How to easily tell the (protected) chat message url

[suntong]

Download (protected) chat files from message urls:
tdl dl -u https://t.me/tdl/1 -u https://t.me/tdl/2

So how to get such (protected) chat message url like above? (I poked around in my own chats/groups but was never able to figure it out from the UI...) thx.

[iyear]

1. Export the history you need via tdl chat export. For more information:https:/iyear/tdl/blob/master/docs/desktop_export.md
2. Use tdl dl -f EXPORTED_FILE to download the media.

But frankly, it's still a lot of work. I've thought about making a simple TUI to simply browse the history, but that would require research and time.

[suntong]

Hmm..., there should be a way to get how many (total) messages have been sent in a group/channel, right?

If so, output that number in tdl chat ls, then at least for the last several messages of a group/channel, we can construct the urls ourselves.

[iyear]

Yes. Chat utils are rather rudimentary at the moment. Do you have better suggestions?

[suntong]

So, is there any way to get how many (total) messages have been sent in a group/channel?

[iyear]

No. You can try exporting using tdl chat export --time. But none of these methods are elegant. I will add the max message id in the next version of tdl chat export as a temp solution.

I'm building TUI that can be used to visually export chat links. Do you have better ideas or suggestions? Thanks!

[suntong]

I will add the max message id in the next version of tdl chat export as a temp solution.

Thanks, yeah, this is the easiest/quickest fix for a working solution, albeit not very elegant, as we still have to construct the urls ourselves. Or,

Maybe add another cli sub-command instead, getlast or something, so that it'll output the last message url according to the dl format, based on the max message id. Else, just output it after each group/channel in tdl chat ls without introducing another cli sub-command.

That might be a more helpful solution.

[iyear]

Looks like a better solution. Thanks!

[iyear]

The new version has been released, feel free to try it or reopen the issue.

[suntong]

So I tried it with one of my group and got this:

{"id":608310358,"messages":[{"id":678251,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":678250,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":678249,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":677922,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":677921,"type":"message","file":"0"}]}

So,

• what's the last message url according to the tdl dl format? Is it https://t.me/c/608310358/678251? Why TG says that I have no access to my own group from that url?
• why there is such a huge skipping in the message ids (over 320, from 678249 down to 677922)? I didn't delete any of the messages in that group.

To illustrate it, I got into a group that we both are in, and the last 15 message ids are:

{"id":1174669987,"messages":[{"id":39976,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39974,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39971,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39966,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39916,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39905,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39885,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39884,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39883,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39882,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39881,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39876,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39874,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39873,"type":"message","file":"0"},{"id":39869,"type":"message","file":"0"}]}

As we can see there is a skip between 39976 and 39974, yet if I construct a message url of https://t.me/c/1174669987/39975, that url exist and message accessible.

Moreover, the 39976 is not the last message id. There are still 3 more messages after it, as we speak.

Please double-check.

[iyear]

• tdl export only count messages that contains media, instead of all messages.
• tdl export should be used with tdl dl -f

So, workflow is

tdl export xxxxx -o export.json
tdl dl -f export.json

See README download section for details.