uosc

Feature-rich minimalist proximity-based UI for MPV player.

Most notable features:

• UI elements hide and show based on their proximity to cursor instead of every time mouse moves. This gives you 100% control over when you see the UI and when you don't. Click on the preview above to see it in action.
• Set min timeline size to make an always visible discrete progress bar.
• Build your own context menu with nesting support by editing your input.conf file.
• Configurable controls bar.
• Fast and efficient thumbnails with thumbfast integration.
• UIs for:
  • Loading external subtitles.
  • Selecting subtitle/audio/video track.
  • Selecting stream quality.
  • Quick directory and playlist navigation.
• Mouse scroll wheel does multiple things depending on what is the cursor hovering over:
  • Timeline: seek by timeline_step seconds per scroll.
  • Volume bar: change volume by volume_step per scroll.
  • Speed bar: change speed by speed_step per scroll.
  • Just hovering video with no UI widget below cursor: your configured wheel bindings from input.conf.
• Transform chapters into timeline ranges (the red portion of the timeline in the preview).
• And a lot of useful options and commands to bind keys to.

Changelog.

Download

• uosc.zip - main archive with script and its requirements
• uosc.conf - configuration file with default values and documentation

Installation

1. Extract uosc.zip into your mpv config directory.

   List of all the possible places where it can be located is documented here: https://mpv.io/manual/master/#files

   On Linux and macOS these terminal commands can be used to install or update uosc (if wget and unzip are installed):

   mkdir -pv ~/.config/mpv/script-opts/
   rm -rf ~/.config/mpv/scripts/uosc_shared
   wget -P /tmp/ https://github.com/tomasklaen/uosc/releases/latest/download/uosc.zip
   unzip -od ~/.config/mpv/ /tmp/uosc.zip
   rm -fv /tmp/uosc.zip
   

   On Windows these equivalent PowerShell commands can be used:

   New-Item -ItemType Directory -Force -Path "$env:APPDATA/mpv/script-opts/"
   $Folder = "$env:APPDATA/mpv/scripts/uosc_shared"
   if (Test-Path $Folder) {
     Remove-Item -LiteralPath $Folder -Force -Recurse
   }
   Invoke-WebRequest -OutFile "$env:APPDATA/mpv/uosc_tmp.zip" -Uri https://github.com/tomasklaen/uosc/releases/latest/download/uosc.zip
   Expand-Archive "$env:APPDATA/mpv/uosc_tmp.zip" -DestinationPath "$env:APPDATA/mpv" -Force
   Remove-Item "$env:APPDATA/mpv/uosc_tmp.zip"
   

2. uosc is a replacement for the built in osc, so that has to be disabled first.

   In your mpv.conf (file that should already exist in your mpv directory, if not, create it):

   # required so that the 2 UIs don't fight each other
   osc=no
   # uosc provides its own seeking/volume indicators, so you also don't need this
   osd-bar=no
   # uosc will draw its own window controls if you disable window border
   border=no
   

3. To configure uosc, create a script-opts/uosc.conf file, or download uosc.conf with all default values from the link above, and save into script-opts/ folder.

4. OPTIONAL: To have thumbnails in timeline, install thumbfast. That's it, no other step necessary, uosc integrates with it seamlessly.

5. OPTIONAL: If the UI feels sluggish/slow while playing video, you can remedy this a lot by placing this in your mpv.conf:

   video-sync=display-resample
   

   Though this does come at the cost of a little bit higher CPU/GPU load.

   What is going on?

   uosc places performance as one of its top priorities, so how can the UI feel slow? Well, it really isn't, uosc is fast, it just doesn't feel like it because when video is playing, the UI rendering frequency is chained to its frame rate, so unless you are the type of person that can't see above 24fps, it will feel slow, unless you tell mpv to resample the video framerate to match your display. This is mpv limitation, and not much we can do about it on our side.

Options

All of the available uosc options with their default values and documentation are in the provided uosc.conf file.

To change the font, uosc respects the mpv's osd-font configuration.

Navigation

These bindings are active when any uosc menu is open (main menu, playlist, load/select subtitles,...):

• up, down - select previous/next item
• left, right - back to parent menu or close, activate item
• enter - activate item
• esc - close menu
• wheel_up, wheel_down - scroll menu
• pgup, pgdwn, home, end - self explanatory
• ctrl+up/down - move selected item in menus that support it (playlist)
• del - delete selected item in menus that support it (playlist)
• shift+enter, shift+right - activate item without closing the menu
• ctrl+enter, ctrl+click - force activate an item, even if it's a submenu. In practical terms: activates a directory instead of navigation to its contents.

Click on a faded parent menu to go back to it.

Commands

uosc provides various commands with useful features to bind your preferred keys to. These are all unbound by default.

To add a keybind to one of this commands, open your input.conf file and add one on a new line. The command syntax is script-binding uosc/{command-name}.

Example to bind the tab key to peek timeline:

tab  script-binding uosc/toggle-ui

Available commands:

toggle-ui

Makes the whole UI visible until you call this command again. Useful for peeking remaining time and such while watching.

There's also a toggle-elements <ids> message you can send to toggle one or more specific elements by specifying their names separated by comma:

script-message-to uosc toggle-elements timeline,speed

Available element IDs: timeline, controls, volume, top_bar, speed

Under the hood, toggle-ui is using toggle-elements, and that is in turn using the set-min-visibility <visibility> [<ids>] message. <visibility> is a 0-1 floating point. Leave out <ids> to set it for all elements.

toggle-progress

Toggles the always visible portion of the timeline. You can look at it as switching timeline_size_min option between it's configured value and 0.

toggle-title

Toggles the top bar title between main and alternative title's. This can also be done by clicking on the top bar.

Only relevant if top bar is enabled, top_bar_alt_title is configured, and top_bar_alt_title_place is toggle.

flash-ui

Command(s) to briefly flash the whole UI. Elements are revealed for a second and then fade away.

To flash individual elements, you can use: flash-timeline, flash-top-bar, flash-volume, flash-speed, flash-pause-indicator, decide-pause-indicator

There's also a flash-elements <ids> message you can use to flash one or more specific elements. Example:

script-message-to uosc flash-elements timeline,speed

Available element IDs: timeline, controls, volume, top_bar, speed, pause_indicator

This is useful in combination with other commands that modify values represented by flashed elements, for example: flashing volume element when changing the volume.

You can use it in your bindings like so:

space        cycle pause; script-binding uosc/flash-pause-indicator
right        seek  5
left         seek -5
shift+right  seek  30; script-binding uosc/flash-timeline
shift+left   seek -30; script-binding uosc/flash-timeline
m            no-osd cycle mute; script-binding uosc/flash-volume
up           no-osd add volume  10; script-binding uosc/flash-volume
down         no-osd add volume -10; script-binding uosc/flash-volume
[            no-osd add speed -0.25; script-binding uosc/flash-speed
]            no-osd add speed  0.25; script-binding uosc/flash-speed
\            no-osd set speed 1; script-binding uosc/flash-speed
>            script-binding uosc/next; script-message-to uosc flash-elements top_bar,timeline
<            script-binding uosc/prev; script-message-to uosc flash-elements top_bar,timeline

Case for (flash/decide)-pause-indicator: mpv handles frame stepping forward by briefly resuming the video, which causes pause indicator to flash, and none likes that when they are trying to compare frames. The solution is to enable manual pause indicator (pause_indicator=manual) and use flash-pause-indicator (for a brief flash) or decide-pause-indicator (for a static indicator) as a secondary command to appropriate bindings.

menu

Toggles default menu. Read Menu section below to find out how to fill it up with items you want there.

Note: there's also a menu-blurred command that opens a menu without pre-selecting the 1st item, suitable for commands triggered with a mouse, such as control bar buttons.

subtitles, audio, video

Menus to select a track of a requested type.

load-subtitles, load-audio, load-video

Displays a file explorer with directory navigation to load a requested track type.

For subtitles, the explorer only displays file types defined in subtitle_types option. For audio and video, the ones defined in video_types and audio_types are displayed.

playlist

Playlist navigation.

chapters

Chapter navigation.

editions

Editions menu. Editions are different video cuts available in some mkv files.

stream-quality

Switch stream quality. This is just a basic re-assignment of ytdl-format mpv property from predefined options (configurable with stream_quality_options) and video reload, there is no fetching of available formats going on.

open-file

Open file menu. Browsing starts in current file directory, or user directory when file not available. The explorer only displays file types defined in the video_types, audio_types, and image_types options.

You can use ctrl+enter or ctrl+click to load the whole directory in mpv instead of navigating its contents.

items

Opens playlist menu when playlist exists, or open-file menu otherwise.

next, prev

Open next/previous item in playlist, or file in current directory when there is no playlist. Enable loop-playlist to loop around.

first, last

Open first/last item in playlist, or file in current directory when there is no playlist.

next-file, prev-file

Open next/prev file in current directory. Enable loop-playlist to loop around

first-file, last-file

Open first/last file in current directory.

shuffle

Toggle uosc's playlist/directory shuffle mode on or off.

This simply makes the next selected playlist or directory item be random, like the shuffle function of most other players. This does not modify the actual playlist in any way, in contrast to the mpv built-in command playlist-shuffle.

delete-file-next

Delete currently playing file and start next file in playlist (if there is a playlist) or current directory.

Useful when watching episodic content.

delete-file-quit

Delete currently playing file and quit mpv.

show-in-directory

Show current file in your operating systems' file explorer.

audio-device

Switch audio output device.

open-config-directory

Open directory with mpv.conf in file explorer.

Menu

uosc provides a way to build, display, and use your own menu. By default it displays a pre-configured menu with common actions.

To display the menu, add uosc's menu command to a key of your choice. Example to bind it to right click and menu buttons:

mbtn_right  script-binding uosc/menu
menu        script-binding uosc/menu

To display a submenu, send a show-submenu message to uosc with first parameter specifying menu ID. Example:

R    script-message-to uosc show-submenu "Utils > Aspect ratio"

Note: The menu key is the one nobody uses between the win and right_ctrl keys (it might not be on your keyboard).

Adding items to menu

Adding items to menu is facilitated by commenting your keybinds in input.conf with special comment syntax. uosc will than parse this file and build the context menu out of it.

Syntax

Comment has to be at the end of the line with the binding.

Comment has to start with #! (or #menu:).

Text after #! is an item title.

Title can be split with > to define nested menus. There is no limit on nesting.

Use # instead of a key if you don't necessarily want to bind a key to a command, but still want it in the menu.

If multiple menu items with the same command are defined, uosc will concatenate them into one item and just display all available shortcuts as that items' hint, while using the title of the first defined item.

Menu items are displayed in the order they are defined in input.conf file.

The command ignore does not result in a menu item, however all the folders leading up to it will still be created. This allows more flexible structuring of the input.conf file.

Examples

Adds a menu item to load subtitles:

alt+s  script-binding uosc/load-subtitles  #! Load subtitles

Adds a stay-on-top toggle with no keybind:

#  cycle ontop  #! Toggle on-top

Define and display multiple shortcuts in single items' menu hint (items with same command get concatenated):

esc  quit  #! Quit
q    quit  #!

Define a folder without defining any of its contents:

#  ignore  #! Folder title >

Example context menu:

This is the default pre-configured menu if none is defined in your input.conf, but with added shortcuts. To both pause & move the window with left mouse button, so that you can have the menu on the right one, enable click_threshold in uosc.conf (see default uosc.conf for example/docs).

menu        script-binding uosc/menu
mbtn_right  script-binding uosc/menu
s           script-binding uosc/subtitles          #! Subtitles
a           script-binding uosc/audio              #! Audio tracks
q           script-binding uosc/stream-quality     #! Stream quality
p           script-binding uosc/items              #! Playlist
c           script-binding uosc/chapters           #! Chapters
>           script-binding uosc/next               #! Navigation > Next
<           script-binding uosc/prev               #! Navigation > Prev
alt+>       script-binding uosc/delete-file-next   #! Navigation > Delete file & Next
alt+<       script-binding uosc/delete-file-prev   #! Navigation > Delete file & Prev
alt+esc     script-binding uosc/delete-file-quit   #! Navigation > Delete file & Quit
o           script-binding uosc/open-file          #! Navigation > Open file
#           set video-aspect-override "-1"         #! Utils > Aspect ratio > Default
#           set video-aspect-override "16:9"       #! Utils > Aspect ratio > 16:9
#           set video-aspect-override "4:3"        #! Utils > Aspect ratio > 4:3
#           set video-aspect-override "2.35:1"     #! Utils > Aspect ratio > 2.35:1
#           script-binding uosc/audio-device       #! Utils > Audio devices
#           script-binding uosc/editions           #! Utils > Editions
ctrl+s      async screenshot                       #! Utils > Screenshot
O           script-binding uosc/show-in-directory  #! Utils > Show in directory
#           script-binding uosc/open-config-directory #! Utils > Open config directory
esc         quit #! Quit

To see all the commands you can bind keys or menu items to, refer to mpv's list of input commands documentation.

Message handlers

uosc listens on some messages that can be sent with script-message-to uosc command. Example:

R    script-message-to uosc show-submenu "Utils > Aspect ratio"

get-version <script_id>

Tells uosc to send it's version to <script_id> script. Useful if you want to detect that uosc is installed. Example:

-- Register response handler
mp.register_script_message('uosc-version', function(version)
  print('uosc version', version)
end)

-- Ask for version
mp.commandv('script-message-to', 'uosc', 'get-version', mp.get_script_name())

show-submenu <menu_id>, show-submenu-blurred <menu_id>

Opens one of the submenus defined in input.conf (read on how to build those in the Menu documentation above). To prevent 1st item being preselected, use show-submenu-blurred instead.

Parameters

<menu_id>

ID (title) of the submenu, including > subsections as defined in input.conf. It has to be match the title exactly.

open-menu <menu_json> [submenu_id]

A message other scripts can send to open a uosc menu serialized as JSON. You can optionally pass a submenu_id to pre-open a submenu. The ID is the submenu title chain leading to the submenu concatenated with >, for example Tools > Aspect ratio.

Menu data structure:

Menu {
  type?: string;
  title?: string;
  items: Item[];
  selected_index?: integer;
  keep_open?: boolean;
  on_close: string | string[];
}

Item = Command | Submenu;

Submenu {
  title?: string;
  hint?: string;
  items: Item[];
  keep_open?: boolean;
}

Command {
  title?: string;
  hint?: string;
  icon?: string;
  value: string | string[];
  bold?: boolean;
  italic?: boolean;
  align?: 'left'|'center'|'right';
  selectable?: boolean;
  muted?: boolean;
  active?: integer;
  keep_open?: boolean;
}

When Command.value is a string, it'll be passed to mp.command(value). If it's a table (array) of strings, it'll be used as mp.commandv(table.unpack(value)). The same goes for Menu.on_close.

Menu.type controls what happens when opening a menu when some other menu is already open. When the new menu type is different, it'll replace the currently opened menu. When it's the same, the currently open menu will simply be closed. This is used to implement toggling of menus with the same type.

item.icon property accepts icon names. You can pick one from here: Google Material Icons
There is also a special icon name spinner which will display a rotating spinner. Along with a no-op command on an item and keep_open=true, this can be used to display placeholder menus/items that are still loading.

When keep_open is true, activating the item will not close the menu. This property can be defined on both menus and items, and is inherited from parent to child if child doesn't overwrite it.

It's usually not necessary to define selected_index as it'll default to the first active item, or 1st item in the list.

Example:

local utils = require('mp.utils')
local menu = {
  type = 'menu_type',
  title = 'Custom menu',
  items = {
    {title = 'Foo', hint = 'foo', value = 'quit'},
    {title = 'Bar', hint = 'bar', value = 'quit', active = true},
  }
}
local json = utils.format_json(menu)
mp.commandv('script-message-to', 'uosc', 'open-menu', json)

update-menu <menu_json>

Updates currently opened menu with the same type. If the menu isn't open, it will be opened.

The difference between this and open-menu is that if the same type menu is already open, open-menu will close it (facilitating menu toggling with the same key/command), while update-menu will update it's data.

update-menu, along with {menu/item}.keep_open property and item.command that sends a message back can be used to create a self updating menu with some limited UI. Example:

local utils = require('mp.utils')
local script_name = mp.get_script_name()
local state = {
  checkbox = 'no',
  radio = 'bar'
}

function command(str)
  return string.format('script-message-to %s %s', script_name, str)
end

function create_menu_data()
  return {
    type = 'test_menu',
    title = 'Test menu',
    keep_open = true,
    items = {
      {
        title = 'Checkbox',
        icon = state.checkbox == 'yes' and 'check_box' or 'check_box_outline_blank',
        value = command('set-state checkbox ' .. (state.checkbox == 'yes' and 'no' or 'yes'))
      },
      {
        title = 'Radio',
        hint = state.radio,
        items = {
          {
            title = 'Foo',
            icon = state.radio == 'foo' and 'radio_button_checked' or 'radio_button_unchecked',
            value = command('set-state radio foo')
          },
          {
            title = 'Bar',
            icon = state.radio == 'bar' and 'radio_button_checked' or 'radio_button_unchecked',
            value = command('set-state radio bar')
          },
          {
            title = 'Baz',
            icon = state.radio == 'baz' and 'radio_button_checked' or 'radio_button_unchecked',
            value = command('set-state radio baz')
          },
        },
      },
      {
        title = 'Submit',
        icon = 'check',
        value = command('submit'),
        keep_open = false
      },
    }
  }
end

mp.add_forced_key_binding('t', 'test_menu', function()
  local json = utils.format_json(create_menu_data())
  mp.commandv('script-message-to', 'uosc', 'open-menu', json)
end)

mp.register_script_message('set-state', function(prop, value)
  state[prop] = value
  -- Update currently opened menu
  local json = utils.format_json(create_menu_data())
  mp.commandv('script-message-to', 'uosc', 'update-menu', json)
end)

mp.register_script_message('submit', function(prop, value)
  -- Do something with state
end)

set <prop> <value>

Tell uosc to set an external property to this value. Currently, this is only used to set/display control button active state and badges:

In your script, set the value of foo to 1.

mp.commandv('script-message-to', 'uosc', 'set', 'foo', 1)

foo can now be used as a toggle or cycle property by specifying its owner with a @{script_name} suffix:

toggle:icon_name:foo@script_name
cycle:icon_name:foo@script_name:no/yes!

If user clicks this toggle or cycle button, uosc will send a set message back to the script owner. You can then listen to this message, do what you need with the new value, and update uosc state accordingly:

-- Send initial value so that the button has a correct active state
mp.commandv('script-message-to', 'uosc', 'set', 'foo', 'yes')
-- Listen for changes coming from `toggle` or `cycle` button
mp.register_script_message('set', function(prop, value)
    -- ... do something with `value`
    -- Update uosc external prop
    mp.commandv('script-message-to', 'uosc', 'set', 'foo', value)
end)

External properties can also be used as control button badges:

controls=command:icon_name:command_name#foo@script_name?My foo button

overwrite-binding <name> <command>

Allows a overwriting handling of uosc built in bindings. Useful for 3rd party scripts that specialize in a specific domain to replace built in menus or behaviors provided by existing bindings.

Example that reroutes uosc's basic stream quality menu to christoph-heinrich/mpv-quality-menu:

mp.commandv('script-message-to', 'uosc', 'overwrite-binding', 'stream-quality', 'script-binding quality_menu/video_formats_toggle')

To cancel the overwrite and return to default behavior, just omit the <command> parameter.

Why uosc?

It stood for micro osc as it used to render just a couple rectangles before it grew to what it is today. And now it means a minimalist UI design direction where everything is out of your way until needed.