YouTube Live Chat in Terminal

ARCHIVED PROJECT

This project is considered archived and is no longer in active development.

Reason: It relies on the YouTube Data API v3, which has significant quota limitations (10,000 points/day). Continuous polling for live chat messages quickly exhausts this quota, making this approach unsustainable for long-term or frequent use.

Recommendation: For a more sustainable and quota-friendly solution, please refer to the youtube-chat-webhook-v2 project. That project explores alternative methods for fetching YouTube live chat data that do not rely on the official API and its restrictive quotas.

Project Description

This project aims to provide a customizable way to view YouTube Live Chat directly in your terminal. It is implemented in main.py.

Features

Real-time Live Chat Display: Fetches and displays messages from YouTube Live Streams.
OAuth 2.0 Authentication: Securely connects to your YouTube account to access your live stream data.
Terminal-based Interface: View chat directly in your command-line interface.

Planned Features

Color-coded usernames for better readability.
Customizable terminal output (e.g., font size, message formatting).
Ability to send messages back to the live chat.
Local web overlay for use with streaming software like OBS.

Setup Instructions

1. Clone the Repository

Clone the project from your Gitea instance:

git clone https://gitea.ramforth.net/RamTech/youtube-chat-terminal.git
cd youtube-chat-terminal

2. Gitea Repository

This project is hosted on your Gitea instance at: https://gitea.ramforth.net/RamTech/youtube-chat-terminal

cd /home/joe/Cloud9/Documents/Obisdian/youtube_chat_terminal
python3 -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate

(If you are using a shell like fish and encounter issues with source venv/bin/activate, try running bash first, then source venv/bin/activate within the bash session.)

3. Install Dependencies

With your virtual environment activated, install the required Python libraries:

pip install google-api-python-client google-auth-oauthlib google-auth-httplib2 prompt_toolkit

4. Google Cloud Project Setup

To allow this application to access YouTube Live Chat data, you need to set up a project in the Google Cloud Console:

Go to the Google Cloud Console.
Create a new project or select an existing one.
Navigate to "APIs & Services" > "Library".
Search for and enable the "YouTube Data API v3".
Go to "APIs & Services" > "Credentials".
Click "+ CREATE CREDENTIALS" and choose "OAuth client ID".
For "Application type", select "Desktop app".
Give it a name (e.g., "YouTube Chat Terminal App") and click "CREATE".
Download the JSON file containing your Client ID and Client Secret. Rename this file to client_secret.json.

5. Place `client_secret.json`

Move the downloaded client_secret.json file into the root directory of this project (i.e., /home/joe/Cloud9/Documents/Obisdian/youtube_chat_terminal/).

6. Initial Authentication

Run the main.py script for the first time to complete the OAuth 2.0 authentication flow:

python main.py

This will open a browser window, prompting you to log in with your Google account and grant permissions to the application. Upon successful authentication, a token.json file will be created in the project directory. This file stores your credentials for future use, so you won't need to re-authenticate every time.

Usage

To view the live chat of a YouTube stream, run the script and provide the YouTube Live Stream Video ID when prompted:

python main.py

The script will then continuously fetch and display live chat messages in your terminal.

Finding the YouTube Live Stream Video ID

Go to the live stream on YouTube.
The Video ID is the alphanumeric string in the URL after v= (e.g., in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOUR_VIDEO_ID, YOUR_VIDEO_ID is the ID you need).

Future Development

Contributions and suggestions are welcome! Planned enhancements include:

Advanced terminal formatting and styling.
Integration for sending chat messages.
Development of a local web overlay.

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