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FILE: README.md

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🌟 YouTube Comment Scraper

⚡ Instant audience insights — collect, analyze, and export YouTube comments with zero friction.

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📖 Summary

A production-ready Apify Actor that extracts structured YouTube comments quickly and reliably. Ideal for research, marketing, sentiment analysis, and trend detection — plug-and-play in Apify Console.

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💡 Use cases / When to use

• Research & academic analysis (qualitative + quantitative).
• Sentiment analysis and brand monitoring.
• Creator & community engagement insights.
• Training data collection for NLP models.

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⚡ Quick Start (Console — one click)

1. Open this Actor in Apify Console.
2. Paste your YouTube video URL(s) into startUrls.
3. Click Run — results appear in the default dataset in seconds.

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⚙️ Quick Start (CLI & API)

CLI

$apify run -p input.json

Python (apify-client)

from apify_client import ApifyClient
client = ApifyClient('<APIFY_TOKEN>')
run = client.actor('your-actor-id').call(run_input={
    'startUrls': ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abcd1234'],
    'maxComments': 100,
    'getAllComments': False,
    'sortBy': 'top'
})
print('Dataset ID:', run['defaultDatasetId'])

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📝 Inputs (fields & schema highlights)

Always use JSON input for Console / CLI / API.

• startUrls (array | required) — List of YouTube video URLs or objects with url fields.
• maxComments (integer | optional) — Max comments per video (use with getAllComments=false).
• getAllComments (boolean | optional) — When true, fetches all available comments.
• sortBy (string | optional) — top, newest, or oldest.
• proxyConfig (object | optional) — Proxy settings (e.g., { "useApifyProxy": true }).

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⚙️ Configuration (Quick reference)

🔑 Name	📝 Type	❓ Required	⚙️ Default	📌 Example	🧠 Notes
startUrls	array	✅ Yes	null	["https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abcd1234"]	Primary input — required.
maxComments	integer	❌ No	null	200	Limits results when getAllComments is false.
getAllComments	boolean	❌ No	false	true	Toggle full extraction.
sortBy	string	❌ No	"top"	"newest"	Sorting preference.
proxyConfig	object	⚙️ Optional	{}	{"useApifyProxy": true}	Proxy options for network reliability.

Console mini-example: Paste this into Input and click Run

{ "startUrls": ["https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abcd1234"], "maxComments": 50 }

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📄 Outputs (dataset / KV examples)

Each dataset item represents one comment with structured fields.

Example output item:

{
  "cid": "Ugxyz123abc",
  "author": "Jane Doe",
  "text": "Great tutorial — helped me a lot!",
  "votes": 124,
  "time_text": "2 days ago",
  "time_unix": 1716239023,
  "video_id": "abcd1234",
  "video_url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abcd1234",
  "total_available_comments": 523
}

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🔑 Environment Variables

Use placeholders for secrets.

• APIFY_TOKEN: <APIFY_TOKEN> — required for API/CLI runs.
• HTTP_PROXY: http://<PROXY_USER:PASS@HOST:PORT> — optional.
• HTTPS_PROXY: https://<PROXY_USER:PASS@HOST:PORT> — optional.

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▶️ How to Run (step-by-step)

1. Console — Paste JSON input and click Run. Results in default dataset.
2. CLI — apify run -p input.json.
3. API — Use apify-client to call the actor; fetch defaultDatasetId for results.

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⏰ Scheduling & Webhooks

• Use Apify Schedules to run automatically (hourly/daily).
• Attach Webhooks to trigger downstream processes (e.g., downstream ML or dashboards).

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🕾️ Logs & Troubleshooting

Common messages & quick fixes

• No startUrls provided — Add valid YouTube URLs in startUrls.
• Empty output → video may be private or comments disabled.
• Rate-limiting / network errors → enable proxyConfig or Apify Proxy.

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🔒 Permissions & Storage notes

• Outputs are stored in the Apify default dataset.
• No personal credentials are stored in plaintext — always use secrets.
• Privacy-safe: collects public comments only; follow YouTube terms of service.

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🔟 Changelog / Versioning tip

• v1.0 — Initial production-ready release.
• Versioning tip: bump major for breaking changes to input schema.

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🖌 Notes / TODOs

• TODO: Consider proxy rotation for large-scale scraping — main.py performs network calls.
• TODO: Add optional post-processing hooks (e.g., sentiment flag) — non-breaking enhancement.

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🌍 Proxy Configuration

If you encounter network issues or rate limits, enable Apify Proxy or set custom proxies.

Enable Apify Proxy (Console) — toggle proxyConfig.useApifyProxy to true.

Custom proxy example

{ "proxyConfig": { "proxyUrls": ["http://<PROXY_USER:PASS@HOST:PORT"] } }

Env vars

HTTP_PROXY=http://<PROXY_USER:PASS@HOST:PORT>
HTTPS_PROXY=https://<PROXY_USER:PASS@HOST:PORT>

Remember to store credentials as Apify secrets, not in plain input. TODO: Consider proxy rotation for large-scale scraping.

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📚 References

• Apify Actor README Guidelines — official docs.
• Input/Output schema — official docs.
• Apify CLI & API docs — official docs.

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🤔 What I inferred from main.py

• Actor extracts YouTube comments from provided video URLs.
• Supports maxComments, getAllComments, and sortBy inputs.
• Async architecture for efficient fetching.
• Network activity detected → Proxy guidance included.

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Run this Actor on Apify Console — get instant results in seconds.

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FILE: input.example.json

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{ "startUrls": [ "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abcd1234", "https://youtu.be/wxyz5678" ], "maxComments": 100, "getAllComments": false, "sortBy": "top", "proxyConfig": { "useApifyProxy": true } }

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FILE: CONFIG.md

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CONFIG.md — Quick configuration & tips

Purpose

Small reference for operators deploying this actor at scale.

Important notes

• Input schema expects startUrls (array). Supports both full YouTube links and shortened youtu.be links.
• For large runs, set getAllComments to true and consider using Apify Proxy.
• Keep maxComments if you want a controlled result set for sampling.

Troubleshooting tips

• If dataset is empty, verify the video is public and has comments enabled.
• Use maxComments to reduce runtime and avoid transient rate limits.

Security

• Always keep APIFY_TOKEN and proxy credentials in Apify secrets.
• Do not store sensitive credentials in input JSON.

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