#+TITLE: matrixcli: a minimal command line matrix client #+AUTHOR: saadnpq #+date: 2019-03-30 #+HUGO_BASE_DIR: ~/blog/ #+hugo_auto_set_lastmod: t #+EXPORT_FILE_NAME: matrixcli #+hugo_tags: projects

matrixcli is a simple [[https://matrix.org/blog/home/][matrix]] client based on the [[https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-python-sdk][matrix-python-sdk]]. if you wonder how this is useful please see [[https://github.com/saadnpq/matrixcli#applications][applications]]

• installation you can install matrixcli using setup.py in root project directory. This will also install all needed dependencies. #+BEGIN_SRC shell git clone https://github.com/saadnpq/matrixcli.git cd ./matrixcli sudo ./install.sh #+END_SRC this will put the matrixcli script in your path, install a template config.py file in /etc/matrixcli and systemd unit file in /lib/systemd/user

for ubuntu users you have to install python3-setuptools first before running the above commands #+begin_src shell sudo apt install python3-setuptools #+end_src

to enable the systemd service you can run the following. #+begin_src shell systemctl --user enable --now matrixcli #+end_src

• configuration file the account configuration is done through the config.py file in either one of the following locations sorted by precedence

1. custom file specified using the -c option
2. $HOME/.config/matrixcli
3. /etc/matrixcli

this is a one account sample configuration. #+begin_src python def password_eval(): return "Y0UrPredIctabLePA$$w0ord"

accounts=[{ "server":"https://matrix.org/", "username":"putYourUserNameHere", "passeval":password_eval }]

the password_eval function can be named any thing as long as

it matches the function definition

ignore_rooms = ["room_id", "another_room_id"]

note: room_id not room_alias (run matrixcli rooms to get the room_id)

#+end_src

the configuration file should have an =accounts= variable which holds a list of dictionaries where every dictionary consists of the account information server, username and password eval

the rationale behind defining a function that returns the password value is that if you don't want to write your password in plain text you can write any python code you wish that generates or reads the password from an encrypted file or a key ring

the ignore_rooms list contains rooms that you want to be ignored when calculating unread messages and in listen mode

if you don't want to make a configuration file at all, you can pass the server, username and password through command line arguments. see [[*usage][usage]]

** multi account configuration

suppose you have the following configuration file #+begin_src python def account1_password_eval(): return "account1secretpassword"

def account2_matrixorg_password_eval(): return "account2secretpassword"

def account3_password_eval_any_name(): return "yXkdsjhslkjhdlksjhffffffkkssskjsdhkljhssdc"

accounts=[

    { "server":"https://example.com",
      "username":"account1",
      "passeval":account1_password_eval },

    { "server":"https://matrix.org",
      "username":"account2",
      "passeval":account2_matrixorg_password_eval},

    { "server":"https://example.com",
      "username":"account3",
      "passeval":account3_password_eval_any_name },]

ignore_rooms = ["room_id", "another_room_id"] #+end_src

if you didn't specify any command line option, the program will use the first account in the accounts list. to use any other account its enough to pass the -u or --username option to the command with the username of that account.

for example #+begin_src shell matrixcli -u account3 getrooms #+end_src that command will login with the parameters of the third account.

if you have two or more accounts with the same username but with different servers. you can specify the --server option to norrow down the possible accounts to the account you want.

• applications below are the ways i personally use matrixcli,

** desktop notifications the first motive to make this program was that i didn't want to keep riot webpage open or to run an electron app just for notifications.

you can enable the systemd service, to get notifications for events as they come. #+begin_src shell systemctl --user enable --now matrixcli #+end_src

[[file:screenshots/notifications.png]]

** status bars using =matrixcli unread= you write a module for any status bar to display unread messages. here is a simple example for polybar

#+begin_src yaml [module/matrix] type = custom/script exec = matrixcli unread -f 2> /dev/null tail = true interval = 30 format = label = M[%output%] format-underline = #268bd2 #+end_src

[[file:screenshots/polybar.jpg]]

M[6] here indicates 6 unread messages

** sendmail for matrix for example i have this cron job that sends every day a random song from my music directory to a specific room.

#+begin_src shell 0 0 * * * /usr/local/bin/matrixcli send -r '!OSPeUVrwMKbIrLQuBX:matrix.org' $(tree /home/pi/musiqa -fi | grep ".*.mp3" | shuf | sed 1q) #+end_src

and i use it in many scripts on remote servers to notify me about a script output or just when something goes wrong.

• how to use for a list of the subcommands and options run #+begin_src shell matrixcli --help #+end_src output: #+begin_example #usage: matrixcli [-h] [-s SERVER] [-u USERNAME] [-p PASSWORD] [-c CONFIG] {send,listen,rooms,unread,tail} ...

command line matrix client

optional arguments: -h, --help show this help message and exit -s SERVER, --server SERVER server to login to -u USERNAME, --username USERNAME username to login with -p PASSWORD, --password PASSWORD the password -c CONFIG, --config CONFIG custom configuration file

subcommands: {send,listen,rooms,unread,tail} send send something to a room listen listen forever for events rooms get all joined rooms unread get unread notifications tail print last messages #+end_example

to list the options of a specific sub command, (e.g. send)

#+begin_src shell matrixcli send --help #+end_src

** rooms every sub-command that supposed to act on a specific room accepts the -r/--room-id optional argument which takes the room-id to act upon, or -a/--room_alias which takes a room alias.

to get a room-id of a room run: #+begin_src matrixcli rooms #+end_src outputs the following (for my account). #+begin_example logging in .... logged in .... 0 : momenamr : !ocOmULdomkoJWYzXts:matrix.org 1 : mahmoudhafez : !fCXcmULzIohNQomvXD:saadnpq.com 2 : Emacs Matrix Client : !ZrZoyXEyFrzcBZKNis:matrix.org 3 : elm3alem zaki : !OaBjEnLTTVqGpqrPES:matrix.org 4 : matrix-python-sdk : !YHhmBTmGBHGQOlGpaZ:matrix.org 5 : Emacs : !PWxnIIDhCBAbNItsSN:matrix.org 6 : moatazomar : !LsBUkYVYJignwCpACn:saadnpq.com #+end_example

if you didn't specify the room-id or room-alias through the command line, the program will prompt you with your joined rooms when it needs to.

** listen #+begin_src shell matrixcli listen #+end_src listens forever for events and outputs incoming messages to both stdout and os notifications, if you are running this command on a headless system or the program failed to send notifications for some reason, it will output events only to stdout without complaining.

you can press C-c to quit the listen mode.

there is also a systemd service installed with the program that uses =matrixcli listen=, to enable it you can run the following.

#+begin_src shell systemctl --user enable --now matrixcli #+end_src

** tail returns the last n messages of a room.

#+begin_src shell matrixcli tail -h #+end_src

#+begin_example usage: matrixcli tail [-h] [-r ROOM_ID | -a ROOM_ALIAS] [-f] [-n [1-100]]

optional arguments: -h, --help show this help message and exit -r ROOM_ID, --room-id ROOM_ID specify the room id -a ROOM_ALIAS, --room-alias ROOM_ALIAS specify the room by room alias -f, --follow wait for messages and print them as they come -n [1-100], --messages [1-100] print the last specified messages #+end_example

the option -f prints the last messages but wait for new messages and print them as they come.

you can also send messages while in follow mode by typing the message you want to send and hit enter to send it.

** send #+begin_src shell matrixcli send --help #+end_src #+begin_example usage: matrixcli send [-h] [-r ROOM_ID | -a ROOM_ALIAS] [-t | -f] content

positional arguments: content

optional arguments: -h, --help show this help message and exit -r ROOM_ID, --room-id ROOM_ID specify the room id -a ROOM_ALIAS, --room-alias ROOM_ALIAS specify the room by room alias -t, --text force the program to treat the content as text message -f, --file force the program to treat the content as a file #+end_example

the send command takes the content you want to send as a positional arguments, the program first sees if the passed text represent a file that exists in the filesystem, if so it will try to guess its MIME type based on the extension to correctly preview the content on the receiver's end. if the passed text does not represent any file on the filesystem the program will treat it as a text message.

to force the program to treat the content as a file or a text you can specify the optional arguments --file or --text.

** unread

#+begin_src shell matrixcli unread --help #+end_src

#+begin_example usage: matrixcli unread [-h] [-f] [-r ROOM_ID | -a ROOM_ALIAS]

optional arguments: -h, --help show this help message and exit -f, --follow don't close connection and print the number of unread messages whenever updated -r ROOM_ID, --room-id ROOM_ID specify the room id -a ROOM_ALIAS, --room-alias ROOM_ALIAS specify the room by room alias #+end_example

outputs unread messages for room_id or all rooms (except those in ignore_rooms) if no room_id or room_alias specified