Add get_channel_type method

[mayty]

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
I have a workflow that goes like this:

1. Get channelId from YouTube handle using v3/channels YouTube data api
2. Scrape this channelId using ytmusicapi

The issue happens on step 2, as channelId produced in the first step can lead to channels of different types, which need to be scraped using different methods:

• @RammsteinOfficial -> UCYp3rk70ACGXQ4gFAiMr1SQ -> YTMusic.get_artist()
• @4tunenocopyrightmusic881 -> UC44hbeRoCZVVMVg5z0FfIww -> YTMusic.get_user()
• @LinusTechTips -> UCXuqSBlHAE6Xw-yeJA0Tunw -> YTMusic.get_channel()

Describe the solution you'd like
A method to determine channel type:
YTMusic.get_channel_type(channelId: str) -> ChannelType

Describe alternatives you've considered
If for determining channel type the same request is required as for channel scraping, scraping result can be returned instead of type only:
YTMusic.get_generic_channel(channelId: str) -> tuple[ChannelType, GetArtistResponse | GetUserResponse | GetChannelResponse]

[sigma67]

Sure, any suggestion how to achieve it other than trial and error? Because that can be done by the user easily right now.

[mayty]

From what I can see, it can go like this (based on the html I see in my browser):

flowchart TD
    A[Request Page] --> B{Div class inside header}
    B -->|"`ytmusic-immersive-header-renderer`"| C[Artist]
    B -->|ytmusic-visual-header-renderer| D{"Has `ytmusic-menu-renderer` at the same level as `ytmusic-subscribe-button-renderer`"}
    D -->|Yes| E[User]
    D -->|No| F[Channel]

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that can be done by the user easily right now

While it can be done on the user side, implementing it this way seems pretty sketchy and requires multiple network calls:

def guess_account_type(channel_id: str) -> str:
    try:
        client.get_artist(channel_id)
        return 'artist'
    except KeyError:
        pass
    channel_response = client.get_channel(channel_id)
    return 'podcast' if 'episodes' in channel_response else 'channel'

[sigma67]

Right, the guess_account_type is obviously not an option.

Just to make it clear, this library doesn't operate on the HTML page. It uses the JSON API that YouTube Music is built on.

[sigma67]

They all use the /browse endpoint, so if you can figure out a surefire way based on the JSON response to tell which of the three types it is, feel free to submit a PR.

Please use an enum for the return value. I do wonder if it might not be more convenient to simply return the correct response after determining the type of the account (because that's what the user would most likely do anyway?)

[Daveson217]

@mayty, what are possible value/options for proposed ChannelType other than artist? Is there a classification somewhere?

[mayty]

@mayty, what are possible value/options for proposed ChannelType other than artist? Is there a classification somewhere?

@Daveson217 artist, user, and channel, corresponding to get_artist, get_user, and get_channel methods. In my PR I called enum ProfileTypes, so there is no weird ambiguity of channel type "channel"