Windows media player powershell

In PowerShell, you can play a sound file using the `System.Media.SoundPlayer` class, as shown in the snippet below:

$player = New-Object System.Media.SoundPlayer 'C:\path\to\your\soundfile.wav'; $player.PlaySync();

Understanding Sound in PowerShell

What is PowerShell?

PowerShell is a powerful scripting language and command-line shell designed specifically for system administrators and power users. It allows users to automate tasks and manage system configurations efficiently. One of the many capabilities of PowerShell is the ability to interact with system-level components, such as sound.

Why Use Sound in Scripts?

Incorporating sound notifications into your scripts can significantly enhance the user experience. Whether you need alerts for completed processes or warnings for errors, audio cues can draw attention effectively. Imagine a script that performs automated tasks throughout the day; a sound alert can notify you when specific conditions arise, making your workflow smoother and more efficient.

Картинка с сайта: powershellcommands.com

Mastering PowerShell LastIndexOf: Find String Positions Easily

Playing Sounds with PowerShell

Overview of Sound File Formats

When dealing with audio in PowerShell, it’s essential to understand compatible sound file formats. The most commonly used format, .wav, is recommended because it is natively supported and offers fast playback without conversion delays. While .mp3 files can be used, they may require additional handling and libraries.

Built-in Methods to Play Sounds in PowerShell

Using the `System.Media.SoundPlayer`

The `System.Media.SoundPlayer` class provides a straightforward way to play sound files. It is primarily designed for `.wav` files and offers two main methods for playback: Play() (asynchronous) and PlaySync() (synchronous).

Example:

$player = New-Object System.Media.SoundPlayer
$player.SoundLocation = "C:\Path\To\Your\Sound.wav"
$player.PlaySync()  # Plays the sound synchronously

In this example, the sound file specified by SoundLocation will play until it completes before the script continues execution. If you want the script to continue running while the sound plays, use Play() instead.

Utilizing Windows Media Player COM Object

Another method for playing sounds in PowerShell is by using the Windows Media Player COM object. This is versatile because it can handle multiple audio formats, including `.mp3`.

Example:

$wmp = New-Object -ComObject WMPlayer.OCX
$wmp.URL = "C:\Path\To\Your\Sound.mp3"
$wmp.controls.play()

In this case, we’ve created an instance of Windows Media Player and specified the URL of the sound file. $wmp.controls.play() allows for additional controls over playback, such as pause, stop, and volume adjustments.

Картинка с сайта: powershellcommands.com

Mastering the Art of PowerShell Round Commands

Advanced Sound Playback Techniques

Creating a Sound Notification System

Incorporating a sound notification system adds significant functionality to your scripts, particularly for monitoring tasks. For example, imagine a PowerShell script that continuously checks for a running process and alerts you with sound when it finds it.

Example Implementation:

if (Get-Process "notepad" -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue) {
    $player.PlaySync()
}

In this snippet, the script checks if Notepad is running. If it is, the sound will play, effectively notifying you without needing constant checks visually.

Scheduling Sound Alerts with Task Scheduler

You can enhance your automation further by scheduling sound alerts with Windows Task Scheduler. By creating a task that triggers the playback of a sound file at specific intervals or based on system events, you can ensure that you receive notifications aligned with your workflow.

Картинка с сайта: powershellcommands.com

Unlocking Password Last Set with PowerShell Magic

Troubleshooting Sound Playback Issues

Common Problems and Solutions

When implementing sound playback in PowerShell scripts, several common issues may arise:

• No sound output: This often occurs due to incorrect path specifications or volume settings. Ensure the file path is correct and check your system’s volume settings.
• File type not supported: PowerShell typically supports `.wav` files natively. If you’re using another format, it’s advisable to convert them to `.wav`.

Debugging Sound Playback with PowerShell

Effective debugging can save a lot of time during development. Implement Try-Catch blocks in your scripts to handle any errors gracefully:

Example:

try {
    $player = New-Object System.Media.SoundPlayer
    $player.SoundLocation = "C:\Path\To\Your\Sound.wav"
    $player.PlaySync()
} catch {
    Write-Host "An error occurred: $_"
}

This snippet captures any exceptions and outputs them to the console, helping you identify issues quickly.

Картинка с сайта: powershellcommands.com

Quick Guide to Powershell PasswordExpired Command

Best Practices for Sound in PowerShell Scripts

Choosing the Right Sound Files

When integrating sound, it’s crucial to choose files that are appropriate for the context. Sound files should be short and clear—long or annoying sounds can disrupt productivity. Aim for audio cues that are noticeable but not intrusive.

Documenting Sound Usage in Scripts

Proper documentation enhances the maintainability of your scripts. Including comments that explain why a sound is played or what event triggers it is beneficial for anyone who may work with your code in the future.

Example of well-documented sound playback code:

# Check for Notepad process and play alert sound if found
if (Get-Process "notepad" -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue) {
    $player.SoundLocation = "C:\Path\To\Your\AlertSound.wav"
    $player.PlaySync()  # Alert sound for user notification
}

Картинка с сайта: powershellcommands.com

Retrieve LastLogonDate with PowerShell Effortlessly

Conclusion

Integrating sound playback into your PowerShell scripts can elevate functionality and provide essential notifications in your automated workflows. From alerting you to system changes to enhancing the interactivity of your scripts, using PowerShell play sound features effectively can lead to a more efficient user experience.

Картинка с сайта: powershellcommands.com

Mastering PowerShell Array Count: A Simple Guide

Call to Action

Experiment with your own scripts to incorporate sound notifications. Don’t hesitate to share your scripts or ask questions! For further resources, tutorials, or specialized training in PowerShell, explore our offerings designed to empower your scripting capabilities.

Function Start-MediaPlayer

{

[cmdletbinding()]

Param(

[Alias(‘P’)] [String] $Path,

[Alias(‘Sh’)] [switch] $Shuffle,

[Alias(‘St’)] [Switch] $Stop,

[Alias(‘L’)] [Switch] $Loop

)

If($Stop)

{

Write-Verbose «Stoping any Already running instance of Media in background.»

Get-Job MusicPlayer -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | Remove-Job -Force

}

Else

{

#Caches Path for next time in case you don’t enter path to the music directory

If($path)

{

$Path | out-file C:\Temp\Musicplayer.txt

}

else

{

If((cat C:\Temp\Musicplayer.txt -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue).Length -ne 0)

{

Write-Verbose «You’ve not provided a music directory, looking for cached information from Previous use.»

$path = cat C:\Temp\Musicplayer.txt

If(-not (Test-Path $Path))

{

«Please provide a path to a music directory.`nFound a cached directory `»$Path`» from previous use, but that too isn’t accessible!»

# Mark Path as Empty string, If Cached path doesn’t exist

$Path = »

}

}

else

{

«Please provide a path to a music directory.»

}

}

#initialization Script for back ground job

$init = {

# Function to calculate duration of song in Seconds

Function Get-SongDuration($FullName)

{

$Shell = New-Object -COMObject Shell.Application

$Folder = $shell.Namespace($(Split-Path $FullName))

$File = $Folder.ParseName($(Split-Path $FullName -Leaf))

[int]$h, [int]$m, [int]$s = ($Folder.GetDetailsOf($File, 27)).split(«:»)

$h*60*60 + $m*60 +$s

}

# Function to Notify Information balloon message in system Tray

Function Show-NotifyBalloon($Message)

{

[system.Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName(‘System.Windows.Forms’) | Out-Null

$Global:Balloon = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.NotifyIcon

$Balloon.Icon = [System.Drawing.Icon]::ExtractAssociatedIcon((Get-Process -id $pid | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Path))

$Balloon.BalloonTipIcon = ‘Info’

$Balloon.BalloonTipText = $Message

$Balloon.BalloonTipTitle = ‘Now Playing’

$Balloon.Visible = $true

$Balloon.ShowBalloonTip(1000)

}

Function PlayMusic($path, $Shuffle, $Loop)

{

# Calling required assembly

Add-Type -AssemblyName PresentationCore

# Instantiate Media Player Class

$MediaPlayer = New-Object System.Windows.Media.Mediaplayer

# Crunching the numbers and Information

$FileList = gci $Path -Recurse -Include *.mp* | select fullname, @{n=’Duration’;e={get-songduration $_.fullname}}

$FileCount = $FileList.count

$TotalPlayDuration = [Math]::Round(($FileList.duration | measure -Sum).sum /60)

# Condition to identifed the Mode chosed by the user

if($Shuffle)

{

$Mode = «Shuffle»

$FileList = $FileList | Sort-Object {Get-Random} # Find the target Music Files and sort them Randomly

}

Else

{

$Mode = «Sequential»

}

# Check If user chose to play songs in Loop

If($Loop)

{

$Mode = $Mode + » in Loop»

$TotalPlayDuration = «Infinite»

}

If($FileList)

{

»| select @{n=’TotalSongs’;e={$FileCount};},@{n=’PlayDuration’;e={[String]$TotalPlayDuration + » Mins»}},@{n=’Mode’;e={$Mode}}

}

else

{

«No music files found in directory `»$path`» .»

}

Do

{

$FileList |%{

$CurrentSongDuration= New-TimeSpan -Seconds (Get-SongDuration $_.fullname)

$Message = «Song : «+$(Split-Path $_.fullname -Leaf)+»`nPlay Duration : $($CurrentSongDuration.Minutes) Mins $($CurrentSongDuration.Seconds) Sec`nMode : $Mode»

$MediaPlayer.Open($_.FullName) # 1. Open Music file with media player

$MediaPlayer.Play() # 2. Play the Music File

Show-NotifyBalloon ($Message) # 3. Show a notification balloon in system tray

Start-Sleep -Seconds $_.duration # 4. Pause the script execution until song completes

$MediaPlayer.Stop() # 5. Stop the Song

$Balloon.Dispose();$Balloon.visible =$false

}

}While($Loop) # Play Infinitely If ‘Loop’ is chosen by user

}

}

# Removes any already running Job, and start a new job, that looks like changing the track

If($(Get-Job Musicplayer -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue))

{

Get-Job MusicPlayer -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue |Remove-Job -Force

}

# Run only if path was Defined or retrieved from cached information

If($Path)

{

Write-Verbose «Starting a background Job to play Music files»

Start-Job -Name MusicPlayer -InitializationScript $init -ScriptBlock {playmusic $args[0] $args[1] $args[2]} -ArgumentList $path, $Shuffle, $Loop | Out-Null

Start-Sleep -Seconds 3 # Sleep to allow media player some breathing time to load files

Receive-Job -Name MusicPlayer | ft @{n=’TotalSongs’;e={$_.TotalSongs};alignment=’left’},@{n=’TotalPlayDuration’;e={$_.PlayDuration};alignment=’left’},@{n=’Mode’;e={$_.Mode};alignment=’left’} -AutoSize

}

}

}

Stange bedfellows you might think but why shouldn’t media be scripted ?

I was thinking this a couple of weeks ago. I wanted to run a video before I started a presentation. If the Presentation is due to start at 10:00, and the video is 3 minutes I want to the video to start automatically at 9:57, and step onto the stage at 10:00 exactly as it finishes. I cobbled something together to do that but I didn’t like it. Actually I want to play music before the video. I want a play list of tracks to start at the right time, I want the last one to fade out and go into the video. If people are in their seats before the video starts I want something counting down on screen. Etc.

Now Windows Media Player has an object model and I’ve used it before so how hard could it be ? It turned out to be a little harder than I thought because the object I used in a bit of VB.net aeons ago doesn’t seem to like running in PowerShell. I found Saveen was using a different object so I typed in

$wmp = New-object  –COM WMPlayer.OCX

and I was away… but compared with other things I have worked with recently the Object model is – backward is the nicest word I can use. I can get a play list and I’d expect to be able to do “For each item in list.tracks”. But no: you have to go call list.item(track Number) for each track. To get a playlist you have to request it by name from the “playlist collection” object.  You have to specify the exact name – no wild cards. Yet it comes back as a collection, which again doesn’t work with forEach. Grrr. So I wrote a function to get a playlist.

Function get-Playlist   
{param ($Name)

 if ($Name -eq $null) {$wmp.currentPlayList}

 else                 {$list=$wmp.playlistCollection.getByName($Name)
                       0..($list.count - 1)|foreach {$list.item($_) } }

}

filter Set-Playlist

{param ($Playlist)   
 if ($playlist -eq $null)                {$playList=$_}

 if ($playlist -is [string])             {$playlist=get-playlist $playList}  
 if ($Playlist -is [system.__ComObject]) {$WMP.currentPlaylist = $playlist}
}

Of Course I wanted to see the tracks in a play list so that became the next function – again set up to take Piped input, or a name or an object

filter get-MediaInPlaylist  
{param ($Playlist) 

 if ($playlist -eq $null)    {$playList=$_}

 if ($playlist -is [string]) {$playlist=Get-Playlist $playList}

 if ($playlist -eq $null)    {$playList=$wmp.currentPlayList}

 0..($Playlist.count - 1) | foreach {$playlist.item($_) }

 $playlist=$null

}

Getting media which is not in an existing play list involves a query to the mediaCollection object there is get media by name, get media by artist and get media by album. It turns out that any attempt to get media returns a playlist, I could have left it that way and te results could be piped into set-playlist but I wanted to see the tracks, so that was how I built the next function.

function get-media 

{param ($Name, [Switch]$album, [Switch]$artist)

 if ($artist)    {$wmp.mediaCollection.getByAuthor($Name)| get-MediaInPlaylist }

 elseif ($album) {$wmp.mediaCollection.getByAlbum($Name) | get-MediaInPlaylist }

 else            {$wmp.mediaCollection.GetByName($name)  | get-MediaInPlaylist }  
}

There’s also a get media by attribute so you can say “Find me all files where the format is MP3.”

function get-mediaByAttribute 
{param ($attribute, $value)
 $wmp.mediaCollection.getByAttribute($Attribute,$value)  | get-MediaInPlaylist }

Next I wanted to be able to add the items I’d just found to the current playlist – so in came Append media, and to make sure I could start with an empty list so did Reset-Media.

filter Append-Media

{param ($item , $Playlist) 

 if ($Item -eq $null) {$Item=$_}

 if ($playlist -is [string]) {$playlist=get-playlist $playList}

 if ($playlist -eq $null) {$playList=$wmp.currentPlayList}

 $playList.appendItem($item)

 $item=$null
} 

Function reset-media {$wmp.currentPlaylist=$wmp.newPlaylist("Playlist","") }

Finally (for now ) came starting and stopping the playlist.

Function Start-media   {$wmp.controls.play() }

Function Stop-media  {$wmp.controls.stop() } 
Function Pause-media {$wmp.controls.pause() } 

In the next post I’ll look at waiting for the media to do things, fading music up and down, why this is no good for video and what to do about it.

This post originally appeared on my technet blog.