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https://github.com/ravachol/kew

A command-line music player
https://github.com/ravachol/kew

command-line kew linux music music-player player terminal

Last synced: 28 days ago
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A command-line music player

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README 

        
# kew

[![GitHub license](https://img.shields.io/github/license/ravachol/kew?color=333333&style=for-the-badge)](https://github.com/ravachol/kew/blob/master/LICENSE)



Listen to music in the terminal.



![Example screenshot](images/kew-screenshot.png)


*Example screenshot running in Konsole: [Jenova 7: Lost Sci-Fi Movie Themes](https://jenova7.bandcamp.com/album/lost-sci-fi-movie-themes).*



kew (/kjuː/) is a terminal music player.



## Features



 * Search a music library with partial titles.

 * Creates a playlist based on a matched directory.

 * Control the player with previous, next and pause.

 * Edit the playlist by adding and removing songs.

 * Supports gapless playback (between files of the same format and type).

 * Supports MP3, FLAC, MPEG-4 (AAC, M4A), OPUS, OGG and WAV audio.

 * Supports desktop events through MPRIS.

 * Private, no data is collected by kew.



## Installing



Packaging status



### Installing with package managers



kew is available from Ubuntu 24.04.



```bash

sudo apt install kew         (Debian, Ubuntu)

sudo yay -S kew              (Arch Linux, Manjaro)

sudo yay -S kew-git          (Arch Linux, Manjaro)

sudo zypper install kew      (OpenSUSE)

sudo pkg install kew         (FreeBSD)

brew install kew             (macOS, Linux)

```



### Building the project manually



kew dependencies are:



* FFTW

* Chafa

* libopus

* opusfile

* libvorbis

* TagLib

* faad2 (optional)

* libogg

* pkg-config

* glib2.0



Install these dependencies using your distro's package manager. Below are some examples.



#### For Debian/Ubuntu:



```bash

sudo apt install -y pkg-config libfaad-dev libtag1-dev libfftw3-dev libopus-dev libopusfile-dev libvorbis-dev libogg-dev git gcc make libchafa-dev libglib2.0-dev

```



#### For Arch Linux:



```bash

sudo pacman -Syu --noconfirm --needed pkg-config faad2 taglib fftw git gcc make chafa glib2 opus opusfile libvorbis libogg

```



#### For macOS:



```bash

brew install gettext faad2 taglib chafa fftw opus opusfile libvorbis libogg glib pkg-config make git

```

Notes for mac users:

1) A sixel-capable terminal like kitty or WezTerm is recommended for macOS.

2) The visualizer and album colors are disabled by default on macOS, because the default terminal doesn't handle them too well. To enable press v and i respectively.



#### For Fedora:



```bash

dnf install -y pkg-config taglib-devel fftw-devel opus-devel opusfile-devel libvorbis-devel libogg-devel git gcc make chafa-devel libatomic gcc-c++ glib2-devel

```

Option: add libfaad-devel for AAC,M4A support (Requires RPM-fusion to be enabled).



#### For OpenSUSE:



```bash

sudo zypper install -y pkg-config taglib-devel fftw-devel opus-devel opusfile-devel libvorbis-devel libogg-devel git chafa-devel gcc make glib2-devel

```

Option: add libfaad-devel for AAC,M4A support (Requires Packman to be enabled).



#### For CentOS/RHEL:



```bash

sudo yum install -y pkgconfig taglib-devel fftw-devel opus-devel opusfile-devel libvorbis-devel libogg-devel git gcc make chafa-devel glib2-devel

```

Option: add libfaad2-devel for AAC,M4A support (Probably requires EPEL to be enabled).



#### For Solus:



```bash

sudo eopkg install -y pkg-config faad2-devel taglib-devel fftw-devel opus-devel opusfile-devel libvorbis-devel libogg-devel git gcc make chafa-devel glib2-devel

```



#### For Guix:



```bash

guix install pkg-config faad2 taglib fftw git gcc make chafa opus opusfile libvorbis libogg glib

```



#### For Void Linux:



```bash

sudo xbps-install -y pkg-config faad2 taglib taglib-devel fftw git gcc make chafa chafa-devel opus opusfile opusfile-devel libvorbis libogg glib-devel

```



#### For Alpine Linux:



```bash

sudo apk add pkgconfig faad2 faad2-dev taglib-dev fftw-dev opus opusfile libvorbis-dev libogg-dev git build-base chafa-dev glib-dev

```



Then run this (either git clone or unzip a release zip into a folder of your choice):



```bash

git clone https://github.com/ravachol/kew.git

```

```bash

cd kew

```

```bash

make -ij4

```

```bash

sudo make install

```

### Uninstalling



If you installed kew manually, simply run:



```bash

sudo make uninstall

```



#### Faad2 is optional



By default, the build system will automatically detect if `faad2` is available and includes it if found.



### Standalone AppImage for musl systems



If you are running a musl-based system, for instance Alpine Linux, you can download a standalone appImage of kew:



https://github.com/ravachol/kew/releases/tag/stable-musl



### Terminals



A sixel (or equivalent) capable terminal is recommended, like Konsole or kitty, to display images properly.



For a complete list of capable terminals, see this page: [Sixels in Terminal](https://www.arewesixelyet.com/).



## Usage



Run kew. It will first help you set the path to your music folder, then show you that folder's contents.



kew can also be told to play a certain music from the command line. It automatically creates a playlist based on a partial name of a track or directory:



```bash

kew cure great

```



This command plays all songs from "The Cure Greatest Hits" directory, provided it's in your music library.



kew returns the first directory or file whose name matches the string you provide. It works best when your music library is organized in this way: artist folder->album folder(s)->track(s).



#### Some Examples:



 ```

kew (starting kew with no arguments opens the library view where you can choose what to play)



kew all (plays all songs, up to 20 000, in your library, shuffled)



kew albums (plays all albums, up to 2000, randomly one after the other)



kew moonlight son (finds and plays moonlight sonata)



kew moon (finds and plays moonlight sonata)



kew beet (finds and plays all music files under "beethoven" directory)



kew dir  (sometimes it's necessary to specify it's a directory you want)



kew song  (or a song)



kew list  (or a playlist)



kew shuffle  (shuffles the playlist)



kew artistA:artistB:artistC (plays all three artists, shuffled)



kew --help, -? or -h



kew --version or -v



kew --nocover



kew --noui (completely hides the UI)



kew -q , --quitonstop (exits after finishing playing the playlist)



kew -e , --exact (specifies you want an exact (but not case sensitive) match, of for instance an album)



kew . loads kew.m3u



kew path "/home/joe/Musik/" (changes the path)



 ```



Put single-quotes inside quotes "guns n' roses".



#### Views



In kew, you normally add songs to the playlist in Library View F3. Then you can see the playlist in Playlist View F2.



There is also Track View F4 for seeing song info and cover. Search View is F5 and Help View is F6.



You can select all music by pressing the - MUSIC LIBRARY - header at the top of Library View.



#### Key Bindings

* Use + (or =), - keys to adjust the volume.

* Use ←, → or h, l keys to switch tracks.

* Space, p to toggle pause.

* F2 or Shift+z to show/hide the playlist.

* F3 or Shift+x to show/hide the library.

* F4 or Shift+c to show/hide the track view.

* F5 or Shift+v to search.

* F6 or Shift+b to show/hide key bindings.

* u to update the library.

* v to toggle the spectrum visualizer.

* i to switch between using your regular color scheme or colors derived from the track cover.

* b to toggle album covers drawn in ascii or as a normal image.

* r to repeat the current song.

* s to shuffle the playlist.

* a to seek back.

* d to seek forward.

* x to save the currently loaded playlist to a m3u file in your music folder.

* Tab to switch between views.

* gg go to first song.

* number +G, g or Enter, go to specific song number in the playlist.

* g go to last song.

* . to add current song to kew.m3u (run with "kew .").

* Esc to quit.



## Configuration



kew will create a config file, kewrc, in a kew folder in your default config directory for instance ~/.config/kew or ~/Library/Preferences/kew on macOS. There you can change some settings like key bindings and the default colors of the app. To edit this file please make sure you quit kew first.



## Nerd Fonts



kew looks better with Nerd Fonts: https://www.nerdfonts.com/.



## License



Licensed under GPL. [See LICENSE for more information](https://github.com/ravachol/kew/blob/main/LICENSE).



## Attributions



kew makes use of the following great open source projects:



Chafa by Hans Petter Jansson - https://hpjansson.org/chafa/



TagLib by TagLib Team - https://taglib.org/



faad2 by fabian_deb, knik, menno - https://sourceforge.net/projects/faac/



FFTW by Matteo Frigo and Steven G. Johnson - https://www.fftw.org/



Libopus by Opus - https://opus-codec.org/



Libvorbis by Xiph.org - https://xiph.org/



Miniaudio by David Reid - https://github.com/mackron/miniaudio



Minimp4 by Lieff - https://github.com/lieff/minimp4



Img_To_Txt by Danny Burrows - https://github.com/danny-burrows/img_to_txt



Comments? Suggestions? Send mail to [email protected].