Web Import

Bayanat can import media directly from a public URL. Paste a link to a video or audio post and Bayanat downloads it in the background (using yt-dlp) and attaches it to a new Bulletin.

This is distinct from Data Import, which loads spreadsheets in bulk.

Supported Sources

Hundreds of sites are supported, including YouTube, Twitter/X, Facebook, and Telegram. See yt-dlp's supported sites list.

Enabling Web Import

Web import is configured under System Administration → Web import. Toggle it on to reveal three settings:

Setting	Purpose
Web import proxy	Route downloads through a proxy. Leave blank for a direct connection.
Allowed domains	A safety list of domains media may be imported from. URLs outside this list are rejected.
Web import cookies	Login cookies for sites that require authentication. Stored as a secret and masked after saving.

Changes apply on save

Saving the form reloads Bayanat automatically (a brief "Restarting..." screen appears and clears within a minute). No manual restart is needed.

Proxy

A proxy routes downloads through a different network, which helps when a source is geo-blocked or rate-limiting your server's IP. The value is a single address in the form scheme://host:port. A port is always required.

Supported schemes: http, https, socks4, socks5, socks5h. Add credentials in front of the host if needed:

socks5h://username:password@proxy.example.com:1080

Easiest option: a local Tor relay

Installing Tor on the Bayanat server gives you a working SOCKS proxy with no account or extra configuration. The package starts a background service that listens on port 9050 automatically.

sudo apt update && sudo apt install -y tor

Then set the proxy to:

socks5h://127.0.0.1:9050

socks5 vs socks5h

Prefer socks5h:// for Tor: the proxy resolves the destination hostname, rather than your server doing the lookup first.

WARNING

Tor exit nodes are themselves often blocked by large platforms (YouTube may show CAPTCHAs), and Tor is slower than a direct connection. It is excellent for censored or geo-blocked material and for hiding the server's IP, but it is not a universal fix. A commercial residential proxy is the alternative when a platform blocks Tor.

Cookies

Some media is private, age-restricted, or members-only, and the source serves it only to a logged-in session. Providing cookies lets Bayanat download as if it were that logged-in browser. Bayanat first tries without cookies and only retries with them if the download is rejected for authentication.

Use a throwaway account

Cookies grant access to whatever account they came from. Always export them from a dedicated, disposable archiving account, never a personal or organisational primary account.

Cookies must be in Netscape format (the classic cookies.txt layout, tab-separated). Export them with a "Get cookies.txt" browser extension while logged in to the source site, then paste the file contents into the Web import cookies field.

# domain        flag  path  secure  expiry      name                value
.youtube.com    TRUE  /     TRUE    1735689600  VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE  CgtadGVzdGluZ...

Cookies expire

The expiry column is a date. If logins that worked before start failing, your cookies have likely expired. Log in again, re-export, and paste the fresh values.

How It Works

1. You submit a URL; Bayanat checks its domain against Allowed domains.
2. A background worker downloads the media via yt-dlp, applying the proxy if set.
3. If the download is rejected for authentication, it retries using your cookies.
4. On success the media is stored and attached to a new Bulletin, and you receive a notification.

Configuration

See Configuration for full setup details.