lmd-dl

A free and open source download manager for subscribers of the German edition of Le Monde Diplomatique.

Why lmd-dl?

I enjoy reading (or listening) to the German edition of Le Monde Diplomatique. However, using the website https://monde-diplomatique.de/digitale-formate in order to download the latest issues in my preferred file formats is not enjoyable at all. The software lmd-dl tries to make LMD subscriptions more user friendly.

Get lmd-dl

You can clone the repository from Github:

git clone https://github.com/hollma/lmd-dl.git

Usage

Firstly, edit src/config.ini. Initially, the config looks like this:

[CREDENTIALS]
username = change_me
password = change_me

[FORMATS]
pdf    = yes
pdfz   = yes
epub   = yes
epubt  = yes
ascii  = yes
asciiz = yes
html   = yes
mp3    = yes

[PATHS]
cache_dir  = /path/to/the/cache/directory
output_dir = /path/to/the/output/directory

[DOWNLOAD_OPTIONS]
issue_count = 1

Replace username and password with your credentials. Moreover, enter valid directory paths in the PATHS section. Modify the remaining options according to your own preferences.

Run python3 lmd-dl.py -h in order to show the help option.

usage: lmd-dl [-h] [--username USERNAME] [--password PASSWORD] [--pdf] [--pdfz] [--epub] [--epubt] [--ascii] [--asciiz] [--html] [--mp3] [-c COUNT]

A free and open source download manager for subscribers of the German edition of Le Monde Diplomatique.

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit

Authentication information:
  --username USERNAME   Your username
  --password PASSWORD   Your password

Supported filetypes:
  --pdf                 Download LMD as pdf
  --pdfz                Download LMD as pdf (zipped)
  --epub                Download LMD as epub
  --epubt               Download LMD as epub (text-only)
  --ascii               Download LMD as txt
  --asciiz              Download LMD as txt (zipped)
  --html                Download LMD as html (zipped)
  --mp3                 Download LMD as mp3 (zipped)

Download options:
  -c COUNT, --count COUNT
                        Download the <count> most recent issues of Le Monde Diplomatique.

Get the most recent version at https://github.com/hollma/lmd-dl.

If everything is set up, run python3 lmd-dl.py in order to download the most recent issues of Le Monde Diplomatique to the cache directory (see src/config.ini).

TODO

• further processing of the cached files (extract zip files, ...)

Technical background

Downloading the latest LMD issue works like this.

You visit the website https://monde-diplomatique.de/digitale-formate.

Then you choose your preferred file format, for example, PDF.

If you click on "Auswahl als Liste" you will see a list of the latest issues.

Downloading an issue works like this. You send a HTTP GET request to the server.

The server's response contains the HTTP status code 200 and the requested file if you have been authenticated successfully. Otherwise the server responds with the status code 403 (Not Authorized). Now you choose a directory for saving the file (or your browser does it for you).

This can also be done using curl:

NAME=myusername
PASS=mypassword
curl -u $NAME:$PASS 'https://dl.monde-diplomatique.de/ascii/id/lmd_2023_10_12.120843.txt'

The goal of lmd-dl to automate this process.