Little Feature Request: enable --title by default

[BURGINABC]

I think it would be more intuitive if fetching the title and using it as the file-name were enabled by default, and instead there were a flag to manually disable it.

Before reading the man-page I didn't even know it had that feature (title fetching), I think it would be more user friendly for people to get that by default instead of having to look in the manual for it, because I imagine most people would pretty much always prefer the video's actual title over a random-looking string of characters, particularly when downloading youtube playlists or otherwise downloading large groups of vids at once.

Just a suggestion for your consideration.

[phihag]

The main problem is that existing scripts may rely on the current format.

Seems worthwile though, so I'll let this issue open and wait for comments/protest.

[FiloSottile]

+1 but add a --id and a kind warning when updating

[phihag]

--id is added now. We should update the FAQ and wait 6 months before switching the default.

[phihag]

@FiloSottile How could we warn users who don't pass any options, but still rely on --id being the default? And what purpose would that serve?

[FiloSottile]

I was thinking about something like

WARNING: since version xxxx the default filename for videos is its title. If you want to keep the old behavior, use --id.

to be shown if no outtmpl is specified for a couple of releases.

It will not be noticed by everyone, but...

[FiloSottile]

Uh! Idea: release notes.
youtube-dl -U is more likely to be run by a human and it is where stuff changes. Also, extra output there isn't really annoying.

So, why not implement the ability to print a line or two of announcement while updating?

We could put it as a nullable field in the update-info.json.

If it's OK for you, I'll add it to the release flow.
We could also announce the new downloads page, or when pip package arrives, etc...

[phihag]

I managed to still have Internet access (still in Germany atm) - I'll probably not be able to answer.

I'm a definite -1 on printing anything by default, but I like the update notes idea.
Can't we just integrate that in the versions.json that we're going to use anyways? As in

{
   latest: "2012.12.12",
   versions: [
      '2012.12.12': {
          'url': 'http://youtube-dl.org/downloads/2012.12.12/youtube-dl',
          'url.exe': 'http://youtube-dl.org/downloads/2012.12.12/youtube-dl.exe',
          'url.src': 'http://youtube-dl.org/downloads/2012.12.12/youtube-dl-src-2012.12.12.tar.gz',
          'notes': ['The default output template will switch to a more human-readable format soon. Use --id for the old behavior.']
      }
   ]
}

It's not like we'd write many notes at all.

[FiloSottile]

Yeah, I explained it badly, I meant to include it in the JSON like in your example.
So, going with the update notes!

[hickford]

Yes please, saving the download with a meaningful name would be much more useful. While it's easy enough to rename a single download by hand when you forgot --title, renaming a whole playlist of downloads is unpleasant.

[surve5]

can i show the progress bar on php page while the video gets downloaded.help me plz

[phihag]

@surve5 Please open a new issue - otherwise, it will be impossible to follow the discussion. Also, can you clarify what you mean by php page? At the very least, post a link to your code.