README.md

yahoo-group-archiver

Note: Yahoo now have a "Get My Data" tool available, which may provide an alternative to this tool, although the content it provides is not known at the time of writing.

This tool archives a Yahoo group using the non-public API used by the Yahoo Groups website UI.

Features:

• Saves full email content
• Downloads attachments as separate files
• Fetch all files
• Fetch all photos
• Fetch all database tables
• Fetch all links
• Fetch all events in the calendar
• Fetch all polls

Requirements:

• Python 2.7 or 3+

Usage:

pip install -r requirements.txt
./yahoo.py -ct "<T_cookie>" -cy "<Y_cookie>" "<groupid>"

You will need to get the T and Y cookie values from an authenticated browser session.

The cookies should look like this, where someLongText and someShortText are arbitrary strings:

• T: z=someLongText&a=someLongText&sk=someLongText&ks=someLongText&kt=someLongText&ku=someLongText&d=someLongText&af=someLongText
• Y: v=1&n=someLongText&l=someShortText=someShortText&r=hp&intl=us

In Google Chrome these steps are required:

1. Go to Yahoo Groups.
2. Click the ⓘ (cicled letter i) in the address bar.
3. Click "Cookies".
4. On the Allowed tab select "Yahoo.com" followed by "Cookies" in the tree listing.
5. Select the T cookie and copy the Content field in place of <T_cookie> in the above command line.
6. Select the Y cookie and copy the Content field in place of <Y_cookie> in the above command line.

In Firefox:

1. Go to Yahoo Groups (make sure you're signed in with your account).
2. Press Shift-F9 or select the menu Tools/Web Developer/Storage Inspector.
3. Double click on the T cookie's value and copy the content in place of <T_cookie> in the above command line.
4. Double click on the Y cookie's value and copy the content in place of <Y_cookie> in the above command line.

Note: the string you paste must be surrounded by quotes.

Using the --cookie-file (or -cf) option allows you to specify a file in which the authentication cookies will be loaded and saved in.

Files will be placed into the directory structure groupname/{email,files,photos,databases}