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claude-code

Llm-wiki-skill baoyu-url-to-markdown

Fetch any URL and convert to markdown using Chrome CDP. Saves the rendered HTML snapshot alongside the markdown, uses an upgraded Defuddle pipeline with better web-component handling and YouTube transcript extraction, and automatically falls back to the pre-Defuddle HTML-to-Markdown pipeline when needed. If local browser capture fails entirely, it can fall back to the hosted defuddle.md API. Supports two modes - auto-capture on page load, or wait for user signal (for pages requiring login). Use when user wants to save a webpage as markdown.

install
source · Clone the upstream repo
git clone https://github.com/sdyckjq-lab/llm-wiki-skill
Claude Code · Install into ~/.claude/skills/
T=$(mktemp -d) && git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/sdyckjq-lab/llm-wiki-skill "$T" && mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills && cp -r "$T/deps/baoyu-url-to-markdown" ~/.claude/skills/sdyckjq-lab-llm-wiki-skill-baoyu-url-to-markdown && rm -rf "$T"
manifest: deps/baoyu-url-to-markdown/SKILL.md
source content

URL to Markdown

Fetches any URL via Chrome CDP, saves the rendered HTML snapshot, and converts it to clean markdown.

Script Directory

Important: All scripts are located in the 

scripts/
subdirectory of this skill.

Agent Execution Instructions:

  1. Determine this SKILL.md file's directory path as 
    {baseDir}
  2. Script path = 
    {baseDir}/scripts/<script-name>.ts
  3. Resolve 
    ${BUN_X}
    runtime: if 
    bun
    installed → 
    bun
    ; if 
    npx
    available → 
    npx -y bun
    ; else suggest installing bun
  4. Replace all 
    {baseDir}
    and 
    ${BUN_X}
    in this document with actual values

Script Reference:

ScriptPurpose
scripts/main.ts
CLI entry point for URL fetching
scripts/html-to-markdown.ts
Markdown conversion entry point and converter selection
scripts/defuddle-converter.ts
Defuddle-based conversion
scripts/legacy-converter.ts
Pre-Defuddle legacy extraction and markdown conversion
scripts/markdown-conversion-shared.ts
Shared metadata parsing and markdown document helpers

Preferences (EXTEND.md)

Check EXTEND.md existence (priority order):

# macOS, Linux, WSL, Git Bash
test -f .baoyu-skills/baoyu-url-to-markdown/EXTEND.md && echo "project"
test -f "${XDG_CONFIG_HOME:-$HOME/.config}/baoyu-skills/baoyu-url-to-markdown/EXTEND.md" && echo "xdg"
test -f "$HOME/.baoyu-skills/baoyu-url-to-markdown/EXTEND.md" && echo "user"

# PowerShell (Windows)
if (Test-Path .baoyu-skills/baoyu-url-to-markdown/EXTEND.md) { "project" }
$xdg = if ($env:XDG_CONFIG_HOME) { $env:XDG_CONFIG_HOME } else { "$HOME/.config" }
if (Test-Path "$xdg/baoyu-skills/baoyu-url-to-markdown/EXTEND.md") { "xdg" }
if (Test-Path "$HOME/.baoyu-skills/baoyu-url-to-markdown/EXTEND.md") { "user" }

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┬───────────────────┐ │ Path │ Location │ ├────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼───────────────────┤ │ .baoyu-skills/baoyu-url-to-markdown/EXTEND.md │ Project directory │ ├────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼───────────────────┤ │ $HOME/.baoyu-skills/baoyu-url-to-markdown/EXTEND.md │ User home │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┴───────────────────┘

┌───────────┬───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ Result │ Action │ ├───────────┼───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤ │ Found │ Read, parse, apply settings │ ├───────────┼───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤ │ Not found │ MUST run first-time setup (see below) — do NOT silently create defaults │ └───────────┴───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

EXTEND.md Supports: Download media by default | Default output directory | Default capture mode | Timeout settings

First-Time Setup (BLOCKING)

CRITICAL: When EXTEND.md is not found, you MUST use 

AskUserQuestion
to ask the user for their preferences before creating EXTEND.md. NEVER create EXTEND.md with defaults without asking. This is a BLOCKING operation — do NOT proceed with any conversion until setup is complete.

Use 

AskUserQuestion
with ALL questions in ONE call:

Question 1 — header: "Media", question: "How to handle images and videos in pages?"

  • "Ask each time (Recommended)" — After saving markdown, ask whether to download media
  • "Always download" — Always download media to local imgs/ and videos/ directories
  • "Never download" — Keep original remote URLs in markdown

Question 2 — header: "Output", question: "Default output directory?"

  • "url-to-markdown (Recommended)" — Save to ./url-to-markdown/{domain}/{slug}.md
  • (User may choose "Other" to type a custom path)

Question 3 — header: "Save", question: "Where to save preferences?"

  • "User (Recommended)" — ~/.baoyu-skills/ (all projects)
  • "Project" — .baoyu-skills/ (this project only)

After user answers, create EXTEND.md at the chosen location, confirm "Preferences saved to [path]", then continue.

Full reference: references/config/first-time-setup.md

Supported Keys

KeyDefaultValuesDescription
download_media
ask
ask
/ 
1
/ 
0
ask
= prompt each time, 
1
= always download, 
0
= never
default_output_dir
emptypath or emptyDefault output directory (empty = 
./url-to-markdown/
)

EXTEND.md → CLI mapping:

EXTEND.md keyCLI argumentNotes
download_media: 1
--download-media
default_output_dir: ./posts/
--output-dir ./posts/
Directory path. Do NOT pass to 
-o
(which expects a file path)

Value priority:

  1. CLI arguments (
    --download-media
    , 
    -o
    , 
    --output-dir
    )
  2. EXTEND.md
  3. Skill defaults

Features

  • Chrome CDP for full JavaScript rendering
  • Two capture modes: auto or wait-for-user
  • Save rendered HTML as a sibling 
    -captured.html
    file
  • Clean markdown output with metadata
  • Upgraded Defuddle-first markdown conversion with automatic fallback to the pre-Defuddle extractor from git history
  • Materializes shadow DOM content before conversion so web-component pages survive serialization better
  • YouTube pages can include transcript/caption text in the markdown when YouTube exposes a caption track
  • If local browser capture fails completely, can fall back to 
    defuddle.md/<url>
    and still save markdown
  • Handles login-required pages via wait mode
  • Download images and videos to local directories

Usage

# Auto mode (default) - capture when page loads
${BUN_X} {baseDir}/scripts/main.ts <url>

# Wait mode - wait for user signal before capture
${BUN_X} {baseDir}/scripts/main.ts <url> --wait

# Save to specific file
${BUN_X} {baseDir}/scripts/main.ts <url> -o output.md

# Save to a custom output directory (auto-generates filename)
${BUN_X} {baseDir}/scripts/main.ts <url> --output-dir ./posts/

# Download images and videos to local directories
${BUN_X} {baseDir}/scripts/main.ts <url> --download-media

Options

OptionDescription
<url>
URL to fetch
-o <path>
Output file path — must be a file path, not directory (default: auto-generated)
--output-dir <dir>
Base output directory — auto-generates 
{dir}/{domain}/{slug}.md
(default: 
./url-to-markdown/
)
--wait
Wait for user signal before capturing
--timeout <ms>
Page load timeout (default: 30000)
--download-media
Download image/video assets to local 
imgs/
and 
videos/
, and rewrite markdown links to local relative paths

Capture Modes

ModeBehaviorUse When
Auto (default)Capture on network idlePublic pages, static content
Wait (
--wait
)		User signals when readyLogin-required, lazy loading, paywalls

Wait mode workflow:

  1. Run with 
    --wait
    → script outputs "Press Enter when ready"
  2. Ask user to confirm page is ready
  3. Send newline to stdin to trigger capture

Output Format

Each run saves two files side by side:

  • Markdown: YAML front matter with 
    url
    , 
    title
    , 
    description
    , 
    author
    , 
    published
    , optional 
    coverImage
    , and 
    captured_at
    , followed by converted markdown content
  • HTML snapshot: 
    *-captured.html
    , containing the rendered page HTML captured from Chrome

When Defuddle or page metadata provides a language hint, the markdown front matter also includes 

language
.

The HTML snapshot is saved before any markdown media localization, so it stays a faithful capture of the page DOM used for conversion. If the hosted 

defuddle.md
API fallback is used, markdown is still saved, but there is no local 
-captured.html
snapshot for that run.

Output Directory

Default: 

url-to-markdown/<domain>/<slug>.md
With 
--output-dir ./posts/
: 
./posts/<domain>/<slug>.md

HTML snapshot path uses the same basename:

  • url-to-markdown/<domain>/<slug>-captured.html

  • ./posts/<domain>/<slug>-captured.html

  • <slug>
    : From page title or URL path (kebab-case, 2-6 words)

  • Conflict resolution: Append timestamp 

    <slug>-YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS.md

When 

--download-media
is enabled:

  • Images are saved to 
    imgs/
    next to the markdown file
  • Videos are saved to 
    videos/
    next to the markdown file
  • Markdown media links are rewritten to local relative paths

Conversion Fallback

Conversion order:

  1. Try Defuddle first
  2. For rich pages such as YouTube, prefer Defuddle's extractor-specific output (including transcripts when available) instead of replacing it with the legacy pipeline
  3. If Defuddle throws, cannot load, returns obviously incomplete markdown, or captures lower-quality content than the legacy pipeline, automatically fall back to the pre-Defuddle extractor
  4. If the entire local browser capture flow fails before markdown can be produced, try the hosted 
    https://defuddle.md/<url>
    API and save its markdown output directly
  5. The legacy fallback path uses the older Readability/selector/Next.js-data based HTML-to-Markdown implementation recovered from git history

CLI output will show:

  • Converter: defuddle
    when Defuddle succeeds
  • Converter: legacy:...
    plus 
    Fallback used: ...
    when fallback was needed
  • Converter: defuddle-api
    when local browser capture failed and the hosted API was used instead

Media Download Workflow

Based on 

download_media
setting in EXTEND.md:

SettingBehavior
1
(always)		Run script with 
--download-media
flag
0
(never)		Run script without 
--download-media
flag
ask
(default)		Follow the ask-each-time flow below

Ask-Each-Time Flow

  1. Run script without 
    --download-media
    → markdown saved
  2. Check saved markdown for remote media URLs (
    https://
    in image/video links)
  3. If no remote media found → done, no prompt needed
  4. If remote media found → use 
    AskUserQuestion
    :
    • header: "Media", question: "Download N images/videos to local files?"
    • "Yes" — Download to local directories
    • "No" — Keep remote URLs
  5. If user confirms → run script again with 
    --download-media
    (overwrites markdown with localized links)

Environment Variables

VariableDescription
URL_CHROME_PATH
Custom Chrome executable path
URL_DATA_DIR
Custom data directory
URL_CHROME_PROFILE_DIR
Custom Chrome profile directory

Troubleshooting: Chrome not found → set 

URL_CHROME_PATH
. Timeout → increase 
--timeout
. Complex pages → try 
--wait
mode. If markdown quality is poor, inspect the saved 
-captured.html
and check whether the run logged a legacy fallback.

YouTube Notes

  • The upgraded Defuddle path uses async extractors, so YouTube pages can include transcript text directly in the markdown body.
  • Transcript availability depends on YouTube exposing a caption track. Videos with captions disabled, restricted playback, or blocked regional access may still produce description-only output.
  • If the page needs time to finish loading descriptions, chapters, or player metadata, prefer 
    --wait
    and capture after the watch page is fully hydrated.

Hosted API Fallback

  • The hosted fallback endpoint is 
    https://defuddle.md/<url>
    . In shell form: 
    curl https://defuddle.md/stephango.com
  • Use it only when the local Chrome/CDP capture path fails outright. The local path still has higher fidelity because it can save the captured HTML and handle authenticated pages.
  • The hosted API already returns Markdown with YAML frontmatter, so save that response as-is and then apply the normal media-localization step if requested.

Extension Support

Custom configurations via EXTEND.md. See Preferences section for paths and supported options.