CMUS colour scheme and persistent settings

DATE: 2022-12-08

AUTHOR: John L. Godlee

cmus[1] uses a file called autosave (~/.config/cmus/autosave) to store configuration settings. This file is loaded every time cmus is launched. Settings changed during a session will be written to autosave on exit. This can make changing settings a bit finicky. A few times I've accidentally changed a setting by pressing the wrong hotkey, and then not been able to change it back. There is another file called rc (~/.config/cmus/rc) which can store persistent settings. These settings are loaded after autosave and will not be overwritten on exit.

1: https://cmus.github.io/

In my cmus rc I only have a few settings:

set aaa_mode=all - play all tracks, alternatively artist or album for all songs in the current artist or album.
set stop_after_queue=true - after the play queue has finished, stop playing
set continue=true - Play the next song automatically
bind -f common q quit - rebind q to not ask for confirmation on exit
unbind -f common C - unbind C, which normally toggles playing the next song automatically. I never want to disable continuous mode.

All settings can be found in the cmus manual[2].

2: https://github.com/cmus/cmus/blob/master/Doc/cmus.txt

The rest is colour settings:

set color_separator=white - separator colour between artist and track view in tree view
set color_statusline_bg=gray - statusline background
set color_statusline_fg=black - statusline foreground
set color_win_title_bg=gray - background of window title
set color_win_title_fg=black - foreground of window title
set color_titleline_bg=default - background of currently playing track
set color_titleline_fg=white - foreground of currently playing track
set color_win_sel_bg=gray - background of selected row when not currently playing
set color_win_sel_fg=black - foreground of selected row when not currently playing
set color_win_inactive_sel_bg=darkgray - background of selected row when not in that window and not currently playing
set color_win_inactive_sel_fg=black - foreground of selected row when not in that window and not currently playing
set color_win_cur_sel_bg=gray - background of currently playing track when selected
set color_win_cur_sel_fg=black - foreground of currently playing track when selected
set color_win_inactive_cur_sel_bg=darkgray - background of currently playing track when row selected but not in that window
set color_win_inactive_cur_sel_fg=black - foreground of currently playing track when row selected but not in that window
set color_win_cur=green - text colour of currently playing track when not selected

Annotated screenshot of cmus showing colour settings