MPROMPT(1)

💖 MPROMPT(1) — the manual, but make it cute 💖

okay bestie, sit down, hydrate, because we're learning mprompt today and it's genuinely iconic. this is the mprompt page from the mprompt manual, and yes i'm gonna walk you through every single bit of it. no skips. periodt. 🎀

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✨ NAME ✨

mprompt — simple prompt-based control for mpd 🎵

like. the name literally tells you the whole vibe. it's a prompt. it's for mpd. it's simple. slay.

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🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

mpompt [-s] [-m key=key] [-t n] [-f] [tty] [-T] [host]

okay so first thing: yes, that's exactly how it's written on the page, character for character, and i am not touching it. i copy, i do not edit. that's the rule. 🫶 (the flags you're actually gonna read about below are -s, -m key=key, -t n, and -T — plus -f, tty, and host hanging out in the synopsis. we're just reporting, not inventing.)

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🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

mprompt is an mpd client with a prompt-based interface. it's built to be usable on a headless machine — meaning no fancy GUI, no window manager, just you and a terminal and your music. main character energy, honestly. 💅

at the prompt, you type the name of a playlist — or part of the name of an album, an artist, or a song. anything that matches will start playing. you can also paste in urls to stream. 🎧✨

(if the perl String::Approx module is available, it will be used to handle typos, etc in the names you enter. so your chaotic little fingers are safe. 🙈)

use the left and right arrow keys to adjust volume, and the up and down arrow keys to move through the playlist. lowkey the most intuitive control scheme ever.

the Tab and Enter keys can both be used to pause and unpause playback. (Enter toggles pause only if nothing has been entered at the prompt — like, if you already typed something, Enter is doing its own thing, bestie.)

here's an example of how to run mprompt in /etc/inittab:

1:2345:respawn:/usr/bin/mprompt /dev/tty1

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👑 OPTIONS 👑

• -s — this option allows shell commands to be typed in to mprompt, to be run by whatever user it is running as. (typically root if it's being run from /etc/inittab.)

to enter a shell command, type a "!", followed by the command to run, followed by Enter.

⚠️ bestie. listen to me. that's shell commands running as whatever user it's running as. if that's root, that's root. the original says it, i'm saying it louder. 💀

• -m key=key — this option allows remapping keys. any key can be remapped to any other key, which is useful to support keyboards with unusual key layouts, or missing keys. 🧚

for alphanumeric and punctuation keys, individual symbols can be remapped. for example, "-m a=b" will turn each entered "a" into "b".

for other keys, use the following names:

• <return>
• <tab>
• <space>
• <up>
• <down>
• <left>
• <right>
• <backspace>

for example, -m "n=<down>" will map the "n" key to the down arrow, causing that key to change to the next track; -m "<space>=<return>" will make the space bar act as a pause. 🎹

it's possible to swap keys too. for example, -m "<down>=<up>" -m "<up>=<down>"

a single key can also be bound to a series of keystrokes. for example, -m "1=Mule Variations<return>" will cause the "1" key to play the "Mule Variations" album, a nice choice. 😌 (the manpage said it. i'm just agreeing. it is a nice choice.)

• -t n — adds a timeout, a specified number of seconds after which the entry on the command line will be cleared. useful for headless systems, to avoid cat-on-keyboard confusing your later commands. 🐈⬛ literally the most relatable feature ever, cats walk on keyboards and ruin everything.
• -T — enables terse output mode. this mode tries to avoid displaying excessive or complex things, with the intent that mprompt's output can be piped into a speech synthesiser, such as espeak. 🗣️ accessibility queen. we love to see it.

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🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

vipl(1) mptoggle(1) mpd(1)

go read those too, bestie. iykyk. 📚

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💜 AUTHOR 💜

Copyright 2009 Joey Hess <joey@kitenet.net>

Licensed under the GNU GPL version 2 or higher.

http://kitenet.net/~joey/code/mpdtoys

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and that's the whole page!! 🎉 this was perl v5.36.0, dated 2023-02-01, and that's your sign-off from the mprompt manual. you ate this. go play some music. 💖✨🎀🦋🌸💅🫶🔥👑