NAME¶
pulse-cli-syntax - PulseAudio Command Line Interface Syntax
SYNOPSIS¶
~/.config/pulse/default.pa
/etc/pulse/default.pa
/etc/pulse/system.pa
DESCRIPTION¶
PulseAudio provides a simple command line language used by configuration
scripts, the pacmd interactive shell, and the modules module-cli and
module-cli-protocol-{unix,tcp}. Empty lines and lines beginning with a
hashmark (#) are silently ignored. Several commands are supported.
Note that any boolean arguments can be given positively as '1', 't', 'y',
'true', 'yes' or 'on'. Likewise, negative values can be given as '0', 'f',
'n', 'false', 'no' or 'off'. Case is ignored.
GENERAL COMMANDS¶
- help
- Show a quick help on the commands available.
STATUS_COMMANDS¶
- list-modules
- Show all currently loaded modules with their arguments.
- list-cards
- Show all currently registered cards
- list-sinks or list-sources
- Show all currently registered sinks (resp. sources).
- list-clients
- Show all currently active clients.
- list-sink-inputs or list-source-outputs
- Show all currently active inputs to sinks a.k.a. playback streams (resp.
outputs of sources a.k.a. recording streams).
- stat
- Show some simple statistics about the allocated memory blocks and the
space used by them.
- info or ls or list
- A combination of all status commands described above (all three commands
are synonyms).
MODULE MANAGEMENT¶
- load-module name [arguments...]
- Load a module specified by its name and arguments. For most modules it is
OK to be loaded more than once.
- unload-module index|name
- Unload a module, specified either by its index in the module list or its
name.
- describe-module name
- Give information about a module specified by its name.
VOLUME COMMANDS¶
- set-sink-volume|set-source-volume index|name
volume
- Set the volume of the specified sink (resp. source). You may specify the
sink (resp. source) either by its index in the sink/source list or by its
name. The volume should be an integer value greater or equal than 0
(muted). Volume 65536 (0x10000) is 'normal' volume a.k.a. 100%. Values
greater than this amplify the audio signal (with clipping).
- set-sink-mute|set-source-mute index|name boolean
- Mute or unmute the specified sink (resp. source). You may specify the sink
(resp. source) either by its index or by its name. The mute value is
either 0 (not muted) or 1 (muted).
- set-sink-input-volume|set-source-output-volume index
volume
- Set the volume of a sink input (resp. source output) specified by its
index. The same volume rules apply as with set-sink-volume.
- set-sink-input-mute|set-source-output-mute index
boolean
- Mute or unmute a sink input (resp. source output) specified by its index.
The same mute rules apply as with set-sink-mute.
CONFIGURATION COMMANDS¶
- set-default-sink|set-default-source index|name
- Make a sink (resp. source) the default. You may specify the sink (resp.
source) by its index in the sink (resp. source) list or by its name.
Note that defaults may be overridden by various policy modules or by
specific stream configurations.
- set-card-profile index|name profile-name
- Change the profile of a card.
- set-sink-port|set-source-port index|name
port-name
- Change the profile of a sink (resp. source).
- set-port-latency-offset card-index|card-name
port-name offset
- Change the latency offset of a port belonging to the specified card
- suspend-sink|suspend-source index|name boolean
- Suspend (i.e. disconnect from the underlying hardware) a sink (resp.
source).
- suspend boolean
- Suspend all sinks and sources.
MOVING STREAMS¶
- move-sink-input|move-source-output index
sink-index|sink-name
- Move sink input (resp. source output) to another sink (resp. source).
PROPERTY LISTS¶
- update-sink-proplist|update-source-proplist index|name
properties
- Update the properties of a sink (resp. source) specified by name or index.
The property is specified as e.g. device.description="My Preferred
Name"
- update-sink-input-proplist|update-source-output-proplist
index properties
- Update the properties of a sink input (resp. source output) specified by
index. The properties are specified as above.
SAMPLE CACHE¶
- list-samples
- Lists the contents of the sample cache.
- play-sample name sink-index|sink-name
- Play a sample cache entry to a sink.
- remove-sample name
- Remove an entry from the sample cache.
- load-sample name filename
- Load an audio file to the sample cache.
- load-sample-lazy name filename
- Create a new entry in the sample cache, but don't load the sample
immediately. The sample is loaded only when it is first used. After a
certain idle time it is freed again.
- load-sample-dir-lazy path
- Load all entries in the specified directory into the sample cache as lazy
entries. A shell globbing expression (e.g. *.wav) may be appended to the
path of the directory to add.
KILLING CLIENTS/STREAMS¶
- kill-client index
- Remove a client forcibly from the server. There is no protection against
the client reconnecting immediately.
- kill-sink-input|kill-source-output index
- Remove a sink input (resp. source output) forcibly from the server. This
will not remove the owning client or any other streams opened by the same
client from the server.
LOG COMMANDS¶
- set-log-level numeric-level
- Change the log level.
- set-log-meta boolean
- Show source code location in log messages.
- set-log-target target
- Change the log target (null, auto, journal, syslog, stderr, file:PATH,
newfile:PATH).
- set-log-time boolean
- Show timestamps in log messages.
- set-log-backtrace num-frames
- Show backtrace in log messages.
MISCELLANEOUS COMMANDS¶
- play-file filename sink-index|sink-name
- Play an audio file to a sink.
- dump
- Dump the daemon's current configuration in CLI commands.
- dump-volumes
- Debug: Shows the current state of all volumes.
- shared
- Debug: Show shared properties.
- exit
- Terminate the daemon. If you want to terminate a CLI connection ("log
out") you might want to use ctrl+d
In addition to the commands described above there are a few meta directives
supported by the command line interpreter.
- .include filename|folder
- Executes the commands from the specified script file or in all of the *.pa
file within the folder.
- .fail and .nofail
- Enable (resp. disable) that following failing commands will cancel the
execution of the current script file. This is a ignored when used on the
interactive command line.
AUTHORS¶
The PulseAudio Developers <pulseaudio-discuss (at) lists (dot) freedesktop
(dot) org>; PulseAudio is available from
http://pulseaudio.org/
SEE ALSO¶
default.pa(5),
pacmd(1),
pulseaudio(1)