discogs_alert 0.0.12

Configurable, real-time alerts for your discogs wantlist

Discogs Alert

Customised, real-time alerting for your hard-to-find wantlist items.

discogs-alert enables you to set up ~real-time alerts so you get notified the moment those hard-to-find releases go on sale. The project is designed to be 'set and forget'; you customise your preferences for a particular release once, and then sit back and wait for a notification.

discogs-alert enables both global and fine-grained customisation of your preferences (incl. price thresholds, minimum seller rating, and minimum media/sleeve condition). This means you'll only be notified if a record goes on sale that really matches what you're looking for.

If you have suggestions or ideas, please reach out! I'll be maintaining this repo much more actively this year, and I'd love to continue making discogs_alert as useful as possible!

Requirements

• Python >= 3.8
• Chromedriver (if you have Google Chrome or any Chromium browser installed on your computer, you'll be fine).

Installation & Setup

You can install discogs-alert as a Python package, either via the Python Package Index (PyPI) or from source, or as a docker image from DockerHub.

Python

To install using pip:

pip install discogs-alert

Downloading and installing from source

Download the latest version of discogs-alert from PyPI:

https://pypi.org/project/discogs-alert/

You can then install it by doing the following:

$ tar xvfz discogs_alert-0.0.0.tar.gz
$ cd discogs_alert-0.0.0
$ python setup.by build
$ python setup.py install 

The last command must be executed as a privileged user if you aren't currently using a virtualenv.

Docker

Assuming you have docker installed, you can pull the latest image via

docker pull miggleball/discogs_alert:latest

NB: the discogs_alert docker image doesn't yet support M1 macs (those recent models with the ARM64 chip). Support there will hopefully be coming soon.

Setup

Before you can use this project, there are a couple more things that need to be setup.

Discogs access token

A Discogs access token allows discogs_alert to send requests to the discogs API on your behalf, as well as to increase its allowed rate of request. This token can only be used to access the music database features of the Discogs API, not the marketplace, so there is no concern that you are accidentally granting control over the buying or selling of records. You can find more information here.

To create an access token, go to your Discogs settings and click on the Developer tab. There is a button on this page to generate a new token. For now, just copy this token to your computer.

Pushbullet

This project uses Pushbullet for notifying you once a record you are searching for has gone on sale. You can choose exactly how you want to receive these notifications (i.e. on which device), but you first need to create a Pushbullet account. After signing up, make sure to install Pushbullet on all devices where you would like to receive notifications.

Once you've created an account, simply navigate to your settings page and create an access token. As before, copy this token to your computer.

NB: when using pushbullet, please note that you'll need to open the pushbullet mobile or web app once a month. If you don't, the notification service won't work, as it deems you to have a 'dead' account.

NB: support for more notification options is coming soon! Please bear with me (or open a PR!)

Creating your wantlist

There are two different ways you can create a wantlist: 1) by connecting to one of your existing Discogs lists, or 2) by creating a local JSON file. The first option is easier, faster, and fits within your regular Discogs workflow, while the latter enables more expressivity as you can specify fine-grained filters (e.g. price, media/sleeve quality) for each release (in addition to overall). I will add support for this expressivity to the Discogs List approach as soon as possible.

Discogs List

Using one of your existing Discogs lists requires only specifying the ID of the list at runtime (outlined in the usage section below). As of now, there is no fine-grained control allowed with this option, meaning the list you use should be one containing only those records about which you want to be notified immediately if they go on sale. You can set global media/sleeve condition filters, but you cannot customize this for each release separately. This approach makes it incredibly easy to add new releases to your wantlist: adding a release to the specificied list means it will automatically be searched for by your running discogs_alert jobs on its next iteration.

Local JSON

Here is an example wantlist.json file:

[
  {
    "id": 1061046,
    "display_title": "Deep² — Sphere",
    "accept_generic_sleeve": true,
    "min_media_condition": "VERY_GOOD"
  },
  {
    "id": 2247646,
    "display_title": "Charanjit Singh — Ten Ragas to a Disco Beat",
    "price_threshold": 500 
  }
]

The wantlist is a list of objects, each object representing a release. The only essential attributes are the id field, which can be found on each release's Discogs page, and the display_title, which is the name you give the release s.t. you will recognise it when you're notified.

There are a number of optional attributes that can be included for each release. The combination of all attributes applied to a given release are used as a filter, so you will only be notified if all conditions are met for a given listing item. In the above case, the user is looking for any VERY_GOOD or higher copies of the Deep² release, with no maximum price (e.g. an example scenario here is that there are currently no copies on the market, and the user wants to be notified as soon as one goes on sale). For the Charanjit Singh release, the user is looking for any copies on sale for less than €500.

NB: the currency is determined later, at runtime. This is outlined in the usage section below.

Note that all attributes relating to media and sleeve characteristics also have global values (the setting of which is discussed in usage). This means that if you want the same filters for most releases you're searching for, you do not need to specify those conditions for every single release in your wantlist.json file. You can set the values once globally (when you run the program), and then set only those per-release values that differ from the global settings. Any filters specified in your wantlist.json will override the global values.

The possible optional filters are as follows:

• price_threshold: maximum allowable price (excluding shipping)
• min_media_condition: minimum allowable media condition (one of 'POOR', 'FAIR', 'GOOD', 'GOOD_PLUS', 'VERY_GOOD', 'VERY_GOOD_PLUS', 'NEAR_MINT', or 'MINT')
• min_sleeve_condition: minimum allowable sleeve condition (one of 'POOR', 'FAIR', 'GOOD', 'GOOD_PLUS', 'VERY_GOOD', 'VERY_GOOD_PLUS', 'NEAR_MINT', or 'MINR')
• accept_generic_sleeve: boolean indicating whether you want to accept a generic sleeve
• accept_no_sleeve: boolean indicating whether you want to accept no sleeve
• accept_ungraded_sleeve: boolean indicating whether you want to accept an ungraded sleeve

Usage

discogs_alert can be run either as a Python process or as a Docker container. Regardless of which command is used, the discogs_alert service will regularly pull the releases from your wantlist, check their availability on the Discogs marketplace, and send you a notification if any release (satisfying your filters) is for sale. You should leave the service running in the background at all times to be most effective.

Python

The minimal command needed to run the discogs_alert Python package is

$ python -m discogs_alert

though that assumes the prior setting of a few environment variables: DISCOGS_TOKEN, PUSHBULLET_TOKEN, and LIST_ID or WANTLIST_PATH. The token values must be set to the values of the tokens created earlier, while the LIST_ID should be set to the ID of the Discogs list you want to use as your discogs_alert wantlist (or WANTLIST_PATH should be set to the path of a local wantlist.json file that will be used instead). If you specify both a Discogs list ID and a local wantlist path, only the latter will be used.

If you aren't sure how to set environment variables, you can instead pass these values manually using the following command

$ python -m discogs_alert -dt <discogs_access_token> -pt <pushbullet_token> --list-id <discogs_list_id>

Docker

The minimal command needed to run the discogs_alert Docker image is

$ docker run -d --env-file .env miggleball/discogs_alert:latest

where it is assumed that you have specified the three minimal environment variables outlined above (as well as any additional customizations) in an .env txt file in the current directory. Your env file should simply look as follows:

DISCOGS_TOKEN=<discogs_access_token>
PUSHBULLET_TOKEN=<pushbullet_token>
LIST_ID=<discogs_list_id>
...

The -d flag specifies that you want to "detach" from the newly created docker container meaning it will continue running in the background.

Extras

Please note that you can add to or change the contents of your wantlist (either Discogs list or local file) while the service is running; the updated list of releases will come into effect the next time the service runs.

Each time one of your releases is found, your Pushbullet account will be sent a notification with the title and the URL to the marketplace listing. As long as you don't delete the pushbullet notification, you will not be sent repeat notifications for the same listing. You can test that the notification system is working correctly by adding a release to your wantlist that you know is currently for sale.

If you want further customisation, there are a number of optional arguments and flags with which the service can be run. These optional arguments include the global versions of the conditions mentioned above (i.e. the global seller, media, and sleeve conditions) that will be applied to all releases in your wantlist by default.

For any of the following arguments, you can use either the abbreviated argument indicator (prefixed with -) or the verbose option (prefixed with --). The complete list of options, including options and default values, can be accessed at any time by running:

$ python -m discogs_alert --help

Here are the possible arguments:

• -dt --discogs-token: (str) your discogs user access token
• -pt --pushbullet-token: (str) your pushbullet token
• -lid --list-id: (int) the ID of your Discogs list (NB: either this or the -wp option are required).
• -wp --wantlist-path: (str) the relative or absolute path to your wantlist.json file (NB: either this or the -lid option are required).
• -ua --user-agent: (str) the user agent string to use for anonymous queries to discogs.com (please change this to another string similar to the default).
• -f --frequency: (int) how often you want the service to run (number of times per hour). This value must be in [1, 60] (default=60, meaning the service runs once a minute)
• -co --country: (str) the country where you are (used for things like computing shipping) (default='Germany')
• -$ --currency: (str) your preferred currency (default=EUR)
• -msr --min-seller-rating: (float) the minimum seller rating you want to accept (default=99)
• -mss --min-seller-sales: (float) the minimum number of sales your accept a seller to have (default=None)
• -mmc --min-media-condition: (str) minimum allowable media condition, as outlined above (default='VERY_GOOD')
• -msc --min-sleeve-condition: (str) minimum allowable sleeve condition, as outlined above (default='VERY_GOOD')

And here are the possible flags:

• -ags, --accept-generic-sleeve: (bool) whether or not you want to accept listings with a generic sleeve (default=true)
• -ans, --accept-no-sleeve: (bool) whether or not you want to accept listings with no sleeve (default=false)
• -aus, --accept-ungraded-sleeve: (bool) whether or not you want to accept listings with an ungraded sleeve (default=false).
• -V --verbose: (bool) use this flag if you want to run the server in verbose mode, meaning it will log updates to the command line as it runs (default=false)

Full Example

To clarify the CLI outlined above, here is a realistic example. In this case, we are replicating a user who has their wantlist.json on their Desktop and who wants verbose logs, no minimum seller rating, and a global minimum media condition of VERY_GOOD. The command to run the service in this case would be

$ python -m discogs_alert -dt <discogs_access_token> -pt <pushbullet_token> -wp ~/Desktop/wantlist.json --msr None -mmc VERY_GOOD --verbose

Running as a cron job

If you aren't running discogs_alert in the background using the docker image, another good approach is to run the process as a cron job. This uses the cron command-line utility to run the service at regular intervals.

Again, assuming you have specified the required environment variables, all you have to do is run crontab -e (to open the cronjob editing window) and append the following line to the bottom of the file:

* * * * * python -m discogs_alert -T >> <path_to_log_file>.log 2>&1

Once you save and exit the file, discogs_alert will be run every minute and it's logs will be saved to the log file you specified. You can then run tail -f <path_to_log_file>.log to check the logs of the running process.

Please refer here for more information on cron and how to use crontab.

Contributing

1. Fork (https://github.com/michaelhball/discogs_alert/fork)
2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b feature/fooBar)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -am 'Add some fooBar')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/fooBar)
5. Create a new Pull Request

Setting up the dev environment

Ideally, you should work inside a virtual environment set up for this project. Once that's the case, simply run the following two commands to install all dependencies:

• $ pip install --user poetry
• $ poetry install

And that's it! Until you want to push your changes and make a PR. When that's the case, you need to run the tests to make sure nothing has broken, which you can do by running $ poetry pytest tests.

Changelog

The complete release history for this project can be found in CHANGELOG.md.

Author

Michael Ball

License

This project is licensed under the GPL License - see the LICENSE file for details

Housekeeping

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