markdown-image-downloader 0.1.9

A tool to download and organize images referenced in markdown files

Markdown Image Downloader

A Python package that automatically downloads and manages images referenced in markdown files, storing them locally in an _attachments folder. This script is particularly useful for maintaining local copies of images in markdown documentation and ensuring consistent image availability.

Or just for Obsidian's Readwise export, which I made this for.

Previously hosted on GitHub Gist. Moved here to allow for easier maintenance and contributions, if any. Also published to PyPI for convenience.

Requirements

Python 3.9+

Installation

Install directly from PyPI using pip:

pip install markdown-image-downloader

Usage

Run the package from the command line, providing the folder containing your markdown files as an argument:

markdown-image-downloader <folder_name>

Example

markdown-image-downloader ../Readwise/Articles

This will:

1. Scan all markdown files in the ../Readwise/Articles folder
2. Download any images referenced in the markdown files
3. Store them in ../Readwise/Articles/_attachments
4. Update the markdown files to reference the local copies

Features

• Uses custom HTTP headers to avoid download blocks
• Falls back to system curl to bypass Cloudflare and other bot-detection challenges
• Unwraps nested proxy CDN URLs (Substack, Omnivore, Microlink) to download from the original source
• Downloads images from URLs referenced in markdown files
• Creates local copies of images in an _attachments directory
• Automatically updates links in the markdown files with new local image paths
• Compresses large images to reduce storage space
• Supports multithreaded concurrent downloads
• Uses rate limit to prevent server overload and download blocks
• Progress bar for tracking download status
• Maintains detailed logging of error operations
• Sanitizes filenames for cross-platform compatibility
• Supports for rerunning the script without re-downloading images
• Correctly handles image URLs containing parentheses (e.g. thumbor filters:focal(...))

How It Works

1. Scanning: The script scans all .md files in the specified folder for image references, using a balanced-parentheses parser so that URLs with () inside them are captured correctly.
2. Downloading: For each image URL found:
   • Unwraps known CDN proxy URLs (Substack, Omnivore, Microlink) to get the real origin URL
   • Downloads the image if it's not already in _attachments
   • Falls back to system curl when urllib is blocked by Cloudflare / bot-protection (HTTP 403, 429, etc.)
   • Compresses images larger than 500KB while maintaining quality
   • Generates unique filenames to avoid collisions
3. Organization: Creates an _attachments folder to store all images
4. Updating: Updates markdown files to reference the local copies in _attachments

Features in Detail

Image Compression

• Automatically compresses large images
• Maintains reasonable quality through progressive compression
• Converts RGBA images to RGB with white background

Filename Handling

• Preserves original filenames
• Sanitizes filenames for cross-platform compatibility

Concurrent Processing

• Uses ThreadPoolExecutor for parallel downloads
• Includes progress bar for tracking downloads
• Implements rate limiting to prevent server overload

Error Handling

• Comprehensive logging of all operations
• Graceful handling of download failures
• Skips already processed images

Logging

The script creates detailed logs in a logs directory:

• Location: ./logs/image_downloader.log
• Includes timestamps, operation details, and error messages
• New log file created for each run

Limitations

• Only processes image links in markdown format: ![alt](url)
• Requires internet connection for downloading external images
• May be rate-limited or just straight denied by some servers (Cloudflare CAPTCHA challenge, Vercel bot detection, etc.)
• SVG files are downloaded but not compressed
• 404 errors are not retried (the image genuinely no longer exists)

Contributing

Feel free to submit issues, fork the repository, and create pull requests for any improvements.

License

This project is available under the MIT License.

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Publishing to PyPI (Maintainer Guide)

This project uses uv for building and publishing. uv handles everything — no need for twine or python -m build separately.

Prerequisites

• uv installed (brew install uv on macOS)
• A PyPI API token stored in ~/.pypirc or passed via UV_PUBLISH_TOKEN env variable

~/.pypirc format

[pypi]
username = __token__
password = pypi-<your-token-here>

Steps

1. Make your code changes.

2. Bump the version in pyproject.toml:

[project]
version = "0.1.X"   # increment this

3. Build the wheel and source distribution:

uv build

This creates a dist/ folder with *.whl and *.tar.gz files.

4. Publish to PyPI:

uv publish

uv reads credentials from ~/.pypirc automatically, or you can pass a token directly:

uv publish --token pypi-<your-token>

5. Commit the version bump and tag the release:

git add pyproject.toml
git commit -m "Bump to version 0.1.X"
git tag v0.1.X
git push origin main --tags

6. Verify on PyPI: https://pypi.org/project/markdown-image-downloader

One-liner (after token is configured)

uv build && uv publish