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Yark is an open source command-line tool designed to simplify the process of archiving YouTube channels for research, analysis, or personal preservation. The project focuses on OSINT (Open Source Intelligence) workflows by allowing users to collect and store videos, metadata, and thumbnails from a YouTube channel in a structured local archive. Instead of simply downloading individual videos, Yark creates a self-contained archive directory that includes metadata files and organized folders for media assets. This format allows users to maintain a historical record of a channel and track updates or changes over time. The tool also provides a local offline web interface that lets users browse and watch archived videos directly in their browser. Because archives are updated using timestamps, users can refresh an existing archive to add newly published content without recreating the entire dataset. Overall, Yark aims to make YouTube archiving and channel analysis easier.
Features
- Archives entire YouTube channels including videos, thumbnails, and metadata
- Generates a structured directory archive with files like yark.json and media folders
- Allows refreshing existing archives to automatically collect new videos and metadata
- Provides a local offline web interface to browse and watch archived content
- Supports note-taking and timestamped comments for videos in the archive interface
- Maintains readable metadata and backup files to help protect archive integrity
Project Samples
