LiveTV

中文文档 Use Youtube live as IPTV feeds

Install

First you need to install Docker, Centos7 users can directly use the following tutorials. How To Install and Use Docker on CentOS 7

After installing Docker, you can enable LiveTV! on your local port 9000 with the following command:

docker run -d -p9000:9000 juestnow/livetv:latest

ghcr.io/qist/livetv:latest

The data file is stored inside the container in the /root/data directory, so it is recommended to use the -v command to map this directory to the host's directory.

An example of using an external storage directory is shown below.

docker run -d --name youtube --restart=always -p9000:9000 -v/mnt/data/livetv:/root/data juestnow/livetv:latest

docker run -d --name youtube --restart=always --net=host -v/opt/data/livetv:/root/data ghcr.io/qist/livetv:latest

This will open a LiveTV! container on port 9000 that uses the /mnt/data/livetv directory as storage.

PS: If you do not specify an external storage directory, LiveTV! will not be able to read the previous configuration file when it reboots.

Usage

Default password is "password".

First you need to know how to access your host from the outside, if you are using a VPS or a dedicated server, you can visit http://your_ip:9000 and you should see the following screen.

First of all, you need to click "Auto Fill" in the setting area, set the correct URL, then click "Save Config".

Then you can add a channel. After the channel is added successfully, you can play the M3U8 file from the address column.

When you use Kodi or similar player, you can consider using the M3U file URL in the first row to play, and a playlist containing all the channel information will be generated automatically.

yt-dlp document here => https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp

Troubleshooting Pull Failures

If the pull URL fails, try the following in order (from simple to more advanced):

1. First, append runtime and component parameters:

Preferred:
--js-runtimes node -f b -g {url}
Then try using：
--js-runtimes deno --remote-components ejs:npm -f b -g {url}

Notes:

• --js-runtimes node --remote-components ejs:npm enables JS-based extractors (required for some YouTube pages).
• This parameter set also works for VOD parsing.
• If deno parsing is unavailable, use node parsing.

2. If it still fails, add the player client and User-Agent:

--js-runtimes node --remote-components ejs:npm --extractor-args 'youtube:player-client=web' --add-header "User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 Chrome/120.0.0.0 Safari/537.36" -f b -g {url}
--js-runtimes node --remote-components ejs:npm --extractor-args 'youtube:player-client=android' -f b -g {url}

Cookies: How to Obtain and Configure

Some channels require login. You can provide cookies so yt-dlp can access them.

How to get cookies.txt (Netscape format)

1. Sign in to the target website in your browser (e.g., YouTube).
2. Install a browser extension that can export cookies, such as "Get cookies.txt".
3. Export cookies from the target site and copy the exported text (Netscape format).

Configure in LiveTV

1. Open the settings page and find "yt-dlp Cookies Content (optional)".
2. Paste the cookies.txt content and save.
3. Leave it empty and save to disable cookies.

Security Notes

• Cookies are saved to LIVETV_DATADIR/cookies.txt with permission 600.
• Only paste-in content is supported; custom paths or file uploads are not allowed to avoid path risks.

New Features

1. Customizable Playlist Base Name

• The setting is a base name without extension. Default: lives
• Actual endpoints are derived from the base name:
  • M3U: /{base}.m3u (e.g., /lives.m3u)
  • TXT: /{base}.txt (e.g., /lives.txt)
• The form label reflects “no extension”. Changes take effect immediately

2. Customizable Channel Parameter

• Default: c (e.g., live.m3u8?c=1)
• Can be customized in the configuration management section

3. Group Support (standard M3U groups)

• Every channel includes group-title, default group is youtube
• Group input uses a datalist with suggestions and no prefilled value; clicking shows all existing groups
• Backend introduces a separate groups table; saving a channel auto-creates/associates the group by name for better querying
• The special youtube group can map to multiple standard titles via config key youtube_m3u_groups (default YouTube). If needed, adjust this key in the database config table

4. TXT Playlist

• TXT entry is shown on the index page
• TXT shares the same base name as M3U (see “Playlist Base Name”)
• TXT format is grouped; each group starts with GroupName,#genre#

5. Custom Channel IDs

• Supports custom string IDs for channels (e.g., "news", "sports")
• Each channel can have a unique custom ID
• Displayed in the channel list

6. Log Output Mode

• Default: Standard output only
• Environment variable LIVETV_LOG_FILE=1 enables file logging
• Logs stored in ./data/livetv.log

7. Error Handling for Scheduled Caching

• Tracks failed channels
• Puts channels in cooldown after 3 consecutive failures
• Automatically retries after 24-hour cooldown

8. Automatic Directory Creation

• Creates data directory if it doesn't exist
• Ensures proper storage structure for logs and database

9. Version Number

• Displays version information on startup
• Current version: 2.0.0

10. Dynamic yt-dlp Parameters

• Changes to ytdl_cmd / ytdl_args / ytdl_cookies / ytdl_timeout take effect without restart
• Cache is cleared automatically so new parameters apply immediately

11. Optional Token Validation (Query-only, local check)

• Purpose: prevent others from using your playlist/stream links by requiring a shared token in the query string
• Config keys (Config Manager):
  • token_enabled: 0 (default, off) / 1 (on)
  • token_param: default token
  • token_value: default livetv
• Protected endpoints: playlists (/{base}.m3u, /{base}.txt) and stream endpoints (/live.m3u8, /live.ts, /cache.txt)
• Notes:
  • Token is validated only by this server and is NOT forwarded to upstream
  • When enabled, generated links (including proxied TS links inside M3U8) automatically include the token
  • This is not a replacement for proper authentication; use HTTPS and keep the token private

Example:

• http://your_host:9000/lives.m3u?token=livetv

Document Translate by DeepL

nginx proxy set

upstream  youtube {
        least_conn;
        server 127.0.0.1:9000 max_fails=3 fail_timeout=30s;
        keepalive 1000;
}

server {
    listen 80;
    server_name www.xxx.com;
     location / {
        proxy_pass http://youtube;
        proxy_redirect     off;
        proxy_set_header   Host $host;
        proxy_set_header   X-Real-IP    $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header   X-Forwarded-For  $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_next_upstream error timeout invalid_header http_502 http_503 http_504;
        proxy_max_temp_file_size 0;
        proxy_connect_timeout      90;
        proxy_send_timeout         90;
        proxy_read_timeout         90;
        proxy_buffer_size          4k;
        proxy_buffers              4 32k;
        proxy_busy_buffers_size    64k;
        proxy_temp_file_write_size 64k;
        proxy_http_version 1.1;
        proxy_set_header Accept-Encoding "";
   }
}