Twoot

Twoot is a python script that extracts tweets from a twitter feed and reposts them as toots on a Mastodon account.

UPDATE 08 OCT 2022 VERSION 2.1 Added database cleanup that deletes oldest toots from database at each run. Keep MAX_REC_COUNT (50 by default) rows in db for each twitter feed.

UPDATE 14 SEP 2022 Added information about the status of throttling applied by the Mastodon instance in the debug log. Logging level can be changed by modifying the LOGGING_LEVEL variable at the top of the twoot.py file.

UPDATE 22 AUG 2022 Fixed bug that would incorrectly mark a new tweet as a "reply to" if it quoted a tweet that is a reply-to.

UPDATE 01 JUN 2021 Added command line argument (-c) to limit the number of toots posted on the mastodon account.

UPDATE 19 DEC 2020 VERSION 2.0 Twitter's no-javascript version has been retired. Twoot has been rewritten to get content from nitter.net which is a javascript-free mirror of twitter. As a bonus (or a curse?) twoot now also supports animated GIFs.

UPDATE 05 APR 2020 VERSION 1.0. Twoot can now optionally download videos from Twitter and upload them on Mastodon.

UPDATE 17 MAR 2020 Added command line switch (-r) to also post reply-to tweets on the mastodon account. They will not be included by default anymore.

UPDATE 06 MAR 2020 Added functionality to automatically get images from tweets considered as "sensitive content"

UPDATE 15 FEB 2020 Twoot has been rewritten to make use of the mobile twitter page without JavaScript after the breaking change of last week.

Features

• Fetch timeline of given users from twitter.com
• Scrape html and formats tweets for post on mastodon
• Emojis supported
• Optionally upload videos from tweet to Mastodon
• Upload images from tweet to Mastodon
• Specify maximum age of tweet to be considered
• Specify minimum delay before considering a tweet for upload
• Remember tweets already tooted to prevent double posting
• Optionally post reply-to tweets on the mastodon account

usage

twoot.py [-h] -t <twitter account> -i <mastodon instance> -m <mastodon account>
                -p <mastodon password> [-r] [-v] [-a <max age in days)>]
                [-d <min delay (in mins>] [-c <max # of toots to post>]

arguments

Assuming that the Twitter handle is @SuperDuperBot and the Mastodon account is @superduperbot@botsin.space

Switch	Description	Example	Req
-t	twitter account name without '@'	SuperDuper	Yes
-i	Mastodon instance domain name	botsin.space	Yes
-m	Mastodon username	superduperbot	Yes
-p	Mastodon password	my_Sup3r-S4f3*pw	Yes
-v	upload videos to Mastodon	N/A	No
-r	Post reply-to tweets (ignored by default)	N/A	No
-a	Max. age of tweet to post (in days)	5	No
-d	Min. delay before posting new tweet (in minutes)	15	No
-c	Max number of toots allowed to post (cap)	1	No

When using the -v switch consider:

• whether the copyright of the content that you want to cross-post allows it
• the storage / transfer limitations of the Mastodon instance that you are posting to
• the upstream bandwidth that you may consume on your internet connection

Default max age is 1 day. Decimal values are OK.

Default min delay is 0 minutes.

installation

Make sure python3 is installed.

Twoot depends on beautifulsoup4 and Mastodon.py python modules.

Only If you plan to download videos with the -v switch, are the additional dependencies required:

• Python module youtube-dl2

pip install beautifulsoup4 Mastodon.py youtube-dl2

In your user folder, execute git clone https://gitlab.com/jeancf/twoot.git to clone repo with twoot.py script.

Add command line to crontab. For example, to run every 15 minutes starting at minute 1 of every hour and process the tweets posted in the last 5 days but at least 15 minutes ago:

1-59/15 * * * * /path/to/twoot.py -t SuperDuperBot -i botsin.space -m superduperbot -p my_Sup3r-S4f3*pw -a 5 -d 15

Background

I started twoot when tootbot stopped working. Tootbot relies on rss feeds from https://twitrss.me that broke when Twitter refreshed their web UI in July 2019.