046-scraping-the-billboard/docs/wiki/Setup-and-Run.md

Setup and Run

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What you need

• Python 3.13 or later.
• For steps 2 to 4: a Google account and Firefox.

Create the virtual environment

python -m venv .venv

Activate it. On Windows PowerShell:

.venv\Scripts\Activate.ps1

On Linux and macOS:

source .venv/bin/activate

Upgrade pip and install the project:

python -m pip install --upgrade pip
python -m pip install -e ".[dev]"

Create browser.json

ytmusicapi has no API key. It reuses the login of your browser, so you copy the request headers of a logged-in session once.

1. Open Firefox and go to https://music.youtube.com, logged in.
2. Open the developer tools (Ctrl+Shift+I, on macOS Cmd+Option+I) and choose Network.
3. Type browse in the filter, pick a successful browse?... request, right-click it and choose Copy Value, then Copy Request Headers.
4. Run ytmusicapi browser in the project folder and paste the headers. Finish with Ctrl+D (Ctrl+Z and Enter on Windows). On macOS run pbpaste | ytmusicapi browser.

The file contains your cookies: it is ignored by git and must never be shared. The cookies expire after a while; repeat the steps for a fresh file.

If --check-login says Expecting value, the file holds entries that are not request headers (a Chrome copy can add Request URL, Decoded, music.youtube.com, a path entry or content-encoding). Copy only the Request Headers block, or use Firefox's Copy Request Headers, and create the file again.

Run

python -m musical_time_machine --list-only      # step 1: print the chart
python -m musical_time_machine --check-login    # step 2: count your playlists
python -m musical_time_machine --create-playlist  # step 3: create the playlist
python -m musical_time_machine                  # step 4: the full program

The date format is YYYY-MM-DD; use a date that Bakeboard has, for example 2026-04-18.

Test

python -m pytest

The tests need no network and no account.