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This error occurred when using youtube-dl:

[youtube] 1234567890A: Downloading webpage
[youtube] 1234567890A: Downloading video info webpage
ERROR: 1234567890A: "token" parameter not in video info for unknown reason;   
please report this issue on https://yt-dl.org/bug. 
Make sure you are using the latest version; type youtube-dl -U to update.   
Be sure to call youtube-dl with the --verbose flag and include its complete output.

I tried to uninstall youtube-dl and reinstall it, but this error reoccurred.

karel
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user296770
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  • @karel I'm fairly sure that's not the issue here. To me it seems that the -U command is recognized, but disabled in the latest Ubuntu Version(s). – Markus Gratis Jun 17 '18 at 09:46
  • CLOSE VOTERS: Note the answer below which answers the question quite directly and gives details of the Debian changes leading to this unexpected behaviour from youtube-dl... – andrew.46 Jun 18 '18 at 09:52
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    I'd much rather see both posts merged to a "how do I keep this updated?" question – muru Jun 18 '18 at 14:32
  • @muru Perhaps: 'How to keep youtube-dl updated under Ubuntu 18.04?' I would be happy to create a 'Question and Answer' question and merge both questions. Incorporating: 1. The issue with the Debian patching 2. The method to update using wget 3. The method to update using pip. Then mark both existing questions as dupes? – andrew.46 Jun 19 '18 at 01:18
  • @andrew.46 "how do I keep YouTube-dl updated" period; your answer describing 1,2; karel's merged in (or the other way around - merge your answer here to the dupe). – muru Jun 19 '18 at 01:54
  • @muru OK, done. I tend to tweak my answers over a short period so there will be improvements coming... – andrew.46 Jun 19 '18 at 02:40

2 Answers2

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Update youtube-dl to the latest version.

sudo youtube-dl -U # no longer supported in Debian-based systems

If youtube-dl cannot be updated with this command, install the latest version of youtube-dl using Alternative Python package installer (pip).

sudo apt-get remove youtube-dl
sudo apt-get install python-pip  
pip install --user youtube-dl

In Ubuntu 14.04 and later youtube-dl is a snap package. To install it:

sudo snap install youtube-dl

The youtube-dl snap package will be updated automatically in the background when updates become available.

karel
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  • I tried it for many videos but the result is same.. I even tried to download videos using "all video downloader" but it is also not working... – user296770 Jun 22 '14 at 05:35
  • In Ubuntu 14.04 you can use the command: youtube-dl -F 'http://www.youtube.com/some-alphanumeric-string' to display a list of all the video formats that are available for any YouTube video that you want to download. For example -f 35 is the option to use to download the common 360p flv video format. For more information about the most commonly used options for youtube-dl see this answer. – karel Jun 22 '14 at 05:39
  • Result is same as previous.. Same error.. – user296770 Jun 22 '14 at 05:43
  • For an experiment try downloading the following 5-second YouTube video using this command: youtube-dl -f 18 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBPPLu2x3lI This video is in the 480p mp4 format, and downloading it will help to test if you have a problem downloading only flv format videos. – karel Jun 22 '14 at 05:49
  • Same tokan error for above URL – user296770 Jun 22 '14 at 05:57
  • Are you using a proxy? Can you watch the video in a web browser? – karel Jun 22 '14 at 06:02
  • Yes I can watch it.. – user296770 Jun 22 '14 at 06:06
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Keeping youtube-dl updated:

youtube-dl is an application that is updated every couple of weeks to match changes made by upstream services such as YouTube. Consequently keeping it update is a busy task. As of Ubuntu 18.04 there is a special issue where the Ubuntu package can no longer be 'manually' updated. Thus the command youtube-dl -U does not work with the repository version of youtube-dl.

Recent Issues with the Ubuntu package:

The Debian package managers for youtube-dl have felt that it "contains a (possibly-insecure) self-update mechanism" and have patched this auto-update mechanism completely out of the application. The bug report and discussion are here:

Debian Bug report logs - #890119
youtube-dl contains a (possibly-insecure) self-update mechanism

The patch to youtube-dl is quite extensive and arguably a little destructive. It can be seen in full here... Note the comment at the top of the patch:

Knowledgeable users will know what to do in any case.

And the good news is that are 2 very good methods for 'knowledgeable users' to keep youtube-dl updated:

1. Update using wget:

And for my own part that involves the following simple commands which remove the repository youtube-dl and manually install the most recent version:

sudo apt-get remove youtube-dl
sudo mkdir -pv /usr/local/bin
sudo wget https://yt-dl.org/downloads/latest/youtube-dl -O /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
sudo chmod a+rx /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl

And now youtube-dl will function as before :). Bear in mind that you will need to periodically manually update youtube-dl (by running youtube-dl -U) rather than expect the package manager to do it for you...

2. Updating using the pip installer:

You can instead use the Alternative Python package installer (pip) to update youtube-dl as follows:

sudo apt-get remove youtube-dl
sudo apt-get install python-pip  
sudo pip install youtube-dl

Then subsequently you can update youtube-dl by running the following:

sudo pip install --upgrade youtube_dl

And now enjoy your offline viewing of YouTube's great video offerings :).

andrew.46
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  • youtube-dl: as you know the normal upgrade command is not working e.g. youtube-dl -U Thus having to remove and re-install using pip (not sure why) has been a common workaround. As a side effect I have noticed that when verifying the version directly after install I get a return: Bash: /usr/bin/youtube-dl: file not found. Then I find the file actually in /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl Once a reboot has occurred the file is in /usr/bin/youtube-dl Q: why is this? And what if any info can you share explaining the change of location after reboot. Perhaps add this to your answer as well. thanks – xtrchessreal Sep 27 '18 at 09:47