waybar-mediaplayer

__

Introduction

This is a mediaplayer for waybar.

Widget with album art and progress bar:

Notification with album art, track ticle and track artist

Tooltip with track title, track artist and track album:

Synced lyrics in tooltip:

It features:

1. Progress bar
2. Tooltip that displays title, author and album
3. Synced lyrics in tooltip
4. Album cover art (click to zoom)
5. Optional notification on song change
6. Click to play/pause, scroll up/down to scroll up/down on the playlist

Requirements

playerctl must be installed.

The default configuration use Nerd Fonts, so it requires waybar to use a Nerd Font.

The default configuration use feh to open the album art image.

Install

1. Create a virtual environment within which to run waybar. For example, using pyenv this would be:

   pyenv virtualenv 3.12.0 waybar
   pyenv activate waybar
   

2. Create a wrapper script to run waybar inside this virtual environment.

   For example, always using pyenv, create the file start_waybar and put it in your PATH:

   #!/usr/bin/env bash
   . ~/.pyenv/versions/waybar/bin/activate
   waybar
   

3. Clone this repo:

   git clone https://github.com/raffaem/waybar-mediaplayer "$HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer"
   cd "$HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer"
   

4. Install the required python packages inside your virtual environment:

   pip3 install -r requirements.txt
   

5. You need to find the name of your player. To do so, run playerctl --list-all while your player is running.

6. Open "$HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/config.json and change player_name with the name of your player.

7. Put the following in $HOME/.config/waybar/config:

   "modules-left": ["image", "custom/mediaplayer"],
   

   "image": {
     "path": "/tmp/waybar-mediaplayer-art",
     "size": 32,
     "signal": 4,
     "on-click": "feh --auto-zoom --borderless --title 'feh-float' /tmp/waybar-mediaplayer-art"
   },
   
   "custom/mediaplayer": {
       "exec": "$HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/mediaplayer monitor",
       "return-type": "json",
       "format": "{}",
       "on-click": "$HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/mediaplayer play-pause",
       "on-scroll-up": "$HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/mediaplayer next",
       "on-scroll-down": "$HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/mediaplayer previous",
       "min-length": 20,
       "max-length": 20
   },
   

   Put the following in $HOME/.config/waybar/style.css:

   #custom-mediaplayer
   {
     font-size: 16px;
     border-radius: 2%;
   }
   @import "./waybar-mediaplayer/src/style.css";
   

8. Start waybar using the wrapper script start_waybar.

The mediaplayer should work. Click on the progress bar to start/stop playing, and scroll on it to change song.

Update

cd "$HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer"
git pull

Personalization

To disable notifications, put is_notification=false in config.json.

To change widget's length, set min-length and max-length in $HOME/.config/waybar/config, and set widget_length in $HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/config.json. These 3 variables MUST be set to the same value.

In order for the album art to automatically update on song change, it's important that the signal variable of the image module in $HOME/.config/waybar/config matches the image_signal variable in $HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/config.json.

If you change the colors of the bar in $HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/config.json, make sure to apply the changes by running $HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/mkstyle and restart waybar.

Troubleshooting

Firefox users

Although Firefox reports MPRIS metadata, the metadata it reports is not sufficient, as it doesn't report song's length. Please install the Plasma Integration add-on and use plasma-browser-integration as player_name in $HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/config.json.

To have album art, make sure to set convert_to_jpeg to true in $HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/config.json (this option decreases performance, don't use it if not necessary).

Me progress bar doesn't work

It's likely cause by the player not reporting song length or position back to us. Run $HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/mediaplayer -vvv to debug.

Player reports its name with instance number

If the player reports an instance after its name, please provide only the player name without the instance number. For example, kew may report itself as kew123456, where 123456 is an instance number which will change with different runs of kew. In this case, we report only kew without the instance number. This software will check whether the reported player name starts with the name you provide to bind the correct player.

Me title and tooltip are empty

It's likely your song file doesn't contain metadata.

Run exiftool SONG.mp3 and check the Title, Album and Artist fields.

Me album art doesn't change on song change

Make sure that the signal in the image module in $HOME/.config/waybar/config matches the number provided by image_signal in $HOME/.config/waybar/waybar-mediaplayer/src/config.json.