Downloading YouTube Audio

[CaptNoize]

Dai
Can you tell me what the command line be to download audio from YouTube...? I tried using youtube dl -- extract audio- mp3 ...the same as I used on Q4OS,,,but it said command not found...tried the Ask Ubuntu command line ...nothing...can you help..?

[dai_trying]

tbh I usually use a Palemoon extension to download directly from the youtube page (it creates a download link) and when clicked I can download mp4, if I only want audio I would use audacity and export it afterwards.
I know there is the cli package youtube-dl but I don't usually use it, I will download it today to see what it can do and post back.

[dai_trying]

I have run a few tests on youtube-dl and have not found (as yet) a direct way to save the file as mp3, you can use the -x option (the same as --extract-audio) but it seems to use whatever the default is for the particular video. Another option is to request the m4a (best quality) track by using -f m4a but I cannot see a way of getting mp3 if it is not available for direct download.
You can see what tracks are directly available using the -F option which outputs to terminal all the track types available with format codes which could also be used with the -f option (-f 140 for m4a).
The downloaded file could then easily be converted using ffmpeg, and using a script it could be automated to download and convert the file in one go.

[CaptNoize]

Perhaps I'll download Pale moon....I tried to download the add on at Firefox 58....YouTube downloader. It doesn't show on the main page. I don't know if it works with FF 58...?

[dai_trying]

FF 58 has changed the way add-ons work so it might be a problem until the developers (youtube downloader) get it sorted. The one I use doesn't have mp3 as an option, but I'm sure I recall seeing one that downloads the file as mp3 but it might use an external website to do it.

[dai_trying]

I found this one that seems to work well with FF58 and downloads mp3 directly

YouTube Download & Adblocker Smarttube Version 2.0.9
By Creative Software Solutions GmbH

link to website

HTH

[crosscourt]

Chrome has an extension called Youtube audio downloader prime,that works fine, havent looked at Chromium.

[CaptNoize]

Thanks everyone....I 'll give them a try and let you know how they work

[CaptNoize]

I tried the SmartTube down loader...works great...! However, when I tried to use Kb3 to burn an audio CD,...it won't work on certain songs..it only plays the ones converted to Mp3. I have the lib6 codecs conversion files loaded for Kb3, but after burning a CD,some songs were good,while others were totally useless. I recently started using MX Linux, I signed up for their forum.....8 times...never got a registration code...checked all my email...! I didn't have this problem running Q4OS,on the same machine.

[dai_trying]

I've had a few problems with mp3 files but they weren't downloaded from youtube, when I upload them to my android phone they don't play properly, I have tried converting them using ffmpeg and audacity and still they don't want to play, very strange...
As for MX Forum CC would be the one to answer that as I don't use it.