Module: Cava: Raw

The cava raw frontend uses ASCII characters to visualize incoming audio data. Each ASCII symbol position corresponds to the value of the audio power pulse. Under the hood:

1. Incoming audio power pulse list is : 12684
2. See format-icons.Configured array of ASCII codes is: ["▁", "▂", "▃", "▄", "▅", "▆", "▇", "█" ] So raw cava frontend will give: ▁▂▆█▄

Example

waybar config:

    "cava": {
        "cava_config": "$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/cava/waybar_raw.conf",
        "input_delay": 2,
        "format-icons" : ["▁", "▂", "▃", "▄", "▅", "▆", "▇", "█" ],
        "actions": {
                   "on-click-right": "mode"
                   }
    },

cava config for waybar

## Configuration file for CAVA.
# Remove the ; to change parameters.


[general]

# Smoothing mode. Can be 'normal', 'scientific' or 'waves'. DEPRECATED as of 0.6.0

# Accepts only non-negative values.

# 'autosens' will attempt to decrease sensitivity if the bars peak. 1 = on, 0 = off
# new as of 0.6.0 autosens of low values (dynamic range)
# 'overshoot' allows bars to overshoot (in % of terminal height) without initiating autosens. DEPRECATED as of 0.6.0

# Manual sensitivity in %. If autosens is enabled, this will only be the initial value.
# 200 means double height. Accepts only non-negative values.

# The number of bars (0-512). 0 sets it to auto (fill up console).
# Bars' width and space between bars in number of characters.
bars = 12
# bar_height is only used for output in "noritake" format

# For SDL width and space between bars is in pixels, defaults are:

# sdl_glsl have these default values, they are only used to calculate max number of bars.


# Lower and higher cutoff frequencies for lowest and highest bars
# the bandwidth of the visualizer.
# Note: there is a minimum total bandwidth of 43Mhz x number of bars.
# Cava will automatically increase the higher cutoff if a too low band is specified.

# Seconds with no input before cava goes to sleep mode. Cava will not perform FFT or drawing and
# only check for input once per second. Cava will wake up once input is detected. 0 = disable.
sleep_timer = 5


[input]

# Audio capturing method. Possible methods are: 'fifo', 'portaudio', 'pipewire', 'alsa', 'pulse', 'sndio', 'oss', 'jack' or 'shmem'
# Defaults to 'oss', 'pipewire', 'sndio', 'jack', 'pulse', 'alsa', 'portaudio' or 'fifo', in that order, dependent on what support cava was built with.
# On Mac it defaults to 'portaudio' or 'fifo'
# On windows this is automatic and no input settings are needed.
#
# All input methods uses the same config variable 'source'
# to define where it should get the audio.
#
# For pulseaudio and pipewire 'source' will be the source. Default: 'auto', which uses the monitor source of the default sink
# (all pulseaudio sinks(outputs) have 'monitor' sources(inputs) associated with them).
#
# For pipewire 'source' will be the object name or object.serial of the device to capture from.
# Both input and output devices are supported.
#
# For alsa 'source' will be the capture device.
# For fifo 'source' will be the path to fifo-file.
# For shmem 'source' will be /squeezelite-AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF where 'AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF' will be squeezelite's MAC address
#
# For sndio 'source' will be a raw recording audio descriptor or a monitoring sub-device, e.g. 'rsnd/2' or 'snd/1'. Default: 'default'.
# README.md contains further information on how to setup CAVA for sndio.
#
# For oss 'source' will be the path to a audio device, e.g. '/dev/dsp2'. Default: '/dev/dsp', i.e. the default audio device.
# README.md contains further information on how to setup CAVA for OSS on FreeBSD.
#
# For jack 'source' will be the name of the JACK server to connect to, e.g. 'foobar'. Default: 'default'.
# README.md contains further information on how to setup CAVA for JACK.
#

# The options 'sample_rate', 'sample_bits', 'channels' and 'autoconnect' can be configured for some input methods:
#   sample_rate: fifo, pipewire, sndio, oss
#   sample_bits: fifo, pipewire, sndio, oss
#   channels:    sndio, oss, jack
#   autoconnect: jack
# Other methods ignore these settings.
#
# For 'sndio' and 'oss' they are only preferred values, i.e. if the values are not supported
# by the chosen audio device, the device will use other supported values instead.
# Example: 48000, 32 and 2, but the device only supports 44100, 16 and 1, then it
# will use 44100, 16 and 1.
#


[output]

# Output method. Can be 'ncurses', 'noncurses', 'raw', 'noritake', 'sdl'
# or 'sdl_glsl'.
# 'noncurses' (default) uses a buffer and cursor movements to only print
# changes from frame to frame in the terminal. Uses less resources and is less
# prone to tearing (vsync issues) than 'ncurses'.
#
# 'raw' is an 8 or 16 bit (configurable via the 'bit_format' option) data
# stream of the bar heights that can be used to send to other applications.
# 'raw' defaults to 200 bars, which can be adjusted in the 'bars' option above.
#
# 'noritake' outputs a bitmap in the format expected by a Noritake VFD display
#  in graphic mode. It only support the 3000 series graphical VFDs for now.
#
# 'sdl' uses the Simple DirectMedia Layer to render in a graphical context.
# 'sdl_glsl' uses SDL to create an OpenGL context. Write your own shaders or
# use one of the predefined ones.
method = raw

# Orientation of the visualization. Can be 'bottom', 'top', 'left', 'right' or
# 'horizontal'. Default is 'bottom'. 'left and 'right' are only supported on sdl
# and ncruses output. 'horizontal' (bars go up and down from center) is only supported
# on noncurses output.
# Note: many fonts have weird or missing glyphs for characters used in orientations
# other than 'bottom', which can make output not look right.

# Visual channels. Can be 'stereo' or 'mono'.
# 'stereo' mirrors both channels with low frequencies in center.
# 'mono' outputs left to right lowest to highest frequencies.
# 'mono_option' set mono to either take input from 'left', 'right' or 'average'.
# set 'reverse' to 1 to display frequencies the other way around.

# Raw output target. A fifo will be created if target does not exist.
raw_target = /dev/stdout

# Raw data format. Can be 'binary' or 'ascii'.
data_format = ascii

# Binary bit format, can be '8bit' (0-255) or '16bit' (0-65530).

# Ascii max value. In 'ascii' mode range will run from 0 to value specified here

# Ascii delimiters. In ascii format each bar and frame is separated by a delimiters.
# Use decimal value in ascii table (i.e. 59 = ';' and 10 = '\n' (line feed)).
bar_delimiter = 0

# sdl window size and position. -1,-1 is centered.

# set label on bars on the x-axis. Can be 'frequency' or 'none'. Default: 'none'
# 'frequency' displays the lower cut off frequency of the bar above.
# Only supported on ncurses and noncurses output.
 
# enable synchronized sync. 1 = on, 0 = off
# removes flickering in alacritty terminal emulator.
# defaults to off since the behaviour in other terminal emulators is unknown

# Shaders for sdl_glsl, located in $HOME/.config/cava/shaders

; for glsl output mode, keep rendering even if no audio

# disable console blank (screen saver) in tty
# (Not supported on FreeBSD)

# show a flat bar at the bottom of the screen when idle, 1 = on, 0 = off

# show waveform instead of frequency spectrum, 1 = on, 0 = off

[color]

# Colors can be one of seven predefined: black, blue, cyan, green, magenta, red, white, yellow.
# Or defined by hex code '#xxxxxx' (hex code must be within ''). User defined colors requires
# a terminal that can change color definitions such as Gnome-terminal or rxvt.
# default is to keep current terminal color

# SDL and sdl_glsl only support hex code colors, these are the default:

# Gradient mode, only hex defined colors are supported,
# background must also be defined in hex or remain commented out. 1 = on, 0 = off.
# You can define as many as 8 different colors. They range from bottom to top of screen

[smoothing]

# Disables or enables the so-called "Monstercat smoothing" with or without "waves". Set to 0 to disable.

# Noise reduction, int 0 - 100. default 77
# the raw visualization is very noisy, this factor adjusts the integral and gravity filters to keep the signal smooth
# 100 will be very slow and smooth, 0 will be fast but noisy.


[eq]

# This one is tricky. You can have as much keys as you want.
# Remember to uncomment more than one key! More keys = more precision.
# Look at readme.md on github for further explanations and examples.

presentation

232342152-640171fc-8977-462d-ac0d-0f8fd7c69774.mp4