Summary: Audio/Music player
Requires: emacs-29.1, persist-0.6, taxy-0.10, taxy-magit-section-0.13
Website: https://github.com/alphapapa/listen.el
Keywords: multimedia
Maintainer: Adam Porter <a...@alphapapa.net>
Author: Adam Porter <a...@alphapapa.net>
━━━━━━━━━━━
LISTEN.EL
━━━━━━━━━━━
[https://elpa.gnu.org/packages/listen.svg]
This package aims to provide a simple audio/music player for Emacs. It
should "just work," with little-to-no configuration, have intuitive
commands, and be easily extended and customized. (Contrast to setting
up EMMS, or having to configure external players like MPD.) A Transient
menu, under the command `listen', is the primary entry point.
The only external dependency is VLC, which is currently the only player
backend that is supported. (Other backends may easily be added; see
library `listen-vlc' for example.) Track metadata is read using EMMS's
native Elisp metadata library, which has been imported into this
package.
Queues are provided as the means to play consecutive tracks, and they
are shown in a `vtable'-based view buffer. They are persisted between
sessions using the `persist' library, and they may be bookmarked.
The primary interface to one's music library is through the filesystem,
by selecting a file to play, or by adding files and directories to a
queue. Although MPD is not required, support is provided for finding
files from a local MPD server's library using MPD's metadata searching.
A simple "library" view is provided that shows a list of files organized
into a hierarchy by genre, date, artist, album, etc. (This will be made
more configurable and useful in the future.)
Note a silly limitation: a track may be present in a queue only once
(but who would want to have a track more than once in a playlist).
[https://elpa.gnu.org/packages/listen.svg]
<https://elpa.gnu.org/packages/listen.html>
1 Installation
══════════════
Note that Listen.el uses [VLC] to play audio, so it must be installed.
Also, `ffprobe' (part of [FFmpeg]) is used to read track durations
when available, but it is not required.
[VLC] <https://www.videolan.org/vlc/>
[FFmpeg] <https://ffmpeg.org/ffprobe.html>
1.1 GNU ELPA
────────────
Listen.el is published in [GNU ELPA] as [listen], so it may be
installed in Emacs with the command `M-x package-install RET listen
RET'. This is the recommended way to install Listen.el, as it will
install the current stable release.
The latest development build may be installed from [ELPA-devel] or
from Git (see below).
[GNU ELPA] <http://elpa.gnu.org/>
[listen] <https://elpa.gnu.org/packages/listen.html>
[ELPA-devel] <https://elpa.gnu.org/devel/listen.html>
1.2 Git
───────
The `master' branch of the Git repository is intended to be usable at
all times; only minor bugs are expected to be found in it before a new
stable release is made.
To install, it is recommended to use [quelpa-use-package], like this
(using [this helpful command] for upgrading versions):
┌────
│ ;; Install and load `quelpa-use-package'.
│ (package-install 'quelpa-use-package)
│ (require 'quelpa-use-package)
│
│ ;; Install Listen.
│ (use-package listen
│ :quelpa (listen :fetcher github :repo "alphapapa/listen.el"))
└────
One might also use systems like [Elpaca] or [Straight] (which is also
used by [DOOM]), but the author cannot offer support for them.
[quelpa-use-package] <https://github.com/quelpa/quelpa-use-package>
[this helpful command]
<https://github.com/alphapapa/unpackaged.el#upgrade-a-quelpa-use-package-forms-package>
[Elpaca] <https://github.com/progfolio/elpaca>
[Straight] <https://github.com/radian-software/straight.el>
[DOOM] <https://github.com/doomemacs/doomemacs>
2 Configuration
═══════════════
Listen is intended to work with little-to-no configuration. You can
set the `listen-directory' to the location of your music library if
it's not at `~/Music'. See `M-x customize-group RET listen RET'.
3 Usage
═══════
Use the command `listen' to show the Transient menu. From there, it
is–hopefully–self-explanatory. Please feel free to give feedback if
it doesn't seem so.
4 Changelog
═══════════
4.1 v0.4
────────
*Additions*
⁃ Command `listen-queue-deduplicate' removes duplicate tracks from a
queue (by comparing artist, album, and title metadata
case-insensitively).
⁃ Read track durations with `ffprobe' and show in library and queue
views.
⁃ Bound key `?' to open the `listen' Transient menu in library and
queue views.
*Fixes*
⁃ Transposing a track in a queue keeps point on the track.
⁃ Autoloading of `listen' command.
4.2 v0.3
────────
*Additions*
⁃ Command `listen-library-from-mpd' shows tracks selected from MPD in
a library view.
⁃ Command `listen-library-from-queue' shows tracks selected from a
queue buffer in a library view.
⁃ Command `listen-library-from-playlist-file' shows tracks from an M3U
playlist in a library view.
⁃ Command `listen-queue-add-from-playlist-file' adds tracks from an
M3U playlist file to a queue.
*Changes*
⁃ Reading tracks from MPD allows multiple selection using
`completing-read-multiple'.
⁃ Various improvements in robustness.
⁃ Command `listen-queue' doesn't recreate its buffer when already
open.
⁃ Key bindings in `listen' Transient menu.
⁃ Function `listen-queue-complete' accepts argument `:allow-new-p' to
return a new queue if the entered name doesn't match an existing
one.
*Fixes*
⁃ Completing read of tracks from MPD.
⁃ Unset VLC process's query-on-exit flag.
*Credits*
⁃ Thanks to [Philip Kaludercic] for reviewing.
[Philip Kaludercic] <https://amodernist.com/>
4.3 v0.2
────────
*Additions*
⁃ Command `listen-queue-jump' jumps to the currently playing track in
the queue.
⁃ Command `listen-queue-shell-command' runs a shell command on the
tracks selected in the queue.
⁃ Reverting a queue buffer with universal prefix argument refreshes
the tracks' metadata from disk.
*Fixes*
⁃ The queue could sometimes skip tracks when playing.
⁃ Improve handling of tracks that are changed during playback
(e.g. metadata).
⁃ Update copyright statements in all libraries.
4.4 v0.1
────────
Initial release.
5 Development
═════════════
Feedback and patches are welcome.
5.1 Copyright assignment
────────────────────────
Listen.el is published in GNU ELPA and is considered part of GNU
Emacs. Therefore, cumulative contributions of more than 15 lines of
code require that the author assign copyright of such contributions to
the FSF. Authors who are interested in doing so may contact
[ass...@gnu.org] to request the appropriate form.
[ass...@gnu.org] <mailto:ass...@gnu.org>
