When yt-dlp is installed but stale (or otherwise unable to fetch transcripts
for any returned videos), runs previously reported YouTube as fully
successful in two user-facing surfaces:
1. Footer (render.py): showed "N videos | M views" with no indication
that zero transcripts were captured. The "with transcripts" segment
was conditionally suppressed when the count was zero - converting
the canonical stale-binary failure mode into a silent absence at
the very surface users read for "did this work?".
2. Quality nudge (quality_nudge.py): classified YouTube as "active"
based purely on yt-dlp installation + absence of a top-level error.
Per-video transcript-fetch ratio was never inspected. A run that
returned N videos with 0 transcripts (canonical stale-binary
failure) was reported as fully active.
The engine itself logs the failure correctly at default stderr level
(`[YouTube] Got transcripts for 0/N videos (N failed)`), but that line
gets buried in 100+ lines of parallel-source progress output and is
contradicted by the success-shaped footer and nudge that follow.
This change makes both conclusion surfaces honest:
* render.py footer always renders "M/N with transcripts" so the ratio
is visible regardless of value. Zero is no longer hidden. Format is
M/N (not bare M) so the denominator is in the message and the user
does not have to cross-reference the "videos" count.
* quality_nudge.py adds a third tier between "active" and "missing":
"degraded". Triggered when yt-dlp is installed AND videos were
returned AND transcript-fetch ratio is below threshold (default 50%,
tunable via DEGRADED_TRANSCRIPT_THRESHOLD env var). Emits an
actionable nudge: "YouTube returned N videos but only M transcripts
captured. The most common cause is a stale yt-dlp binary - YouTube's
caption format changes frequently and old binaries silently fail
every transcript. Update via your package manager: scoop update
yt-dlp (Windows), brew upgrade yt-dlp (macOS), or pip install -U
yt-dlp."
* last30days.py populates youtube_videos_count and
youtube_transcripts_count in the research_results dict it passes to
compute_quality_score, enabling the new degraded check at the call
site.
Threshold rationale: 50% accommodates a few legitimate
caption-disabled videos in a multi-video result, but a stale-binary
run that fails every transcript trips the nudge cleanly.
Score impact: degradation is informational, not score-affecting.
YouTube still counts as "active" in score_pct so users do not see
their score drop for a fixable client-side issue. The nudge directs
them to their own package manager.
Tests:
* tests/test_quality_nudge.py: 6 new TestYouTubeDegraded cases cover
zero-transcripts-flags-degraded, partial-above-threshold-does-not-flag,
zero-videos-does-not-flag (no false positives on absence),
one-of-three-flags-degraded, threshold-tunable-via-config, and
degraded-does-not-affect-score.
* tests/test_render_v3.py: 4 new YoutubeFooterTranscriptRatioTests
cases cover zero-transcripts-with-videos-renders-zero-over-total
(the regression repro), partial-renders-ratio, full-renders-ratio,
and no-videos-suppresses-entire-segment.
All 29 new test cases verified GREEN with the fix and RED without it
(temp-reverted both files separately to confirm each test catches the
specific regression it asserts).
Integration validation: ran the engine against an intentionally stale
yt-dlp 2025.03.31 binary placed first on PATH. Pre-fix the footer
showed `YouTube: 3 videos | 386,815 views` (no transcript signal).
Post-fix the footer shows `YouTube: 3 videos | 386,815 views | 0/3
with transcripts` and stderr emits "Degraded: YouTube" plus the
actionable update-yt-dlp nudge.
Out of scope (deserves its own PR): exposing transcripts_captured in
the EVIDENCE FOR SYNTHESIS block so the synthesizing model can flag
degradation in prose. Larger schema-touching change.
Asserts compute_save_path_display() never returns a backslash when the
save_dir is under the user's home directory, regardless of host OS.
Reproduces the original bug on Windows (failed message before the fix:
AssertionError: '\' unexpectedly found in
'~/l30d_save_path__luu2g76\Documents\Last30Days\british-airways-middle-east-raw-v3.md'
)
and locks in the contract on POSIX hosts (passes trivially today; would
fail if anyone removes .as_posix() in the future).
Verified by temporarily reverting the fix and confirming RED, then
re-applying the fix and confirming GREEN. All 13 CliV3Tests pass.
PR #366 routes Reddit URLs found in web-search results through the public
Reddit JSON API to recover thread body + top comments (the Claude Code
WebFetch tool blocks reddit.com directly). That bypass is sound and the
fixed problem is real - but the always-on shape ignores user intent on
source gating.
A user who sets EXCLUDE_SOURCES=reddit to suppress Reddit results would
still get Reddit content smuggled back in via web-search URLs that
happen to point at reddit.com threads. This contradicts the suppression
contract that EXCLUDE_SOURCES is supposed to provide (see
lib/pipeline.available_sources where the same env var gates the
top-level Reddit source).
Add a _reddit_excluded(config) check in web_search() that mirrors the
parsing pattern from lib/pipeline (comma-separated, case-insensitive,
whitespace-tolerant). When reddit is in EXCLUDE_SOURCES, skip the
enrichment pass entirely - the web results themselves still flow
through, but they're not augmented with Reddit body/comments.
Four new tests in test_grounding_v3.py cover:
- EXCLUDE_SOURCES=reddit skips enrichment
- case-insensitive parsing matches REDDIT/Reddit/whitespace-padded/csv
- Other sources in EXCLUDE_SOURCES don't trigger the gate
- Enrichment runs normally when reddit isn't excluded
19/19 grounding tests pass.
Addresses two concerns surfaced during PR #376 review:
1. **SSH option-injection on the host value.** The original PR uses
shlex.quote() on the remote command and added a `--` option terminator
in front of the host, but neither one stops a hostile env var like
`LAST30DAYS_YT_SSH_HOST=-oProxyCommand=...` from being read in the
first place. Tighten `_ytdlp_ssh_host()` to validate the host against
`^[a-zA-Z0-9._-]+$` (plain hostname/SSH-config-alias shape: letters,
digits, dot, underscore, hyphen). Any value that doesn't match logs a
warning to stderr and returns None, so the wrap function falls back to
local execution. The `--` terminator stays as defense-in-depth for the
case where a valid host happens to start with `-`, but the regex closes
the door on the env var reaching ssh at all.
2. **Env var naming consistency.** Existing skill-internal config knobs
spell out their domain: `LAST30DAYS_X_BACKEND`, `LAST30DAYS_X_MODEL`,
`LAST30DAYS_PLANNER_MODEL`, `LAST30DAYS_RERANK_MODEL`, etc. The module
is `youtube_yt.py`, the source key is `youtube`, the function family
is `is_youtube_*()` — `YT` was the odd abbreviation out. Rename to
`LAST30DAYS_YOUTUBE_SSH_HOST` so the variable matches the user mental
model ("route YouTube fetches via residential IP") and the codebase's
spelled-out convention.
Adds three new tests:
- test_host_alias_with_dash_prefix_is_rejected (validator rejects `-o...`)
- test_host_alias_with_shell_metacharacters_is_rejected (rejects spaces, ;, $, `, &)
- test_host_alias_validator_accepts_realistic_aliases (allows FQDNs, IPs, bare aliases)
The existing test_wrap_cmd_uses_option_terminator is rewritten to use a
valid host value (since an invalid one is now filtered upstream) and
continues to assert the `--` terminator placement as defense-in-depth.
44/44 youtube_yt tests pass (40 prior + 4 net new validator tests).
Three changes from automated review on PR #376:
1. Add `--` option terminator before host in _wrap_ytdlp_cmd (P1 security)
Prevents SSH option injection if LAST30DAYS_YT_SSH_HOST were ever set
to a value starting with `-` (e.g. `-oProxyCommand=...`). Low
exploitability since the env var is user-controlled config — but the
fix is a single arg and turns a self-harm footgun into no footgun.
2. Hoist `import shlex` to module-level (P2 style)
Pure stdlib import, no reason for the deferred form. Cleaner.
3. Cache _ytdlp_ssh_host() result in fetch_transcript (P2 style)
Was being called 2-3x per video; the function is cheap (env lookup
+ strip) so this is purely about readability.
Adds test_wrap_cmd_uses_option_terminator covering the security fix
explicitly with a `-oFoo=bar` host value. Updates index assertions in
the two existing tests that check command shape (host is now at index
4, command string at 5, with `--` at 3).
Adds LAST30DAYS_YT_SSH_HOST env var (or `~/.config/last30days/.env` key).
When set, yt-dlp YouTube search invocations are wrapped as
`ssh <host> "yt-dlp ..."` so they run on a residential-IP machine.
Motivation: when last30days runs on a datacenter VPS (Hetzner,
DigitalOcean, AWS, etc.), `ytsearch:` queries return 0 results because
YouTube's bot-wall fingerprints datacenter IP ranges before any cookie
check runs. Cookies alone don't fix this — the IP reputation is checked
first. Verified across yt-dlp stable 2026.03.17 and nightly builds.
The existing fallbacks (browser cookies, residential proxy services,
excluding YouTube) all have downsides: cookies expire, proxies cost
money, exclusion loses signal. Many users with a Mac mini, Pi, or
home server can host yt-dlp on their own residential IP — this just
needs an SSH alias and a one-line env var to wire it up.
Behaviour:
- Default (env var unset): identical to before, no shape change.
- Env var set: search command list is wrapped with `ssh -o BatchMode=yes
<host> "<shell-quoted yt-dlp invocation>"`. is_ytdlp_installed()
returns True without a local PATH check (the binary lives on the
remote host).
- Transcript path: when SSH-routing is on, skips the yt-dlp transcript
path (which writes a VTT file we couldn't easily read back over SSH)
and uses the existing _fetch_transcript_direct HTTP fallback. The
timedtext API isn't bot-walled, so this works fine on datacenter IPs.
Setup pitfall documented in the function docstring: on macOS hosts
with Homebrew, `eval "$(/opt/homebrew/bin/brew shellenv zsh)"` must
live in ~/.zshenv (not just ~/.zprofile) — non-login SSH shells don't
source .zprofile, so without this `ssh macmini "yt-dlp ..."` returns
"command not found" while interactive SSH works fine.
Tests: 10 new cases covering env var read, whitespace stripping,
empty-value handling, command wrapping passthrough/active modes,
shlex quoting, is_ytdlp_installed short-circuit, and end-to-end
search_youtube wrapping. Full test suite: 0 new failures (the 14
pre-existing failures in test_store, test_watchlist, test_setup_openclaw,
test_safari_cookies, test_version_consistency are unchanged on main).
Verified live: 0 results → 4 real hits for "claude code" search from a
Hetzner VPS routed through a Mac mini exit node on Tailscale.
The Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite preview model is being discontinued on
May 25, 2026. Per Google's GA announcement, the underlying model
architecture is identical and only the model identifier needs to
be updated from `gemini-3.1-flash-lite-preview` to
`gemini-3.1-flash-lite`.
Also relaxes the `_require_gemini_31_preview` guard to accept any
`gemini-3.1-*` identifier (renamed to `_require_gemini_31`), so the
GA name and the still-preview `gemini-3.1-pro-preview` both pass.
CI was running only test_plugin_contract.py and test_version_consistency.py
(2 of 84 test files), masking 13 rotted tests across 4 clusters. The suite is
fully offline-safe (1402 tests in ~7s without network), so the narrow scope
wasn't gating integration flakiness; it was just stale. validate.yml now runs
`uv run pytest` against the full suite.
Engine fix: store.findings_from_report is rerank-first. ranked_candidates is
the primary persistence path; hackernews/polymarket are unconditionally
supplemented from items_by_source because they rank poorly but matter for
watchlists. When ranked_candidates was empty (rerank failed or skipped),
reddit, x, and every other source were silently dropped. The supplement loop
now falls back to all sources only when ranked_candidates is empty; the normal
path is unchanged.
Test repairs:
- test_store.py (6) + test_watchlist_commands.py (2): cascade from the engine fix
- test_get_new_findings_filters_by_date (latent): local-time vs SQLite UTC
flake — switched to datetime.now(timezone.utc)
- TestPollDeviceAuth (3): mock_time.time side_effect lists too short after
impl added a last_reminder call — padded timeout test, pinned others to
return_value=0 (loops terminate via urlopen, not the clock)
- test_bare_run_emits_web_promo: engine reads ~/.config/last30days/.env, so
a contributor's saved EXA/PARALLEL key made grounding "available" and
suppressed the web promo. Also missing X made the "x" promo preempt "web".
Set LAST30DAYS_CONFIG_DIR="", subprocess cwd=tmpdir, XAI_API_KEY stub.
PR #382 introduced an `effective_retries` widening on the first gaierror,
but the widening leaked: every non-DNS error path (HTTPError, non-DNS
URLError, OSError) was gated on `effective_retries - 1` and so inherited
the expanded bound. A caller passing `retries=2` who hit DNS-then-non-DNS
got 3 attempts instead of 2 — contrary to the PR description and the
fail-fast intent of small retry budgets.
Fix:
- Gate every non-DNS sleep/retry decision on the caller's original
`retries`, not the widened `effective_retries`.
- Add an explicit `break` in each non-DNS branch when the original
budget is exhausted, so the (possibly widened) outer loop bound
can't pull us into an extra attempt.
Adds two regression tests covering the DNS-then-non-DNS-URLError and
DNS-then-OSError sequences flagged in Greptile review on PR #382.
Transient DNS resolution failures (socket.gaierror, surfaced as
urllib.error.URLError with reason=gaierror) were retried with the
generic URLError handler — linear backoff (2s, 4s, 6s) and bounded by
the caller-passed `retries` parameter. For callers that pass small
retry values (e.g. lib/reddit.py::_subreddit_search uses retries=2), a
single first-attempt DNS hiccup followed by one quick retry on the
still-flaky resolver would exhaust the retry budget and wipe a whole
subreddit sweep — which the caller's broad `except Exception` then
silent-empties as `[]`.
Fix:
- Distinguish URLError-with-gaierror-reason from generic URLError via
a new `_is_dns_failure()` helper.
- For DNS failures, use exponential backoff (1s, 2s, 4s, ...) instead
of the linear default.
- For DNS failures, expand the effective retry budget to at least
MIN_DNS_RETRIES (=3) on first occurrence, so callers that passed
`retries=2` still get a meaningful retry budget for the transient
case. Non-DNS URLErrors and HTTPErrors keep the caller's value.
- DNS attempts are counted separately (`dns_attempts`) so unrelated
URLError or OSError failures within the same call don't accidentally
expand the budget further.
Reported during a community-signal pass where the Reddit subreddit
sweep silently returned zero items after a first-round transient DNS
hiccup. The fix lives at the http layer (where the retry loop is)
rather than per-source so every caller benefits.
Tests:
- Verifies a caller-passed retries=2 still gets MIN_DNS_RETRIES=3
attempts on gaierror.
- Verifies gaierror-then-success returns successfully on attempt 2.
- Verifies the exponential-backoff sleep pattern (1s, 2s) on the
retry attempts before exhaustion.
- Verifies a non-DNS URLError (ConnectionRefusedError reason) does
NOT expand the retry budget — only true DNS failures do.
All 12 http tests pass (8 baseline + 4 new). No regressions in the
broader test suite (1373 pass / 14 fail, vs 1369 pass / 14 fail on
main — the 14 failures are pre-existing and unrelated to this PR).
Twitter's edge intermittently serves an HTML anti-bot interstitial in
place of JSON when the bird-search subprocess hits a per-query rate
limit. Before this fix, that response made json.loads raise
JSONDecodeError and _run_bird_search() returned {"error": ..., "items":
[]} with the parsed exception message — silent-empty against an
orchestrator that has no way to distinguish "Twitter served HTML; retry
likely succeeds" from "no tweets matched the query."
Surfaced during a community-signal pass where a Karpathy-LLM-wiki
subquery returned zero X items, while a second identical run a few
seconds later returned full results.
Fix:
- Extract the subprocess invocation into _invoke_bird_subprocess() so
the retry loop can call it multiple times cleanly. Returns
(result, terminal_error) — terminal_error is non-None for
unrecoverable cases (subprocess timeout, spawn failure) that should
NOT be retried.
- In _run_bird_search(), wrap the json.loads parse in a retry loop
bounded by MAX_JSON_DECODE_RETRIES (=2) with JSON_DECODE_RETRY_DELAY
(=5s) between attempts.
- On non-JSON stdout, log a diagnostic that names the shape
(`looks_html`, first-80-chars stdout preview, attempt counter) so
silent-empty failures become legible in logs.
- On retry exhaustion, return an error dict whose message explicitly
names "anti-bot interstitial" as the likely cause, distinguishing
this failure from a genuine no-results case.
Subprocess timeout, spawn failure, and non-zero return-code paths are
unchanged — those are terminal and don't retry.
Tests:
- Verifies HTML-then-JSON returns success on attempt 2.
- Verifies all-HTML returns the diagnostic error dict mentioning the
anti-bot interstitial cause.
- Verifies subprocess timeout is NOT retried.
All 12 bird_x tests pass (9 baseline + 3 new).
Two related drifts surfaced while reviewing PR #399 (EXCLUDE_SOURCES) —
docs claimed several SC-backed sources required INCLUDE_SOURCES opt-in
that the code didn't actually enforce, and threads was inconsistently
gated relative to its same-key siblings.
This commit picks the "code as source of truth + EXCLUDE_SOURCES as
suppression knob" model and aligns docs to match. It also promotes
threads to the same auto-on tier as tiktok and instagram, since all
three share the SC key and per-call cost shape — there was no real
product reason for threads being opt-in while the other two weren't.
The resulting source-gating model is three-tier and intentional:
• **Auto-on if backing infra present** (suppress via EXCLUDE_SOURCES):
reddit, HN, polymarket, X, youtube, github, bluesky, truthsocial,
grounding, **tiktok, instagram, threads**
• **INCLUDE_SOURCES persistent opt-in** (cost/billing reasons):
perplexity (different paid API — OpenRouter),
tiktok_comments / youtube_comments (N× extra SC calls per video)
• **--search per-query opt-in** (relevance reasons):
pinterest (visual pins, narrow utility),
xiaohongshu (Chinese-market specific)
Changes:
- env.py: `is_threads_available()` drops the INCLUDE_SOURCES check,
now mirrors tiktok/instagram (SC key → True). Docstring updated.
- tests/test_env_v3.py: new `ThreadsAvailabilityTests` class locks in
the new contract and includes a regression guard ("INCLUDE_SOURCES
should not be needed").
- SKILL.md: lines 333-338 rewritten so the model's "Build
ACTIVE_SOURCES_LIST" checklist reflects what the engine actually
runs. Drops false INCLUDE_SOURCES requirement for
tiktok/instagram/threads; corrects pinterest to mention --search;
adds missing INCLUDE_SOURCES=perplexity requirement.
- README: same alignment for the user-facing "Everything else in v3"
section.
Note on EXCLUDE_SOURCES references in the new docs: the suppression
flag is wired up in PR #399. SKILL.md and README mention EXCLUDE_SOURCES
as the opt-out path; that prose is forward-looking until #399 lands.
The behavior changes in this PR (threads auto-on) are self-contained
and don't require #399 to function — but for users who want to suppress
the newly-auto-on threads source, #399 needs to land first.
nidhi-singh02