how to update software not in repo

[timbuck2]

So youtube changed their api or something and the youtube-dl version in LL 5.4 (2020.03.24-1) doesn't work anymore.  This version is over a year old and out of date.  There is a new 2021.05.16 which is the current version.

How would I install this new version on my system when it is not in the repo provided by LL?  Do I have to uninstall the repo version and build the current version manually?  Any help would be appreciated.

[trinidad]

Be advised You-Tube is in a state of flux these days over changes in EU copyright law, and I expect it to continue to be annoying to the free software community. You can use snapd to install the latest version for Ubuntu 20.x. See the link.
https://snapcraft.io/install/youtube-dl/ubuntu
TC

[robert2019]

HI timbuck2,
You might also try

sudo youtube-dl -U
enter your password

To verify it got updated code now:
youtube-dl --version

Hope it helps.

[timbuck2]

Be advised You-Tube is in a state of flux these days over changes in EU copyright law, and I expect it to continue to be annoying to the free software community. You can use snapd to install the latest version for Ubuntu 20.x. See the link.
https://snapcraft.io/install/youtube-dl/ubuntu
TC

Ok, I will check the link and read about it.  Thanks for the tip.

HI timbuck2,
You might also try

sudo youtube-dl -U
enter your password

To verify it got updated code now:
youtube-dl --version

Hope it helps.

Yes, I had tried that first before I posted here.  I got the following message when I tried:

Code:

youtube-dl: error: youtube-dl's self-update mechanism is disabled on Debian.
Please update youtube-dl using apt(8).
See https://packages.debian.org/sid/youtube-dl for the latest packaged version.

[timbuck2]

Ok, I installed snapd (it is not installed by default on LL 5.4) and ran the command to install youtube-dl with it (after completely removing the older one in synaptics I had installed previously).

Code:

sudo snap install youtube-dl

This resulted in version 2021.01.16 being installed which is newer than the one in synaptics, but not the newest 2021.05.16.

"youtube-dl -U" still won't update it and replies:

Code:

It looks like you installed youtube-dl with a package manager, pip, setup.py or a tarball. Please use that to update.

Do I need to download and compile the newest version manually?

[valtam]

[timbuck2]

Ok, I give up Jerry, how did you do that?  hrug

When I run the same command I get:

Code:

youtube-dl: error: youtube-dl's self-update mechanism is disabled on Debian.
Please update youtube-dl using apt(8).
See https://packages.debian.org/sid/youtube-dl for the latest packaged version.

[valtam]

You need to reverse what ever method you installed it with in the first place. Then start fresh with this...

Code:

sudo curl -L https://yt-dl.org/downloads/latest/youtube-dl -o /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
sudo chmod a+rx /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl

Then updates are simply..

Code:

sudo youtube-dl --update

[timbuck2]

You need to reverse what ever method you installed it with in the first place. Then start fresh with this...

Code:

sudo curl -L https://yt-dl.org/downloads/latest/youtube-dl -o /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
sudo chmod a+rx /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl

Then updates are simply..

Code:

sudo youtube-dl --update

Ok, nice...so I uninstalled the version I had and then used the commands you posted to install from yt-dl.org.  Afterwards, I got the error when trying to --update or --version the program.

Code:

/usr/bin/env: ‘python’: No such file or directory

I was like what?  Isn't python installed by default on every system these days?  hrug

But I went ahead and tried this:

Code:

sudo apt-get install python

And it installed "python-is-python2" package and now it works and youtube-dl is up to date.

[Moltke]

I know it's been marked as solved and everything, but I just wanted to add that this /usr/bin/env: ‘python’: No such file or directory message error, doesn't have to do with python not being installed, but youtube-dl still looking for python2, which is deprecated and that's why when you installed the pkg python-is-python2 youtube-dl worked. You can verify with

Code:

cat $(which youtube-dl)

for python3 you should see

Code:

 moltke  ~  cat $(which youtube-dl)
#!/usr/bin/python3

if you instead see this

Code:

#!/usr/bin/env python

which you probably will, then youtube-dl is indeed looking for python2. This pkg http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ubuntu/...u1_all.deb has that line set properly pointing to python3.

Also, this

Code:

youtube-dl: error: youtube-dl's self-update mechanism is disabled on Debian.
Please update youtube-dl using apt(8).
See https://packages.debian.org/sid/youtube-dl for the latest packaged version.

Is because of youtube api changes made by google, which they do quite often.