tint, paged; show →
seasons/episodes drill-down). Playback announces (P2 wires the real player).
- Feed source dropdown gains a 'Plex' option (gated on me.plex_enabled); App
swaps <Feed> for <PlexBrowse> when librarySource==='plex' so the video-feed
hooks don't run in Plex mode. me exposes plex_enabled.
- api client (plexLibraries/plexBrowse/plexShow/plexImageUrl) + types; librarySource
union + share-URL restore gain 'plex'; new plex i18n namespace en/hu/de.
- Verified over HTTP (authed): libraries, browse+FTS, image proxy 200 image/jpeg.
- app/plex/sync.py: full reconcile of enabled movie/show sections into plex_*
(upsert by rating_key). Reuses Plex's own codec info to classify browser
playability (direct/remux/transcode) — no ffprobe. Movies + episodes become
playable leaves; shows/seasons mirrored for the drill-down.
- routes/plex.py: GET /libraries, /browse (FTS search + sort + paging, movie
leaves or show cards), /show/{rk} (seasons+episodes, per-user state), /image
(proxies Plex art, no duplication); admin POST /sync. All auth'd, demo-allowed.
- scheduler: plex_sync job (interval settings.plex_sync_interval_min).
- Verified against the real server: 2 libs, 3206 movies, 260 shows/961 seasons/
14768 episodes synced in 13s; FTS search + drill-down work. Playability:
~1% direct, 89% remux, 6% transcode (informs P2/P3).
Every download now records the clean source page URL and shows it on the
Downloads page (open in a new tab, or copy to clipboard). The worker stores
yt-dlp's canonical webpage_url on the asset (migration 0043 adds
media_assets.source_webpage_url); the serializer prefers it and falls back to a
URL derived from source_kind+source_ref, so YouTube, external YouTube links and
external URLs (e.g. Facebook reels) all get a correct reference, and queued/older
rows work before the worker fills it. Edit clips return null (a clip's source is
the user's own earlier download, not a web page). i18n en/hu/de.
The logged-out landing probed /api/me, which 401'd, and the browser logs every
non-2xx fetch as a console error regardless of how the app handles it. The
bootstrap probe now returns 200 with {authenticated:false} via a new
optional_current_user dependency; api.me() maps that to null. The render gate
treats no-data as 'signed out' -> the landing, and a thrown error as a real
network/5xx failure. Other protected endpoints still 401, so mid-session expiry
is still caught by the global handler. Lighthouse (dev): Best Practices 96->100.
The 3 landing screenshots were 2.3 MB of PNG (feed.png alone 1.6 MB, decoded
at 2400x1350 for a ~400px slot) — the biggest LCP/transfer cost on the public
page. Re-encoded to WebP capped at 1600px (~284 KB total, feed 91% smaller).
Also set Cache-Control: content-hashed /assets/* are immutable for a year,
other SPA-root static files (welcome images, favicon, robots) get a 7-day TTL;
index.html stays no-cache. Register image/webp+avif mimetypes so FileResponse
serves the right Content-Type. Lighthouse (dev): Perf 80->93, LCP 1.8s->1.2s.
mp4 downloads used yt-dlp's default best video+audio, which on YouTube is
VP9+Opus at 1080p. Chromium plays that, but iOS/Safari WebKit (which every
iOS browser is forced to use) decodes only H.264/H.265+AAC inside mp4 — so a
shared /watch link showed a broken player on iPhone/iPad while the download
still worked. Rank vcodec:h264 + acodec:aac above resolution for mp4 output
(unless a custom profile pins a vcodec), keeping VP9/AV1 as a graceful
fallback. Bump the format signature (v2) so an identical spec gets a fresh
cache identity instead of hitting a stale VP9 asset.
The worker and API start in parallel; the API applies migrations on its own startup, so on a fresh
deploy the worker hit a missing download_jobs table and crash-looped until migrations landed. The
worker now polls for the schema before recovering orphans, and (belt-and-suspenders) the compose
files gate it on the API being healthy. Fixes the observed prod restart-loop on the v0.22.0 deploy.
A shared-with-me item only had a download button. Add two actions (Share is intentionally NOT
offered — no chain re-sharing of someone else's file):
- Edit: the editor now accepts an accessible (owned OR shared) source, so editing a shared video
produces the editor's OWN clip in their library (counts against their quota, fully theirs
including share); the source file is only read. Route uses _accessible_job.
- Remove from my list: DELETE /api/downloads/shared/{job_id} deletes only the recipient's share
grant — the owner's job and physical file are untouched (per-user dismissal).
i18n en/hu/de. Verified in a real browser (edit a shared 70-min video → own 2:31 clip; remove
confirm shows 'won't delete the owner's file').
Share a download by a capability URL (/watch/{token}) that anyone can play on a login-free page —
distinct from the registered-user ACL share. Per-link controls: optional expiry, allow-download
toggle (stream-only vs downloadable), optional argon2 password. Revoke = delete.
- migration 0042 + DownloadLink model; app/downloads/links.py (token, HMAC grant sign/verify)
- owner endpoints (POST/GET/PATCH/DELETE links) + /recipients for the internal user picker
- public router (no auth): watch meta / password unlock→signed grant / range-aware file serve
(inline vs attachment); unlock is rate-limited; meta verifies the file exists on disk
Verified end-to-end: 206 range, inline vs attachment, wrong-password 403, tampered-grant 403.
Editor v2 backend: an edit_spec can carry a 'segments' cut-list that concatenates the kept
ranges into ONE file (accurate=filter_complex trim+concat re-encode; fast=concat-demuxer
stream-copy with per-segment inpoint/outpoint). normalize/edit_sig/clip_duration/needs_reencode
handle segments; worker writes the concat list + runs build_concat_plan. Single-trim path (used by
'separate files' export) unchanged.
YouTube returns flaky per-client responses: the web clients intermittently mislabel normal
videos as 'DRM protected' (like tv did), and android_vr can get bot-flagged under heavy load.
Neither client alone is reliable. So:
- PRIMARY player client = android_vr: high-quality DASH (399+251), no PO token / Deno needed,
reliable for normal use
- on a bot/DRM/format failure the worker retries with the FALLBACK set (web_safari,web,android
+ POT sidecar + Deno) — bypasses bot-detection when android_vr is flagged
- both client sets admin-tunable (DOWNLOAD_PLAYER_CLIENTS[_FALLBACK])
Verified: the previously DRM-failing video now downloads steadily via android_vr, no DRM error.
The web player clients need two things beyond the PO token: (1) a JavaScript runtime for
YouTube's 'n' signature challenge — install Deno (v2.9.1) + yt-dlp[default] (bundles yt-dlp-ejs
solver scripts); auto-detected on PATH. (2) an audio source — the web clients only expose
video-only DASH, so add the 'android' client (also PO-token-backed) for audio/muxed formats.
Player clients: web_safari,web,android (dropped tv — it falsely reports normal videos as DRM).
End-to-end verified in the worker: extraction (POT + Deno n-challenge) + download completes,
no bot/DRM/format errors. Full YouTube stack now: force-ipv4 + bgutil POT sidecar + Deno.
YouTube increasingly demands a Proof-of-Origin token (or shows 'confirm you're not a bot').
Instead of manual cookies, run the bgutil POT provider as a sidecar that mints tokens on demand:
- compose: bgutil-pot service (brainicism/bgutil-ytdlp-pot-provider:1.3.1, port 4416, init)
- requirements: bgutil-ytdlp-pot-provider==1.3.1 plugin (version pinned to the image)
- config: DOWNLOAD_POT_BASE_URL (http://bgutil-pot:4416) + DOWNLOAD_PLAYER_CLIENTS
(web_safari,web,tv — POT-capable; the default android_vr client never requests a token)
- formats.build_ydl_opts wires extractor_args youtube:player_client + youtubepot-bgutilhttp:base_url
Verified: the sidecar mints a valid PO token (BotGuard challenge solved) and yt-dlp fetches it
from the provider. NOTE: end-to-end download couldn't be confirmed here because the test IP got
hard-flagged by YouTube from heavy testing (~16 GB + dozens of extractions) — a hard abuse block
needs cooldown/cookies, which POT doesn't lift; POT bypasses the normal soft bot-check.
Embedding (thumbnail/chapters) rewrote the whole file — a 10 GB video spent minutes making a
10 GB temp copy — while the Plex .nfo + poster sidecars already carry that metadata. So:
- builtin presets no longer embed (migration 0040 re-seeds them; formats._DEFAULTS embed off);
only the tiny FFmpegThumbnailsConvertor (for poster.jpg) remains, so downloads go
video -> audio -> merge -> done with no full-file rewrite
- default preset is now 1080p (Best stays available, second in the list) so a long video
doesn't silently pull ~10 GB and blow the quota
Users who want self-contained files can enable embedding in a custom profile.
ffmpeg post-steps have no byte-progress, so instead of a silent 'Processing' the row now names
the current step (Merging / Extracting audio / Embedding thumbnail / Removing sponsors / Writing
metadata) with an indeterminate pulse. Byte-progress phases (video/audio) keep the % bar.
i18n en/hu/de.
Root cause of the failing downloads: containers usually have no working IPv6 route, but
googlevideo CDN hosts advertise AAAA records, so the downloader tried IPv6 and failed with
'[Errno -5] No address associated with hostname'. Small clips happened to use IPv4; long videos
(more CDN requests / the ffmpeg path) hit IPv6 and died.
- yt-dlp source_address=0.0.0.0 forces IPv4 for every connection (== --force-ipv4). Verified: the
full video+audio download completes cleanly.
- Also: retry (resume) now resets the shared asset from 'error' to 'pending', so it actually
re-downloads — previously the requeued job instantly re-inherited the asset's stale error
because the worker short-circuits a job whose asset already errored.
- Dropped the localdev DNS override (wrong hypothesis; the issue was IPv6, not the resolver).
- Kept yt-dlp retries/fragment_retries/socket_timeout for transient blips.
Verified end-to-end in the worker: two previously-failing long videos now download to done.
_insert_stubs previously stored the raw title, so a brand-new video showed its unnormalized
title until enrichment caught up. Normalize (and stash original_title) at insert as well, so
every video-title write path is covered: stub insert, enrichment, live search, and the download
worker. Every newly imported feed video is normalized from the first insert.
Noisy YouTube titles are cleaned for display + storage, raw kept in videos.original_title:
- app/titles.normalize_title: strip emoji/symbols (keep accents), remove trailing SEO hashtag
clusters (keep numeric #3 episode markers), context-aware de-shout (mostly-ALL-CAPS titles ->
Title Case with an acronym whitelist + function-word lowercasing; otherwise only long all-caps
words), collapse repeated punctuation
- applied at enrichment (sync/videos.py) and in the download worker (ad-hoc yt-dlp titles);
catalog downloads inherit the normalized title automatically
- migration 0039: add original_title, preserve raw, rewrite title (generated search_vector
regenerates); reversible via original_title
Backfill on localdev: 122115/273417 titles normalized in ~2 min. Verified in the feed + on
real messy samples (emoji/de-shout/hashtags), accents + acronyms (PS5/AI/USA/PC) preserved.
The progress bar looked broken (95% -> 5% -> recount) because yt-dlp downloads the video and
audio streams separately (each 0->100%) then merges — with no indication of which step is
running. Now:
- worker labels the phase from the stream codecs (video / audio) and via a postprocessor hook
(merging / processing), so the user sees what's happening
- DownloadCenter shows the phase as the status and renders an indeterminate pulse (no bogus %)
during merge/processing; phase i18n en/hu/de
- yt-dlp retries (3) + fragment_retries (5) so transient network blips self-heal instead of
failing the job (seen once as a DNS 'No address associated with hostname' error)
Verified: phase transitions queued -> video -> processing -> done.