askfm Archiver

A cross-platform tool to archive an ask.fm user profile.

Requirements

• sqlite3 (optional) - Needed if you want to inspect, query, or modify the database.

Overview

The tool archives a user profile and extracts all textual information and any attachment in the answer or the question section. The only information it skips are polls.

The tool can also generate a markdown file of the parsed data that can be converted to HTML or PDF (using another tool). An example pdf that was created from the generated markdown file and the provided css file markdown-pdf.css can be found in the example folder.

Installation

RELEASE FILES

The downloaded zip file can be extracted using a tool like 7zip.

DOCKER

docker run --rm -v $(pwd):/data 'ghcr.io/selbetar/askfmarchiver:latest' --db /data/data.db --out /data/askfm-output [OPTIONS]

BUILD FROM SOURCE

Requirements:

• .Net Core 6.0.
• git

Execute the following commands to build the master branch locally:

$ git clone https://github.com/selbetar/askfmArchiver.git
$ cd askfmArchiver
$ dotnet publish --configuration Release --output="./bin-out" "-p:DebugSymbols=false;DebugType=none" ./askfmArchiver/askfmArchiver.csproj

The generated binary should be under ./askfmArchiver/bin-out.

Usage and Options

In the binary directory, execute the following command:

Unix:
./askfmArchiver -u <user> [OPTIONS]

Windows:
./askfmArchiver.exe -u <user> [OPTIONS]

General Options:

  -u, --user          Required. The userid of the askfm profile

  -o, --out           (Default: ) Specify the output folder where any downloaded or generated files will be saved.

  -c, --config        (Default: ) Specify the config folder where the app configuration file is located.

  -d, --db            Path to the database file.

  --help              Display this help screen.

  --version           Display version information.

Archival Options:

  -a, --archive       Required. Execute an archival job for the specified user.

  -p, --page          (Default: ) The page iterator (id) at which archiving should start. Useful if extraction was interrupted.

  -s, --stop-at       The date at which extraction should stop. Date should be in the following format: yyyy''MM''ddTHH''mm''ss

Markdown Options:

  -m, --markdown      Required. Generate markdown file(s) for the specified user.

  -D, --descending    (Default: false) Specify output folder where any downloaded or generated files will be saved.

  -r, --reset         (Default: false) Specify output folder where any downloaded or generated files will be saved.