Instagram Posts Fetcher

A Python script that fetches Instagram posts from a specified account using a GraphQL endpoint. It supports batching, pagination, and resumable downloads, saving your results into JSON format. It also handles encoding issues for robust JSON loading.

Features

1. Batch Fetching: Pull a specified number of Instagram posts in batches.
2. Pagination: Uses after_cursor to fetch subsequent pages automatically.
3. Resumable: Keeps track of the last fetched cursor in a state file (resume_file) so you can resume fetching later.
4. Flexible Encoding: Includes error-handling for different text encodings (utf-8, latin-1, etc.).

Requirements

• Python 3.7 or later

• Requests library

  pip install requests

• A valid Instagram GraphQL doc_id or endpoint (the example uses doc_id="7898261xxxxxxxxxxx", but this can change).

Installation

1. Clone the repository (or download the script files):

   git clone https://github.com/hitthecodelabs/InstagramPostsFetcher.git

2. Install Dependencies:

   cd InstagramPostsFetcher
   pip install -r requirements.txt

3. If you don't have a requirements file, just ensure requests is installed:

   pip install requests

Usage

1. Update the Code:

   • Replace YOUR_ACCESS_TOKEN with your token if needed (or remove the Authorization header if you’re not using it).
   • Make sure your doc_id is correct or aligned with the currently valid Instagram GraphQL endpoints.

2. Run the Script:

   python ig_posts_fecther.py

   By default, it will:

   • Fetch posts from the specified username (username).
   • Save them to a JSON file (output_file, e.g., instagram_posts_<username>.json).
   • Keep track of pagination state in a resume file (resume_file, e.g., resume_state_<username>.json).

3. Check the Output:

   • After running, open or parse the JSON file to verify the fetched posts.
   • If you stop the script or if it stops due to an error, just run it again to resume where it left off.

Script Explanation

• fetch_instagram_posts(username, after_cursor, post_count)
  Makes a GET request to the Instagram GraphQL endpoint to fetch a specific batch of posts.

• load_resume_state(resume_file)
  Loads the last pagination state from a JSON file so you can resume from the last cursor.

• save_resume_state(resume_file, after_cursor, post_count)
  Saves the pagination state after each successful fetch.

• load_existing_posts(output_file)
  Loads previously saved posts so you can append newly fetched data.

• iterate_and_save_posts(username, output_file, resume_file, batch_size)
  Orchestrates fetching in batches until there are no more posts or an error occurs.

• load_json_file(file_path)
  Demonstrates safe reading of JSON files with fallback encodings.

Troubleshooting

• If Invalid Token errors occur, check your token or authorization method.
• If the doc_id is invalid or outdated, you may see errors from Instagram's GraphQL endpoint. Make sure to update to a valid endpoint or doc_id.

Contributing

1. Fork the project.
2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b feature/NewFeature).
3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add a new feature').
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/NewFeature).
5. Open a Pull Request.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. You are free to modify and use the code. Refer to the license file for details.