[Feature Request] [Youtube] Allow users to add to Invidious instances

[264-bit]

DO NOT REMOVE OR SKIP THE ISSUE TEMPLATE

• I understand that I will be blocked if I intentionally remove or skip any mandatory* field

Checklist

• I'm requesting a site-specific feature
• I've verified that I'm running yt-dlp version 2023.06.22 (update instructions) or later (specify commit)
• I've checked that all provided URLs are playable in a browser with the same IP and same login details
• I've searched known issues and the bugtracker for similar issues including closed ones. DO NOT post duplicates
• I've read the guidelines for opening an issue
• I've read about sharing account credentials and I'm willing to share it if required

Region

No response

Example URLs

https://piped-material.ftp.sh/

Provide a description that is worded well enough to be understood

Please consider allowing users to add to the list of known invidious instances, via a command line arg, config file or similar.
This will help with niche youtube frontends such as piped-material. It also helps with the sometimes rapid pace of new instances, now users don't have to wait for yt-dlp to be updated with every new instance.

Provide verbose output that clearly demonstrates the problem

• Run your yt-dlp command with -vU flag added (yt-dlp -vU <your command line>)
• If using API, add 'verbose': True to YoutubeDL params instead
• Copy the WHOLE output (starting with [debug] Command-line config) and insert it below

Complete Verbose Output

yt-dlp -vU 'https://piped-material.ftp.sh/watch?v=6IxqZOK_dpU'
[debug] Command-line config: ['-vU', 'https://piped-material.ftp.sh/watch?v=6IxqZOK_dpU']
[debug] Encodings: locale UTF-8, fs utf-8, pref UTF-8, out utf-8, error utf-8, screen utf-8
[debug] yt-dlp version stable@2023.06.22 [812cdfa06]
[debug] Python 3.11.4 (CPython x86_64 64bit) - Linux-6.3.8-1-cachyos-x86_64-with-glibc2.37 (OpenSSL 3.1.1 30 May 2023, glibc 2.37)
[debug] exe versions: ffmpeg 6.0 (setts), ffprobe 6.0, rtmpdump 2.4
[debug] Optional libraries: Cryptodome-3.12.0, brotli-1.0.9, certifi-2023.05.07, sqlite3-2.6.0, websockets-10.4
[debug] Proxy map: {}
[debug] Post-Processor Plugins: YoutubeDashGeneratorPP
[debug] Plugin directories: ['/home/user/.config/yt-dlp/plugins/ytdashgen/yt_dlp_plugins']
[debug] Loaded 1851 extractors
[debug] Fetching release info: https://api.github.com/repos/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest
Available version: stable@2023.06.22, Current version: stable@2023.06.22
yt-dlp is up to date (stable@2023.06.22)
[generic] Extracting URL: https://piped-material.ftp.sh/watch?v=6IxqZOK_dpU
[generic] watch?v=6IxqZOK_dpU: Downloading webpage
WARNING: [generic] Falling back on generic information extractor
[generic] watch?v=6IxqZOK_dpU: Extracting information
[debug] Looking for embeds
ERROR: Unsupported URL: https://piped-material.ftp.sh/watch?v=6IxqZOK_dpU
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/yt_dlp/YoutubeDL.py", line 1555, in wrapper
    return func(self, *args, **kwargs)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/yt_dlp/YoutubeDL.py", line 1631, in __extract_info
    ie_result = ie.extract(url)
                ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/yt_dlp/extractor/common.py", line 708, in extract
    ie_result = self._real_extract(url)
                ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/yt_dlp/extractor/generic.py", line 2568, in _real_extract
    raise UnsupportedError(url)
yt_dlp.utils.UnsupportedError: Unsupported URL: https://piped-material.ftp.sh/watch?v=6IxqZOK_dpU

[gamer191]

yt-dlp doesn't support invidious anyway, it just redirects to youtube

[264-bit]

Yes, I understand it redirects invidious instances to youtube. I want to be able to add to the instances that it redirects to youtube, for example piped-material.ftp.sh, so I don't have to manually rewrite links myself.

[coletdjnz]

Unless it goes through generic, It's not really feasible with an extractor arg as the valid url checking is done before the extractor is initialized (afaik). Also may not work with lazy loading.

I would say this is a job is best suited for a plugin.

Example plugin:

from yt_dlp.extractor.youtube import InfoExtractor


class YoutubeInvidiousRedirectIE(InfoExtractor):
    INVIDIOUS_URLS = (r'(?:www\.)?piped-material\.ftp\.sh',)
    _VALID_URL = r'https?://(?P<invidious_base>{})'.format('|'.join(INVIDIOUS_URLS))

    def _real_extract(self, url):
        invidious_base = self._match_valid_url(url).group('invidious_base')
        return self.url_result(url.replace(invidious_base, 'www.youtube.com'))