Video Transcript

Video Transcript

Pull a video's transcript as readable paragraphs. Two paths, in order:

Path 1 — uploader subtitles (accurate, prefer when present):

yt-dlp --skip-download --write-subs --sub-langs en --sub-format vtt \
  -o '<work-dir>/%(id)s' '<URL>'

Path 2 — auto-generated captions (fallback when path 1 writes no file):

yt-dlp --skip-download --write-auto-subs --sub-langs en --sub-format vtt \
  -o '<work-dir>/%(id)s' '<URL>'

Then clean the VTT into paragraphs:

python3 skills/research/video-transcript/scripts/vtt_to_paragraph.py <work-dir>/<id>.en.vtt

Default output is plain paragraph text with [Music]-style cues stripped and the rolling duplicates of auto-captions deduplicated. Use --timestamps for [mm:ss] markers, --keep-brackets to keep cue tags, -o FILE to write to a file.

For other languages, change --sub-langs (e.g. de, en.*). List what a video offers with yt-dlp --list-subs '<URL>'.

Error handling

Both paths write no .vtt file

Cause: video has no subtitles or captions in the requested language.

Solution: run yt-dlp --list-subs '<URL>' and pick an available language; if none exist, report that and offer audio transcription via the markdown-converter skill on a downloaded audio file.

HTTP 429 / "Sign in to confirm"

Cause: platform rate-limiting the host.

Solution: wait and retry with --sleep-requests 2; keep request volume low.

Cleaner output repeats lines

Cause: VTT came from a third path (e.g. translated captions) with cue formats the dedupe misses.

Solution: rerun the cleaner; if repeats remain, file the sample VTT alongside a fix to vtt_to_paragraph.py.