7.4 KiB
Twoot
Twoot is a python script that mirrors tweets from a twitter account to a Mastodon account. It is simple to set-up on a local machine, configurable and feature-rich.
UPDATE 11 DEC 2022 VERSION 3.1 HOTFIX
- Added missing
default.tomlfile - Corrected a bug that could cause an infinity loop when log file is empty
VERSION 3.0 brings some important changes and new features:
- Only potentially breaking change: If you are using a version of python < 3.11 you need to install the
tomlimodule - Twoot can be configured with a config file in TOML format. Check
default.tomlfor details - Domain susbtitution can be configured in the config file to replace links to Twitter, Youtube and Reddit domains with alternatives (e.g. Nitter, Invidious and teddit respectively)
- A footer line can be specified in the config file that gets added to all toots (with e.g. tags)
- Added option to not add reference to "Original tweet" at the bottom of toots
- A password must be provided with
-pon the command-line for the first run only. After that it is no longer required. - The verbosity of logging messages can be set in the config file with
log_level=. - Config file option
log_days =specifies how long to keep log messages in file. Older messages are deleted.
Previous updates can be found in CHANGELOG.
Features
- Fetch timeline of given user from twitter.com (through nitter instance)
- Scrape html and format tweets for post on mastodon
- Emojis supported
- Upload images from tweet to Mastodon
- Optionally upload videos 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
- Optionally ignore retweets
- Allows rate-limiting posts to Mastodon instance
- Removal of redirections (e.g. reveal destination of short URLs)
- Removal of trackers from URLs
- Domain substitution for Twitter, Youtube and Reddit domains (e.g. Nitter, Invidious and teddit respectively)
- Optional footer line to add tags at bottom of toot
Usage
twoot.py [-h] [-f <.toml config file>] [-t <twitter account>] [-i <mastodon instance>]
[-m <mastodon account>] [-p <mastodon password>] [-r] [-s] [-l] [-u] [-v] [-o]
[-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 sd@example.com on instance masto.space:
| Switch | Description | Example | Required |
|---|---|---|---|
| -f | path of .toml file with configuration |
SuperDuper.toml |
No |
| -t | twitter account name without '@' | SuperDuper |
If no config file |
| -i | Mastodon instance domain name | masto.space |
If no config file |
| -m | Mastodon username | sd@example.com |
If no config file |
| -p | Mastodon password | my_Sup3r-S4f3*pw |
Once at first run |
| -v | Upload videos to Mastodon | N/A | No |
| -o | Do not add "Original tweet" line | N/A | No |
| -r | Post reply-to tweets (ignored by default) | N/A | No |
| -s | Skip retweets (posted by default) | N/A | No |
| -l | Remove link redirections | N/A | No |
| -u | Remove trackers from URLs | N/A | No |
| -a | Max. age of tweet to post (in days) | 5 |
No |
| -d | Min. age before posting new tweet (in minutes) | 15 |
No |
| -c | Max number of toots allowed to post (cap) | 1 |
No |
Notes
Password
A password must be provided for the first run only. Once twoot has connected successfully to the
Mastodon host, an access token is saved in a .secret file named after the mastodon account,
and a password is no longer necessary (command-line switch -p is not longer required).
Config file
A default.toml file is provided to be used as template. If -f is used to specify a config file
to use, all the other command-line parameters are ignored, except -p (password) if provided.
Removing redirected links
-l will follow every link included in the tweet and replace them with the url that the
resource is directly dowmnloaded from (if applicable). e.g. bit.ly/xxyyyzz -> example.com
Every link visit can take up to 5 sec (timeout) therefore this option will slow down
tweet processing.
If you are interested by tracker removal (-u) you should also select redirection removal
as trackers are often hidden behind the redirection of a short URL.
Uploading videos
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
Rate control
Default max age is 1 day. Decimal values are OK.
Default min delay is 0 minutes.
No limitation is applied to the number of toots uploaded if -c is not specified.
Installation
Make sure python3 is installed.
Twoot depends on beautifulsoup4 and Mastodon.py python modules. Additionally, if you are using
a version of python < 3.11 you also need to install the tomli module.
Only If you plan to download videos with the -v switch, are the additional dependencies required:
- Python module
youtube-dl2 - ffmpeg (installed with the package manager of your distribution)
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 SuperDuper -i masto.space -m sd@example.com -p my_Sup3r-S4f3*pw -a 5 -d 15
Examples
Twoot is known to be used for the following feeds (older first):
- @todayilearned@botsin.space
- @moznews@noc.social
- @hackster_io@noc.social
- @cnxsoft@noc.social
- @unrealengine@noc.social
- @phoronix@noc.social
- @uanews@fed.celp.de
Background
I started twoot when tootbotstopped working. Tootbot relied on RSS feeds from https://twitrss.methat broke when Twitter refreshed their web UI in July 2019.