https://github.com/alexdelorenzo/brightness
☀️ Dim your Mac's display from the command line via CoreDisplay
https://github.com/alexdelorenzo/brightness
brightness-control brightness-daemon brightness-level coredisplay facial-recognition macos macosx osx
Last synced: about 2 months ago
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☀️ Dim your Mac's display from the command line via CoreDisplay
- Host: GitHub
- URL: https://github.com/alexdelorenzo/brightness
- Owner: alexdelorenzo
- License: agpl-3.0
- Created: 2018-08-11T22:31:33.000Z (almost 7 years ago)
- Default Branch: master
- Last Pushed: 2018-09-01T17:05:11.000Z (almost 7 years ago)
- Last Synced: 2025-04-09T16:05:21.394Z (about 2 months ago)
- Topics: brightness-control, brightness-daemon, brightness-level, coredisplay, facial-recognition, macos, macosx, osx
- Language: Python
- Homepage: https://alexdelorenzo.dev/programming/2018/08/16/reverse_engineering_private_apple_apis
- Size: 85.9 KB
- Stars: 26
- Watchers: 4
- Forks: 1
- Open Issues: 2
-
Metadata Files:
- Readme: README.md
- License: LICENSE
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README
# ☀ brightness: Adjust display brightness with your 🌞
`brightness` is a command-line utility and daemon that adjusts your display's brightness.
In daemonized mode, `brightness` will use facial recognition to determine whether or not to change your display's brightness when your system goes idle.
As a command-line utility, you can use `brightness` to get and set your display's brightness.
## Use Cases
You intend to leave your screen on, even while there's little to no mouse or keyboard activity. This can happen while watching a video, reading text or following a recipe.
You probably don't like it when your screen goes off when you're looking at it. There's probably a camera on your screen and it's probably in front of your face.
Let's use it to make computers a little less annoying.
### You want to adjust display brightness programmatically, or you're using macOS 10.13+
Apple deprecated their public IOKit Framework APIs in favor of an undocumented CoreDisplay API. Deprecation of IOKit broke existing utilities.
However, [`brightness` takes advantage of private CoreDisplay APIs that control display brightness](https://alexdelorenzo.me/programming/2018/08/16/reverse_engineering_private_apple_apis.html), allowing us to adjust it programmatically.
# Installation
```bash
# clone the repo
git clone https://github.com/thismachinechills/brightness.git
# install the application
cd brightness
pip3 install -r requirements.txt
python3 setup.py install
# check if it worked
brightness --help
```
## Notes
I've only tested this on macOS 10.13
## Prerequisites
### Python Version
Python 3.7.0+
### Application Dependencies
`pip3 install -r requirements.txt`
### Platform Dependencies
#### macOS
macOS 10.13+.
All dependencies can be installed with `pip3 install -r requirements.txt`.
Or
`pip3 install pyobjc`
#### Windows
Windows 10+.
All dependencies can be installed with `pip3 install -r requirements.txt`.
Or `pip3 install wmi`
#### Linux
Please install `xbacklight` and `xprintidle`.
##### Ubuntu & Debian
`sudo apt install xbacklight xprintidle`
# Usage
```bash
Usage: brightness [OPTIONS]
brightness is a daemon and command-line utility that adjusts your
display's brightness.
In daemonized mode, brightness will use facial recognition to determine
whether or not to change your display's brightness when your system goes
idle.
As a command-line utility, you can use brightness to get and set your
display's brightness.
Run without arguments to get the current brightness for the default
display.
$ brightness
75.0
Options:
-c, --capture INTEGER Capture device. [default: 0]
-b, --brightness INTEGER RANGE Screen brightness between 0 and 100.
[default: 0]
-d, --daemon Run in daemonized mode. Use facial
recognition when system goes idle to
determine whether to change brightness.
[default: False]
-i, --idle FLOAT Seconds between inactivtiy and facial
recognition. [default: 300]
-f, --frames INTEGER Number of frames to capture in succession.
Increase this value if you're getting false
negatives [default: 2]
--help Show this message and exit.
```
## Example
Change the brightness to 50%
`brightness -b 50`
Run in daemonized mode. If the system has been idle for 10 minutes (600 seconds), `brightness` will check for faces.
`brightness -d -i 600`
Run in daemonized mode. If the system has been idle for 120 seconds, capture 3 frames from device `0` for use in facial recognition.
`brightness -d -c 0 -b 0 -i 120 -f 3`
# Contributions
All contributions are welcomed and encouraged.
By submitting a contribution, you agree that your modifications can be distributed under the licensing terms below.
# License
See `LICENSE`.
## Alternative License
Please contact me if you'd like to use this software under another license.