mpc — mpc 0.29 documentation

# mpc

## Description

mpc is a command-line client for the Music Player Daemon (MPD). It connects to a MPD and controls it according to commands and arguments passed to it. If no command is given, the current status is printed (same as “`mpc status`”).

## Synopsis

> mpc [options] <command> [<arguments>]

## Options

`-f````,` `--format```

  Configure the format of song display for status and the queue. The metadata delimiters are:

  Name | Description
  --- | ---
  %name% | Unknown (doesn’t produce output)
  %artist% | Artist file tag
  %album% | Album file tag
  %albumartist% | Album Artist file tag
  %comment% | Comment file tag (not enabled by default in `mpd.conf`’s metadata_to_use)
  %composer% | Composer file tag
  %date% | Date file tag
  %disc% | Disc file tag
  %genre% | Genre file tag
  %performer% | Performer file tag
  %title% | Title file tag
  %track% | Track file tag
  %time% | Duration of file
  %file% | Path of file, relative to MPD’s music_directory variable
  %position% | Queue track number
  %id% | Queue track id number
  %prio% | Priority in the (random) queue.
  %mtime% | Date and time of last file modification
  %mdate% | Date of last file modification

  The [] operator is used to group output such that if no metadata delimiters are found or matched between [ and ], then none of the characters between [ and ] are output. & and | are logical operators for and and or. # is used to escape characters. Some useful examples for format are: “`%file%`” and “`[[%artist% - ]%title%]|[%file%]`”. This command also takes the following defined escape sequences:

  \ | backslash
  \[ | left bracket
  \] | right bracket
  \a | alert
  \b | backspace
  \e | escape
  \t | tab
  \n | newline
  \v | vertical tab
  \f | form-feed
  \r | carriage return

`--wait```

  Wait for operation to finish (e.g. database update).

`-q````,` `--quiet````,` `--no-status```

  Prevents the current song status from being printed on completion of some of the commands.

`--verbose```

  Verbose output.

`--host``=HOST`

  The host to connect to; if not given, the value of the environment variable `MPD_HOST` is checked before defaulting to localhost. This default can be changed at compile-time.

  To use a password, provide a value of the form “`password@host`”.

  If you specify an absolute path, mpc attempts a connection via Unix Domain Socket.

`--port``=PORT``,` `-p` `PORT`

  The port to connect to; if not given, the value of the environment variable `MPD_PORT` is checked before defaulting to `6600`. This default can be changed at compile-time.

## Commands

Commands can be used from the least unambiguous prefix (e.g insert or ins).

### Player Commands

consume <on|off> - Toggle consume mode if state (`on`
  or `off`) is not specified.
crossfade [<seconds>] - Gets and sets the current amount of
  crossfading between songs (`0` disables crossfading).
current [--wait] - Show the currently playing song. With
  `--wait`, mpc waits until the song changes (or until playback is started/stopped) before it queries the current song from the server.
mixrampdb [<db>] - Gets and sets the volume level at which
  songs with MixRamp tags will be overlapped. This disables the fading of the crossfade command and simply mixes the songs. `-50.0` will effectively remove any gaps, `0.0` will mash tracks together. The amount of overlap is limited by the audio_buffer_size MPD configuration parameter.
mixrampdelay [<seconds>] - Gets and sets the current amount
  of extra delay added to the value computed from the MixRamp tags. (A negative value disables overlapping with MixRamp tagqs and restores the previous value of crossfade).

next - Starts playing next song on queue.

pause - Pauses playing.

play <position> - Starts playing the song-number
  specified. If none is specified, plays number 1.

prev - Starts playing previous song.

random <on|off> - Toggle random mode if state (`on`
  or `off`) is not specified.
repeat <on|off> - Toggle repeat mode if state (`on`
  or `off`) is not specified.
replaygain [<off|track|album>] - Sets the replay gain mode.
  Without arguments, it prints the replay gain mode.
single <on|off> - Toggle single mode if state (`on`
  or `off`) is not specified.
seek [+-][<HH:MM:SS>] or <[+-]<0-100>%> - Seeks by hour,
  minute or seconds, hours or minutes can be omitted. If seeking by percentage, seeks within the current song in the specified manner. If a `+` or `-` is used, the seek is done relative to the current song position. Absolute seeking by default.

stop - Stops playing.

toggle - Toggles between play and pause. If stopped starts
  playing. Does not support start playing at song number (use play).

### Queue Commands

add <file> - Adds a song from the music database to the
  queue. Can also read input from pipes. Use “`mpc add /`” to add all files to the queue.
insert <file> - The insert command works similarly to
  add except it adds song(s) after the currently playing one, rather than at the end. When random mode is enabled, the new song is queued after the current song.

clear - Empties the queue.

crop - Remove all songs except for the currently playing
  song.
del <songpos> - Removes a queue number from the queue. Can
  also read input from pipes (`0` deletes the current playing song).
mv, move <from> <to> - Moves song at position <from> to the
  position <to> in the queue.
searchplay <type> <query> [<type> <query>]... - Search the
  queue for a matching song and play it.

shuffle - Shuffles all songs on the queue.

### Playlist Commands

load <file>: - Loads <file> as queue.

lsplaylists: - Lists available playlists.

playlist [<playlist>] - Lists all songs in <playlist>. If
  no <playlist> is specified, lists all songs in the current queue.

rm <file> - Deletes a specific playlist.

save <file> - Saves playlist as <file>.

### Database Commands

listall [<file>] - Lists <file> from database. If no
  <file> is specified, lists all songs in the database.
ls [<directory>] - Lists all files/folders in
  <directory>. If no <directory> is specified, lists all files in music directory.
search <type> <query> [<type> <query>]... - Searches for
  substrings in song tags. Any number of tag type and query combinations can be specified. Possible tag types are: artist, album, title, track, name, genre, date, composer, performer, comment, disc, filename, or any (to match any tag).
find <type> <query> [<type> <query>]... - Same as search,
  but tag values must match <query>s exactly instead of doing a substring match.
findadd <type> <query> [<type> <query>]... - Same as find,
  but add the result to the current queue instead of printing them.
list <type> [<type> <query>]... - Return a list of all tags
  of given tag <type>. Optional search <type>s/<query>s limit results in a way similar to search.

stats - Displays statistics about MPD.

update [--wait] [<path>] - Scans for updated files in the

  music directory. The optional parameter <path> (relative to the music directory) may limit the scope of the update.

  With `--wait`, mpc waits until MPD has finished the update.

### Sticker Commands

The sticker command allows you to get and set song stickers.

sticker <file> set <key> <value> - Set the value of a song
  sticker.
sticker <file> get <key> - Print the value of a song
  sticker.

sticker <file> list - List all stickers of a song.

sticker <file> delete <key> - Delete a song sticker.

sticker <dir> find <key> - Search for stickers with the
  specified name, below the specified directory.

### Output Commands

volume [+-]<num> - Sets the volume to <num> (0-100). If
  `+` or `-` is used, then it adjusts the volume relative to the current volume.

outputs - Lists all available outputs

disable [only] <output # or name> [...] - Disables the
  output(s); a list of one or more names or numbers is required. If “only” is the first argument, all other outputs are enabled.
enable [only] <output # or name> [...] - Enables the
  output(s); a list of one or more names or numbers is required. If “`only`” is the first argument, all other outputs are disabled.

### Client-to-client Commands

channels - List the channels that other clients have
  subscribed to.
sendmessage <channel> <message> - Send a message to the
  specified channel.
waitmessage <channel> - Wait for at least one message on
  the specified channel.
subscribe <channel> - Subscribe to the specified channel
  and continuously receive messages.

### Other Commands

idle [events] - Waits until an event occurs. Prints a list

  of event names, one per line. See the MPD protocol documentation for further information.

  If you specify a list of events, only these events are considered.

idleloop [events] - Similar to idle, but

  re-enters “idle” state after events have been printed.

  If you specify a list of events, only these events are considered.

version - Reports the version of MPD.

## Environment Variables

All environment variables are overridden by any values specified via command line switches.

`MPC_FORMAT`

  Specifies the format of song display for status and the queue.

`MPD_HOST`

  Specifies the hostname of the mpd server. This can be a hostname, IP address or an absolute path. If it is an absolute path, mpc will use Unix Domain Sockets instead of TCP/IP.

  If the server requires a password, it can be specified using password@host in the MPD_HOST variable.

`MPD_PORT`

  Specifies the port the MPD server is listening on.

## Bugs

Report bugs on https://github.com/MusicPlayerDaemon/mpc/issues

Since MPD uses UTF-8, mpc needs to convert characters to the charset used by the local system. If you get character conversion errors when you’re running mpc you probably need to set up your locale. This is done by setting any of the LC_CTYPE, LANG or LC_ALL environment variables (LC_CTYPE only affects character handling).

## See also

mpd(1)

## Author

See https://raw.githubusercontent.com/MusicPlayerDaemon/mpc/master/AUTHORS