(I'm on Windows 7, but asking in both in case the answer is common to
both.)

I have a batch file (y4.bat) containing

yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"

(I at first tried without the quote marks around the %1, but it didn't
make any difference; I thought they would, but they don't.)

[I find without the "-f mp4", I tend to get a .webm version of the file,
which my copy of VLC can't edit the metadata in, whereas it can the .mp4
version.]

I type y4, a space, then right-click in the command window, to paste in
the URL I've copied from my browser: I see (for example)

.........>y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0

in my command prompt window. I then see on the next line

.........>yt-dlp -f mp4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v"

- i. e. it has trimmed off the parameter at the = sign. (Without the "",
I got the same but without the "".) [If I don't then do a Ctrl-C, it
proceeds to tell me - many times - that it can't find something.]

Ideas?
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

I'd rather trust the guys in the lab coats who aren't demanding that I get up
early on Sundays to apologize for being human.
-- Captain Splendid (quoted by "The Real Bev" in mozilla.general, 2014-11-16)

John,

> in my command prompt window. I then see on the next line
>
> ........>yt-dlp -f mp4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v"
>
> - i. e. it has trimmed off the parameter at the = sign.

Thats not you batchfile pulling some shennigans, but the command.com
/cmd.exe commandline-parser.

In short, it sees that "=" as an argument seperation character. Just try it
in a batchfile :

echo [%1][%2]

and call it with (something like) "foo=bar" (without the double-quotes!).

Now try again but include the double-quotes.

As for the solution ? The above already shows it : you have to enclose
that URL to that batchfile of yours in double-quotes, just as you would need
to when the URL would contain spaces (or some other special characters) -
and remove the double-quotes from around the "%1" in the batchfile.

Hope that helps.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

On 4/15/2022 2:18 PM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
> (I'm on Windows 7, but asking in both in case the answer is common to
> both.)
>
> I have a batch file (y4.bat) containing
>
> yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"
>
> (I at first tried without the quote marks around the %1, but it didn't
> make any difference; I thought they would, but they don't.)
>
> [I find without the "-f mp4", I tend to get a .webm version of the file,
> which my copy of VLC can't edit the metadata in, whereas it can the .mp4
> version.]
>
> I type y4, a space, then right-click in the command window, to paste in
> the URL I've copied from my browser: I see (for example)
>
> ........>y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0
>
> in my command prompt window. I then see on the next line
>
> ........>yt-dlp -f mp4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v"
>
> - i. e. it has trimmed off the parameter at the = sign. (Without the "",
> I got the same but without the "".) [If I don't then do a Ctrl-C, it
> proceeds to tell me - many times - that it can't find something.]
>
> Ideas?

I would try:

y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"

and leave this line in this form, just in case.

yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"

and see what happens.

Some of these shell escape problems are hours of
fun for a person like me who never memorizes the rules.
There are too many shells, scripting languages, and rules
for this stuff to stick, so I don't even try.

Paul

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

> I have a batch file (y4.bat) containing
>
> yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"
>
> I type y4, a space, then right-click in the command window, to paste in
> the URL I've copied from my browser: I see (for example)
>
> ........>y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0
>
> in my command prompt window. I then see on the next line
>
> ........>yt-dlp -f mp4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v"
>
> - i. e. it has trimmed off the parameter at the = sign.

Instead of using %1 which means the 1st parameter (or 2nd argument since
%0 is the first argument which is the name of the called file), or any
of the numbered replaceable arguments (%n, where n = 1 to 9), try using
%* which means to use all the replaceable arguments.

For example, if you create a testme.bat file which contains:

echo off
cls
echo Called file: %0
echo Input line is: %*

When you run:

testme.bat https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0
or
testme https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0

you'll get:

Called file: testme.bat
Input line is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0

or

Called file: testme
Input line is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0

Lots of web docs help explain replaceable parameters, like:

http://winone.com.au/replaceable-parameters.html

On 15/04/2022 19:18, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
>
> (I'm on Windows 7, but asking in both in case the answer is common to
> both.)
>
> I have a batch file (y4.bat) containing
>
> yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"
>
> (I at first tried without the quote marks around the %1, but it didn't
> make any difference; I thought they would, but they don't.)
>
> [I find without the "-f mp4", I tend to get a .webm version of the file,
> which my copy of VLC can't edit the metadata in, whereas it can the .mp4
> version.]
>
> I type y4, a space, then right-click in the command window, to paste in
> the URL I've copied from my browser: I see (for example)
>
> .........>y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0
>
> in my command prompt window. I then see on the next line
>
> .........>yt-dlp -f mp4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v"
>
> - i. e. it has trimmed off the parameter at the = sign. (Without the "",
> I got the same but without the "".) [If I don't then do a Ctrl-C, it
> proceeds to tell me - many times - that it can't find something.]
>
> Ideas?

As others have explained, it happens at the stage of parsing the
command-line, not within the BATch file itself. Therefore, at very
least, you have to call (note the quotes) ...

y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"

.... and have the BATch file line read (note the absence of quotes) ...

yt-dlp -f mp4 %1

Additionally, if that fails, also you could try escaping the '=' by
preceding it with a '^' ...

y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v^=ZWuplW-l-E0"

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

On Fri, 15 Apr 2022 at 21:09:55, Java Jive <java@evij.com.invalid> wrote
(my responses usually FOLLOW):
[]
>As others have explained, it happens at the stage of parsing the
>command-line, not within the BATch file itself. Therefore, at very
>least, you have to call (note the quotes) ...
>
> y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"

So I'd type <y4 ">, then do a paste (right-click in W7), then type
<" enter>. [Without the <> of course.]
>
>... and have the BATch file line read (note the absence of quotes) ...
>
> yt-dlp -f mp4 %1
>
>Additionally, if that fails, also you could try escaping the '=' by
>preceding it with a '^' ...
>
> y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v^=ZWuplW-l-E0"
>
The = is part of a string (the copied URL) that's in the clipboard, so
that wouldn't be easy.

I think I'll try VanguardLH's suggestion of using %* rather than %1 or
"%1".
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Well, let's put it this way. I may not be as good as Olivier but on the other
hand I'm taller than him. - Roger Moore, quoted by Barry Norman

On 4/16/2022 12:04 AM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
> On Fri, 15 Apr 2022 at 21:09:55, Java Jive <java@evij.com.invalid> wrote (my responses usually FOLLOW):
> []
>> As others have explained, it happens at the stage of parsing the command-line, not within the BATch file itself.  Therefore, at very least, you have to call (note the quotes) ...
>>
>>       y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"
>
> So I'd type <y4 ">, then do a paste (right-click in W7), then type
> <" enter>. [Without the <> of course.]
>>
>> ... and have the BATch file line read (note the absence of quotes) ...
>>
>>       yt-dlp -f mp4 %1
>>
>> Additionally, if that fails, also you could try escaping the '=' by preceding it with a '^' ...
>>
>>       y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v^=ZWuplW-l-E0"
>>
> The = is part of a string (the copied URL) that's in the clipboard, so that wouldn't be easy.
>
> I think I'll try VanguardLH's suggestion of using %* rather than %1 or "%1".

But if you don't insulate the passed parameter, this is what is passed.
If an equal sign is bad karma, without insulation it could split into two params.

You type: y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0

This happens: y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v =ZWuplW-l-E0

When you use double-quotes, the intention is to show the shell you mean
to pass the items as a single parameter %1

y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0" dog cat

%1= https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0
%2= dog
%3= cat

Paul

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

> I think I'll try VanguardLH's suggestion of using %* rather than %1 or "%1".

That won't work as none of the argument variables will contain the equals, it's
been parsed away, it's kludgy but you could build it back inside the batch file
using "%1=%2"

Andy,

>> I think I'll try VanguardLH's suggestion of using %* rather than %1 or
>> "%1".
>
> That won't work as none of the argument variables will contain the equals,
> it's been parsed away

Are you sure ? Have you actually tried using %* ?

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

On 16/04/2022 05:04, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
> On Fri, 15 Apr 2022 at 21:09:55, Java Jive <java@evij.com.invalid> wrote
> (my responses usually FOLLOW):
> []
>> As others have explained, it happens at the stage of parsing the
>> command-line, not within the BATch file itself.  Therefore, at very
>> least, you have to call (note the quotes) ...
>>
>>       y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"
>
> So I'd type <y4 ">, then do a paste (right-click in W7), then type
> <" enter>. [Without the <> of course.]

Yes, just to be clear:
1 Type: y4 "
2 Paste URL
3 Type: "
4 Press <Enter>

>> ... and have the BATch file line read (note the absence of quotes) ...
>>
>>       yt-dlp -f mp4 %1
>>
>> Additionally, if that fails, also you could try escaping the '=' by
>> preceding it with a '^' ...
>>
>>       y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v^=ZWuplW-l-E0"
>
> The = is part of a string (the copied URL) that's in the clipboard, so
> that wouldn't be easy.

Easy enough:
1 to 3 As above
4 Type sufficient <Cursor left> to bring the cursor in front of '='
5 Type ^
6 Press <Enter>

> I think I'll try VanguardLH's suggestion of using %* rather than %1 or
> "%1".

As others seem to agree, I don't think it'll work. But, from my
experience, my first suggestion of quoting the URL should work anyway.

Nearly always, such difficulties in BATch files come from a failure to
understand when a particular character is having an effect, and it's
usually much earlier than casually might be assumed, at the time the
command-line calling the BATch file is processed rather than when a
particular command within it is encountered and run.

I have a system where all my PCs have substantially the same data, D:,
drive contents, or subsets of it, which are also backed up to servers.
Particularly when I've watched or listened to some iPlayer content, I
need to delete it from any PCs that it's on, and any servers that it has
semi-automatically been backed up to, and I have three very similar
programs to manage this:
MA.bat (multi-all)
MP.bat (multi-PCs)
MS.bat (multi-servers)
As you might guess, the programs are identical except the list of
machines they work on. So a command like ...
ma del "<path without drive letter>/Science in Action <iso-date>.m4a"
.... will delete the designated edition of 'Science in Action' from
everywhere at once. The same programs can also do REN, MD, RD, etc.

My big problem in writing these programs was ampersands ('&'s) in file
and directory names, which cause similar problems to '=' because the
interpretation of the command line treats them as command separators,
both when the calling command-line is first interpreted, and when
encountered within unquoted parameters to any other command within the
BATch files. Other characters, such as left and right parentheses,
cause similar problems. I now solve this by:
1 Quoting the filenames on the command-line;
2 Early replacement of awkward chars such as the above by
strings like '[ampersand]', etc (to allow other parameter
manipulations to be done without fuss);
3 Replace them back just before giving the relevant command;
4 Do it.

Another similar problem is the use of wildcards such as '*' and '?',
again because they are interpreted as the initial command-line is read
from the console, and what is passed to the BATch file is an
interpretation of the parameter string containing the wildcard as a list
of matching filenames, not the string itself. Using quotes doesn't help
with these, you have to escape each of them with '^' to make the '*' and
'?' characters be included in the parameter string passed to the BATch
file (command-line interpretation strips out the actual '^' escape
characters themselves).

It's all very much a fag, made the programs much more complicated than
they should really have needed to be in any decent programming language,
and took multiple versions over years to get the programs to work as
well as they do now, but finally now they do work very well indeed.

But you can't get around the need in the calling command-line to use
quotes where there is a space, ampersand, etc, in the filenames, and to
escape wildcards that should be interpreted within the BATch file rather
than in calling it. BATch files are a kludgy hack from DOS days, and
that's just the way things are in using them.

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

Java,

>> I think I'll try VanguardLH's suggestion of using %* rather than %1 or
>> "%1".
>
> As others seem to agree, I don't think it'll work.

Why are you leaning onto others to support your "it won't work" *idea* when
all you would need is a couple of seconds to check for yourself (and create
a fact) ?

> Fake news kills!

And the above "I can't be arsed to do a quick-and-easy check myself" is how
such fake news keeps on going. IOW, *you* are part of the problem. :-\

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

"J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@255soft.uk> wrote

| I have a batch file (y4.bat) containing
| | yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"
|

Why not just paste the URL into your .bat file? It seems
like an awfully lot of work. Also, if you've used any GUI
for youtube-dl (there are several, I think) it works the
same way for yt-dlp. The commands have been kept the
same, as far as I can tell.

On 4/16/2022 10:05 AM, Mayayana wrote:
> "J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@255soft.uk> wrote
>
> | I have a batch file (y4.bat) containing
> |
> | yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"
> |
>
> Why not just paste the URL into your .bat file? It seems
> like an awfully lot of work. Also, if you've used any GUI
> for youtube-dl (there are several, I think) it works the
> same way for yt-dlp. The commands have been kept the
> same, as far as I can tell.

Or for that matter, reformulate the data. So there's no equals sign.

https://youtu.be/ZWuplW-l-E0

Paul

On Fri, 15 Apr 2022 19:18:56 +0100, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
> (I'm on Windows 7, but asking in both in case the answer is common to
> both.)
>
> I have a batch file (y4.bat) containing
>
> yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"
>
> (I at first tried without the quote marks around the %1, but it didn't
> make any difference; I thought they would, but they don't.)
>
> [I find without the "-f mp4", I tend to get a .webm version of the file,
> which my copy of VLC can't edit the metadata in, whereas it can the .mp4
> version.]
>
> I type y4, a space, then right-click in the command window, to paste in
> the URL I've copied from my browser: I see (for example)
>
> .........>y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0
>
> in my command prompt window. I then see on the next line
>
> .........>yt-dlp -f mp4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v"
>
> - i. e. it has trimmed off the parameter at the = sign. (Without the "",
> I got the same but without the "".) [If I don't then do a Ctrl-C, it
> proceeds to tell me - many times - that it can't find something.]
>
> Ideas?

When calling your batch file, the URL should be quoted. e.g.

y4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"

Then in the batch file, don't requote the %1. e.g.

yt-dlp -f mp4 %1

If you need to get the unquoted URL, do it like this.

set "url=%~1"
yt-dlp -f mp4 "%url%"

On 16/04/2022 13:00, R.Wieser wrote:

[And fucked up the rest of the quoting ...]

[J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:]
>>>
>>> I think I'll try VanguardLH's suggestion of using %* rather than %1 or
>>> "%1".

[Java Jive wrote:]
>>
>> As others seem to agree, I don't think it'll work.
>
> Why are you leaning onto others to support your "it won't work" *idea* when
> all you would need is a couple of seconds to check for yourself (and create
> a fact) ?

Hypocrite! My opinion was based on my work on the programs I described
but that you snipped. If *YOU* thought or knew it would work, then why
didn't *YOU* do the work to prove me wrong, as indeed it turns out that
I was, but there was nothing except the very laziness, of which you
hypocritically accused me, to stop *YOU* posting something like the
following:

18:48:39 D:\Temp>type y4.bat
@echo yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"
18:50:08 D:\Temp>y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0
yt-dlp -f mp4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v"

18:50:15 D:\Temp>type y5.bat
@echo yt-dlp -f mp4 %1
18:50:30 D:\Temp>y5 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"
yt-dlp -f mp4 "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0"

18:50:36 D:\Temp>type y6.bat
@echo yt-dlp -f mp4 %*
18:50:54 D:\Temp>y6 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0
yt-dlp -f mp4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWuplW-l-E0

So yes, %* will work for the OP's specific problem. However, if he
should ever wish to expand the functionality of his BATch file, say by
having it read other parameters, then, depending on how he wishes to do
it, he might need to revert to using numbered parameters, thus making it
necessary to quote the URLs as suggested by myself and others, which is
generally considered good practice anyway.

What this seems to imply is that when CMD.EXE parses the command-line,
it assigns the entirety of it to %* before attempting to split it into
numbered parameters, whereas I, and presumably others, assumed that %*
was obtained by stringing together the numbered parameters, hence my
erroneous belief that it wouldn't work.

>> Fake news kills!
>
> And the above "I can't be arsed to do a quick-and-easy check myself" is how
> such fake news keeps on going. IOW, *you* are part of the problem. :-\

Hypocrite, as above, and none of your abuse actually helped the OP with
his problem, which at least I was attempting to do.

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

On Sat, 16 Apr 2022 at 08:46:18, Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> wrote
(my responses usually FOLLOW):
>J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
>
>> I think I'll try VanguardLH's suggestion of using %* rather than %1 or "%1".
>
>That won't work as none of the argument variables will contain the
>equals, it's been parsed away, it's kludgy but you could build it back
>inside the batch file using "%1=%2"

Well, I tried VLH's suggestion of putting

echo off
cls
echo Called file: %0
echo Input line is: %*

into a batch file, and tried it with both

t x=y
and
t.bat x=y

, and in both cases the second output line was

Input line is: x=y

, so that suggests the x and y _didn't_ get separated or the = lost.

I've got my y4.bat as

yt-dlp -f mp4 %*

now; I'll report back next time I try it with a real YouTube URL!
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

.... although we regard it as undesirable for children to drive cars, own
credit cards or enter public houses, we don't prevent grown-ups from choosing
to do so. (Quoted by Paul Bray in Computing, 3 October 1996.)

On Sat, 16 Apr 2022 at 10:28:30, Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> wrote (my
responses usually FOLLOW):
>On 4/16/2022 10:05 AM, Mayayana wrote:
>> "J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@255soft.uk> wrote
>>
>> | I have a batch file (y4.bat) containing
>> |
>> | yt-dlp -f mp4 "%1"
>> |
>> Why not just paste the URL into your .bat file? It seems
>> like an awfully lot of work. Also, if you've used any GUI
>> for youtube-dl (there are several, I think) it works the
>> same way for yt-dlp. The commands have been kept the
>> same, as far as I can tell.
>
>Or for that matter, reformulate the data. So there's no equals sign.
>
> https://youtu.be/ZWuplW-l-E0
>
> Paul

I think both of you are missing the reason I made a batch file in the
first place (-:
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

.... although we regard it as undesirable for children to drive cars, own
credit cards or enter public houses, we don't prevent grown-ups from choosing
to do so. (Quoted by Paul Bray in Computing, 3 October 1996.)

Java,

> Hypocrite! My opinion was based on my work on the programs I described
> but that you snipped.

Are you trying to make me/us believe that what you quoted (and I re-quoted)
was just something random, having zero to do with your scribblings directly
below it ? Really ?

Liar.

> If *YOU* thought or knew it would work, then why didn't *YOU* do the work
> to prove me wrong

I did. After I read VanguardLH's suggestion it took me all but a few
seconds I mentioned, and it proved you where wrong. It works just as he
said it would *and* to which he provided a code sample to test it with. I
would just be duplicating his work.

But thats not the point here. The real question is : why didn't YOU take
the few moments it would have taken to also check that, and instead just
posted here that you *didn't believe* that it would work. Can you explain
that to me ?

Mind you, the OP was/is here for facts, not your guesswork.

> I was, but there was nothing except the very laziness, of which you
> hypocritically accused me, to stop *YOU* posting something like the
> following: [snip]

Why ? I'm not thinking that everyone here is stupid and need to be taken
by the hand that way.

> What this seems to imply is that when CMD.EXE parses the command-line, it
> assigns the entirety of it to %* before attempting to split it into
> numbered parameters, whereas I, and presumably others, assumed that %* was
> obtained by stringing together the numbered parameters, hence my erroneous
> belief that it wouldn't work.

Good. Maybe next time you wil remember this and not allow an assumption
make a fool of you again (especialy when its *that* easy to check). Or at
least not publicly by posting it here as the "fake news" it was. *Especially
not* when you publicly show to have a problem with such "fake news".

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

On 16/04/2022 20:55, R.Wieser wrote:

Rude and not wiser

Yawn, plonk!

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk

"J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@255soft.uk> wrote

| I think both of you are missing the reason I made a batch file in the
| first place (-:

I can't imagine. You have a batch file, then you call it
with a custom command line. I'm guessing you're just
a bed-of-nails kinda guy. :)

On Sat, 16 Apr 2022 at 16:33:30, Mayayana <mayayana@invalid.nospam>
wrote (my responses usually FOLLOW):
>"J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@255soft.uk> wrote
>
>| I think both of you are missing the reason I made a batch file in the
>| first place (-:
>
> I can't imagine. You have a batch file, then you call it
>with a custom command line. I'm guessing you're just
>a bed-of-nails kinda guy. :)
>
The custom commands are _in_ the batch file! (If you mean the "-f mp4".)
>
I want to:
o copy the URL
o open the command window (I have a one-click link to do so where the
batch file is)
o type y4 space paste

unfortunately, as the URL contains an "=", it wasn't working.
VanguardLH's "%*" looks like it'll get round that; I'll report back when
I've tried it.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"If you have ten thousand regulations you destroy all respect for the
law." - Winston Churchill.

On 16.04.2022 23:40, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
> On Sat, 16 Apr 2022 at 16:33:30, Mayayana <mayayana@invalid.nospam>
> wrote (my responses usually FOLLOW):
>>"J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@255soft.uk> wrote
>>
>>| I think both of you are missing the reason I made a batch file in the
>>| first place (-:
>>
>> I can't imagine. You have a batch file, then you call it
>>with a custom command line. I'm guessing you're just
>>a bed-of-nails kinda guy. :)
>>
> The custom commands are _in_ the batch file! (If you mean the "-f mp4".)
>>
> I want to:
> o copy the URL
> o open the command window (I have a one-click link to do so where the
> batch file is)
> o type y4 space paste
>
> unfortunately, as the URL contains an "=", it wasn't working.
> VanguardLH's "%*" looks like it'll get round that; I'll report back when
> I've tried it.

Why don't use the batch to read the clipboard? Just copy the youtube
link to the clipboard and then execute this batch (remove the "echo"
in the last line after testing the batch code):

@echo off
echo WScript.Echo(CreateObject("htmlfile").ParentWindow.ClipboardData.GetData("text"))>getClip.vbs
for /f "delims=" %%a in ('cscript /nologo getClip.vbs') do echo yt-dlp -f mp4 "%%a"

On 4/16/2022 5:40 PM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
> On Sat, 16 Apr 2022 at 16:33:30, Mayayana <mayayana@invalid.nospam> wrote (my responses usually FOLLOW):
>> "J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@255soft.uk> wrote
>>
>> | I think both of you are missing the reason I made a batch file in the
>> | first place (-:
>>
>>  I can't imagine. You have a batch file, then you call it
>> with a custom command line. I'm guessing you're just
>> a bed-of-nails kinda guy. :)
>>
> The custom commands are _in_ the batch file! (If you mean the "-f mp4".)
>>
> I want to:
> o copy the URL
> o open the command window (I have a one-click link to do so where the batch file is)
> o type y4 space paste
>
> unfortunately, as the URL contains an "=", it wasn't working. VanguardLH's "%*" looks like it'll get round that; I'll report back when I've tried it.

Isn't there a GUI for this ?

I thought someone made a GUI for the downloader program
at some point. You might need to change the name of the
executable.

https://github.com/MrS0m30n3/youtube-dl-gui

Scroll down to "Windows Installer"

Name: youtube-dl-gui-0.4-win-setup.zip
Size: 28,321,056 bytes (27 MiB)
SHA256: 230690B25BD1C5BF7E396F905FA51C6760AF93AD24A50CE2FB0EEE5FFA9D7068

Install it. It already has an FFMPEG onboard (35MB or so unpacked).
That could be, roughly, V3.3.3 kind of thing. I didn't check.

Important part, is go to:

C:\users\username\AppData\Roaming\youtube-dlg\

You'll see a "settings.json" is already in the folder.

Copy "yt-dlp_x86.exe" into the folder.
Rename the file to "youtube-dl.exe" to fool the program.

The reason you can do that, is yt-dlp_x86.exe *should* support
the same commands (more or less).

Then, start the "youtube-dl-gui.exe" from the Program Files
folder "Youtube-DLG" and start your session. Set the "default"
menu item to "video: mp4".

Enter a URL.

Click Add.

Click lower-right Download button.

Done.

As seen here.

[Picture] If the frame is empty, right-click and select "Reload"

https://i.postimg.cc/8cJqP3Pk/youtube-DLG.gif

HTH,
Paul

Java,

> Rude and not wiser
>
> Yawn, plonk!

Always funny to see how quickly people like you drop a matter when their
accusations get countered and defused.

And by the way, that "hypocrite" you started your previous message with ?
You might want to pick up a dictionary and look up its actual meaning.
Its a single person thing only, not about whatever demands you think you may
make towards someone else.

It /does/ fit your "do as I say, not as I do" though. :-)

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

"Paul" <nospam@needed.invalid> wrote

| Isn't there a GUI for this ?
|

Yes. I mentioned that above. I've written an HTA myself that
works with both EXEs interchangeably. I think there are several
other options. Some people just like to start their car with a
hand crank.