Issue:
Suddenly the iOS apps Watchlater which is supposed to download videos from various video sites including Youtube to device could not download any more. Then install another apps, Ultratube worked for around 2 months, then failed to search any Youtube video, just showing https://youtube.com/devicesupport. What I guess is that the apps connected to Youtube fail due to various reasons. In case it is the intention that Youtube wants to prevent iOS apps to play the videos offline probably due to affecting the hit rates of the videos, then it is a waste of time to search other apps that can download the videos at the moment and fails to achieve it after a minor change of Youtube connection api.
As my iPad has only WiFi but no 3G/4G plan, need to watch videos sometimes offline.
Solution:
Actually there is no other iOS apps I could find to do the download, thus turn to use workaround quite indirectly download the videos from Youtube to my iPad.
Use Python application youtube-dlg which is a cross-platform GUI software for youtube download, and perfectly converts the downloaded video into mp4 format.
Download Youtube videos in my OpenSUSE desktop, then upload them to Google Drive
Use iOS apps AVPlayerHD to access my Google Drive to download the videos to iPad. The beauty of this apps is not just the ability to
- download videos from Google Drive, but actually can
- stream the video directly from Google Drive, and
- organize the local videos into various customizable folders; and
- play or stream HD videos smoothly using hardware coding option
Config:
- OpenSUSE 13.1
- youtube-dlg
- AVPlayerHD apps
- Drive apps
