Volume change notification

Send notifications in response to volume changes.

Styling not included

Features

• Appears on top of full-screen windows (due to layer=overlay).
• Bypasses the do-not-disturb mode.
• Shows a progress bar along with the percentage

Requirements

• Wireplumber as a Pipewire session manager (tested v0.5.6)
• Mako notification daemon (tested v1.9.0)
• libnotify (tested v0.8.3)

Setup

1. Create the notifier script

#!/bin/sh

# Get the volume level and convert it to a percentage
volume=$(wpctl get-volume @DEFAULT_AUDIO_SINK@)
volume=$(echo "$volume" | awk '{print $2}')
volume=$(echo "( $volume * 100 ) / 1" | bc)

notify-send -t 1000 -a 'wp-vol' -h int:value:$volume "Volume: ${volume}%"

Save this file in your PATH (e.g. ~/.local/bin) as wp-vol, and make it executable.

2. Edit your keybindings

This is an example for the Sway WM.

-bindsym XF86AudioRaiseVolume exec wpctl set-volume -l 1.0 @DEFAULT_AUDIO_SINK@ 5%+
+bindsym XF86AudioRaiseVolume exec wpctl set-volume -l 1.0 @DEFAULT_AUDIO_SINK@ 5%+ && wp-vol

-bindsym XF86AudioLowerVolume exec wpctl set-volume @DEFAULT_AUDIO_SINK@ 5%-
+bindsym XF86AudioLowerVolume exec wpctl set-volume @DEFAULT_AUDIO_SINK@ 5%- && wp-vol

Simply make sure wp-vol (the notifier script) is executed after wpctl.

Don't forget to reload your config.

3. Configure Mako

Put this section in your ~/.config/mako/config.

[app-name=wp-vol]
layer=overlay
history=0
anchor=top-center
# Group all volume notifications together
group-by=app-name
# Hide the group-index
format=<b>%s</b>\n%b

[app-name=volume group-index=0]
# Only show last notification
invisible=0

Choose a dedicated area of your screen for such notifications (e.g. anchor=top-center).

If you have a do-not-disturb mode configured, this will ensure that volume notifications are always visible:

[mode=do-not-disturb]
invisible=1

# ... the [app-name=wp-vol] section from earlier should be placed after the do-not-disturb definition,
# so it can override it

[app-name=volume grouped=false]
# Force initial volume notification to be visible
invisible=0

Finally, reload the daemon.

makoctl reload