03 · Start

Command line

Installing the package also installs soundrs. It exists so that a minute after pip install you can check that audio works and find the docs, without writing Python.

soundrs --help

sound_rs — audio for Python

Usage
  soundrs <command> [options]
  soundrs play <file> [--device <name>] [--volume <0-4>]
  soundrs info <file>
  soundrs devices
  soundrs docs
  soundrs --version
  soundrs --help

Commands
  play     Play a file and wait until it ends.
           --device <name>   output device, see `soundrs devices`
           --volume <number> 0 to 4, default 1
  info     Sample rate, channels and duration, read from the header only.
  devices  Output devices, one per line.
  docs     Print the documentation link.

Links
  Documentation  https://neksand.github.io/sound_rs/
  Source         https://github.com/Neksand/sound_rs

Commands

Command	What it does
soundrs play FILE	Plays a file and waits. `--device` picks an output device, `--volume` takes 0…4.
soundrs info FILE	Sample rate, channel count and duration from the container header — no decoding.
soundrs devices	Output devices, the default marked with `*`.
soundrs docs	Prints the documentation URL, for scripts and `open $(soundrs docs)`.
soundrs --version	Version on one line, safe to parse.

sound-rs is installed as an alias of the same command.

Examples

# does audio work at all?
soundrs play ~/Music/test.flac

# which device names can I pass to Player(device=...)?
soundrs devices

# what is this file before writing any code?
soundrs info podcast.m4a

$ soundrs info podcast.m4a
file         podcast.m4a
sample rate  44100 Hz
channels     2
duration     42:13.6 (2533.612 s)

Exit codes0 success, 1 runtime failure (unreadable file, no device), 2 bad usage. Errors go to stderr, so the commands compose in shell pipelines.

Checking an install

After pip install sound_rs:

soundrs --version      # soundrs 0.2.2
soundrs devices        # a device list means the audio backend loaded
soundrs play test.wav  # actual output

If any of these fail with an import or library error, the audio backend did not load — see Troubleshooting. Decoding and soundrs info do not need an output device at all.

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