pi-notebooklm

Pi extension for Google NotebookLM (personal/Pro) — one notebooklm tool backed by notebooklm-py CLI bridge (v0.7.3).

Covers notebooks, sources, grounded chat, research, Studio artifacts (Audio Overviews, video, slides, reports, infographics, quizzes, flashcards, mind maps, data tables), downloads, notes, sharing, and organization.

Requirements

1. Python 3.10+ with uv, pipx, or pip.

2. notebooklm-py CLI installed:

   uv tool install "notebooklm-py[browser]"
   

   The [browser] extra provides Playwright, which is required for interactive notebooklm login. See the upstream docs for pipx/venv alternatives.

3. One-time authentication (in a terminal, not through Pi):

   notebooklm login    # auto-installs Chromium on first run
   notebooklm auth check --test --json
   

   If playwright install chromium fails during login, install it manually:

   uv tool run --from 'notebooklm-py[browser]' playwright install chromium
   

   Auth stays in NotebookLM CLI's own storage. This extension never reads or copies credentials.

Install

pi install npm:@bacnh85/pi-notebooklm

From this repository:

pi install ./pi-notebooklm

Configuration

Zero env vars. Just ensure notebooklm is in your PATH and authentication is valid.

Usage

One tool: notebooklm with an argument array.

notebooklm args=["list", "--json"]
notebooklm args=["auth", "check", "--test", "--json"]
notebooklm args=["create", "Research Notebook", "--json"]
notebooklm args=["source", "add", "https://example.com/doc", "-n", "<notebook-id>", "--json"]
notebooklm args=["source", "add", "Inline text here...", "-n", "<notebook-id>", "--json"]
notebooklm args=["ask", "What are the conclusions?", "-n", "<notebook-id>", "--json"]
notebooklm args=["generate", "audio", "-n", "<notebook-id>"]
notebooklm args=["artifact", "wait", "<task-id>", "-n", "<notebook-id>", "--json"]
notebooklm args=["download", "audio", "-a", "<artifact-id>", "output.mp3"]

Examples

Task	Tool call
List notebooks	args=["list", "--json"]
Auth check	args=["auth", "check", "--test", "--json"]
Create notebook	args=["create", "Project Alpha", "--json"]
Add URL source (auto-detected)	args=["source", "add", "https://...", "-n", "<id>", "--json"]
Add text source (auto-detected)	args=["source", "add", "Some content", "-n", "<id>", "--json"]
Wait for source readiness	args=["source", "wait", "<src-id>", "-n", "<id>", "--json"]
List sources	args=["source", "list", "-n", "<id>", "--json"]
Grounded chat	args=["ask", "Summarize key findings", "-n", "<id>", "--json"]
New conversation (destructive)	args=["ask", "--new", "-y", "question", "-n", "<id>"], confirm: true
Audio overview generation	args=["generate", "audio", "-n", "<id>"] then args=["artifact", "poll", "<task>", "-n", "<id>", "--json"]
Download audio	args=["download", "audio", "-a", "<art-id>", "output.mp3"]
Delete notebook (destructive)	args=["delete", "-n", "<id>", "-y"], confirm: true
Auth logout (destructive)	args=["auth", "logout"], confirm: true (no -y needed)
Clear context (destructive)	args=["clear"], confirm: true (no -y needed)

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Description
args	string[]	Yes	CLI arguments (excluding notebooklm executable)
confirm	boolean	No	Confirm destructive operations (delete, clean, remove, logout, new conversation, file overwrite)
timeout_ms	number	No	Timeout in ms (default 60000, max 600000)

Rules

• Use full notebook IDs and explicit -n for parallel agent calls. Shared notebooklm use context can race.
• Request --json on supported commands for structured output.
• Wait for source readiness before chat or generation (source wait -n <id> / source list -n <id>).
• Async generation: start generate <type> → get task ID → poll with artifact poll or block with artifact wait.
• Destructive operations require confirm: true. Most also need -y/--yes in args. Exceptions: auth logout, clear, skill uninstall, history --clear (CLI v0.7.3 does not support -y/--yes for these).
• File overwrites: download, source fulltext, or skill install with --force overwrites workspace files — requires confirm: true.

Blocked commands (run directly in terminal)

• notebooklm login — browser-based authentication

Scope

Personal and Pro NotebookLM, not NotebookLM Enterprise. This extension relies on notebooklm-py which uses Google's undocumented web RPCs. Google provides no stability guarantee for personal/Pro NotebookLM automation.

Upgrading

When Google changes its private RPCs, the fix normally only requires upgrading notebooklm-py, not this extension:

uv tool upgrade notebooklm-py

Prefer the latest patch release — RPC drift fixes ship upstream.

Troubleshooting

Symptom	Likely cause	Fix
exit 1 + auth error	Expired session	notebooklm auth check --test --json, re-login if needed
Rate limit errors	Quota exceeded	Wait and retry; generation is quota-limited
CLI not found	Missing install	uv tool install "notebooklm-py[browser]"
BrowserType.launch_persistent_context	Playwright browser not found	Auto-installed on first notebooklm login; if fails, run uv tool run --from 'notebooklm-py[browser]' playwright install chromium
Timeout (exit 2)	Command too slow	Increase timeout_ms or split into smaller steps

Development

# Install deps
npm ci --prefix pi-notebooklm

# Run tests
npm test --prefix pi-notebooklm

# Type check
npm run typecheck --prefix pi-notebooklm

# Verify packaging
npm pack --dry-run ./pi-notebooklm

How it works

A single notebooklm tool bridges to the notebooklm-py CLI via pi.exec(), using an argument array rather than a raw run string. This avoids shell injection, quote-parsing bugs, and malformed escaping. The extension validates inputs, gates destructive operations using exact command-path matching, truncates oversized output with byte-aware limits, and surfaces actionable error messages — while delegating all NotebookLM protocol handling to the upstream CLI.

License

MIT