I found an alternative to the Firefox DownloadHelper extension and YoutubeDownloader. While both of these extensions are useful. I really like the Youtube-dl command-line program to download Youtube videos. I recently started to explore Python programming language. It is fairly easy to learn. Though, upgrading Python on a Mac can be confusing at times. Stick with it. It is worth it.
Download the most recent version of the program and unzip the file. The execution permissions need to be changed. To do so, copy it to one of the PATH directories (typically, /usr/local/bin). (At first I had trouble finding PATH directories). I’m new to Python, please don’t criticize. If you don’t know where your PATH directory is, open Terminal and type:
[muse]$ open -a Finder /usr/local/bin
This will open a Finder window to your PATH directory, which you can then copy the Youtube-dl file. From here you need to change the execution permissions. In Terminal, type in the following:
[muse]$ chmod a+x /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
To read more about changing execution permissions, see this tutorial. You will then be prompted to type in your password, but once that is done, you are ready to download videos with the simple command:
[muse]$ youtube-dl "youtube-url"
I find downloading videos with this script is faster than the browser extensions. I also like that I can create a text file with Youtube video links and run a batch download. This comes in super handy.
[muse]$ youtube-dl -t -a your_file.txt
You can also, create a Youtube Playlist and batch download the videos:
[muse]$ youtube-dl -cit "youtube-url"
There are more options available. You can find them in the help files.
