How to read chat comments on someone else's live stream video?

srk3141 · January 27, 2019, 7:01pm

I am trying to build a small application in which users can input a channel id and see some metrics based on the chat of a live video. My specific question is, Is there a reference in the API or a way to use IRC API to read chat messages for a given channel or id?

BarryCarlyon · January 27, 2019, 8:55pm

You would have to connect to chat via IRC and read and store messages in real time.

There is no historical data api’s available for chat.

Rosuav · February 4, 2019, 2:23pm

You can’t get that via IRC, but “chat replay” is available for VODs in the v5 API. I don’t think it’s available in Helix yet though. Here’s an example of downloading all chat and saving it into a JSON file:

github.com

Rosuav/MegaClip/blob/master/megaclip.py#L53


			if info["metadata"]["status"] == "recording":
				# TODO: Allow the cache to be used if and only if it's sufficient
				# For now, if the video was still being recorded last time, we'll
				# just ignore the cache.
				if not cache_only: raise FileNotFoundError # Pretend that the file actually didn't exist
			return info
	except FileNotFoundError:
		if cache_only: raise
		# It's not downloaded. Let's make it.
		pass # De-chain any exceptions
	import requests # ImportError? "python3 -m pip install requests"
	import keys # ImportError? Look at keys_sample.py and follow the instructions.
	params = {"client_id": keys.client_id}
	r = requests.get("https://api.twitch.tv/v5/videos/%s" % video, params)
	r.raise_for_status()
	metadata = r.json()
	comments = []
	params["cursor"] = ""
	while params["cursor"] is not None:
		r = requests.get("https://api.twitch.tv/v5/videos/%s/comments" % video, params)
		r.raise_for_status()

Be aware that the chat replay might include messages that were added to the VOD itself, and will not include any messages that were purged as a result of moderator action.

BarryCarlyon · February 4, 2019, 2:29pm

Chat replay is an undocumented unsupported end point and ought not to be used by third parties

Rosuav · February 4, 2019, 2:32pm

Oh. Thanks for that info. It’d be well worth having an actual supported way to do this; are there any plans?

BarryCarlyon · February 4, 2019, 2:39pm

There is nothing in the road map at this time

system · March 6, 2019, 2:52pm

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