Music and timers
Music
Experimental
Music through Music Assistant is experimental in 1.0: its own set of containers and patches on top.
| Say | What happens |
|---|---|
| “Homer, play Queen” | The best match — track, artist, album or playlist — on the computer speakers, then similar tracks |
| “…play jazz on the Station” | The same through a Yandex Station and Alice (Russian home only) |
| “play my music”, “play my liked songs” | “Liked” of everyone with access to the home — newest like first, in order. The reply: “Playing your music — N liked tracks, newest first” |
| “play my music shuffled” (“shuffle”) | The same, shuffled |
| “stop”, “turn off the music” | Stop |
| “next” | Next track in the queue |
| “louder”, “quieter”, “volume 30” | Volume from 0 to 100 |
| “what's playing?” | Artist and title |
While music is playing, stop, next, louder, quieter and “what's playing” work right away, without waiting for the model, in English too.
The speaker doesn't know who is talking, so “Liked” is shared by the home. If it is empty, the speaker says so: tap the heart on what is playing — in the Homer player on the phone, on the web or in Homer Node.
Where the sign-in comes from
You need a Yandex Plus subscription. No separate sign-in: the Homer server takes the sign-in from the Yandex Station integration in Home Assistant and gives the speaker a Music token. The token is issued only with the speaker key, only in the home network, and is never stored.
To use another account, put its token in secrets/yandex-music-token.txt on the speaker computer.
Details
- Without Music Assistant,
ffplayplays on the default Windows output device, separately from the speaker voice. - While music plays, a Homer icon sits in the Windows tray: a click stops the music, right-click shows the track title and “Next track”. If you kill
ffplayin Task Manager, the queue stops too. - Starting volume is 40. When the volume changes, the track continues from the same place.
- With loud music, call the speaker louder or closer to the microphone: echo cancellation doesn't see the music.
Player in Homer Node
While music plays, the node's mini player floats above the windows: one speaker and five buttons — Dislike, Previous, pause, Next, Like. The ⌃ button (“Full player”) expands it upwards into the full player, the same as in the app. The window remembers its view.
- Play on — every speaker of the home and what each one plays. Each has ⏯ and ⏹; on a silent speaker ▶ plays “Liked”.
- Seek and volume of the selected speaker.
- Up next — the queue, with a “Crossfade” checkbox.
- Liked — “Play all”, “Shuffle”, tap a track to “Play from here”; × removes a track from the list.
- Search — artist, song or YouTube link; each result has three buttons: play now, “Play next”, “Add to queue”.
- Play together — checkboxes in the “Play on” list, left of the names: the selected speaker leads, the checked ones play the same track with it in sync. An offline speaker is unavailable, the reason is in the tooltip. In the list header: “Everywhere” (all online speakers together with the selected one) and “Only here” (the rest separately).
The Home tab of the Homer Node window is the same player, next to reminders, the latest frames of the home cameras and a short node summary; everything else is in the “Settings” tab. If the node belongs to several homes, pick the home above the player (empty ones are marked “— no speakers”); the choice is remembered.
The computer works with the “Liked” of the home's first owner — in the full player and with the heart in the mini player.
Music on several speakers
Speakers that play together are aligned in the app: Settings → Music → Music on several speakers → Calibrate from phone. A speaker that didn't accept its shift (the measurement missed or it didn't answer) doesn't stop the others; if nothing was applied, the reply names the speaker and the reason.
Timers and reminders
| Say | What happens |
|---|---|
| “set a timer for 10 minutes” | After 10 minutes the speaker rings three times and says “Timer” — heard on every speaker of the home |
| “remind me in half an hour to take out the pizza” | A ring and “take out the pizza” |
| “how much time is left?” | List of timers |
| “cancel the timer”, “cancel all” | Cancel |
A reminder that fires is heard across the home: every Homer speaker says the phrase in its own voice, a computer without satellite speakers uses its own speaker, with a ring. The home's phones get a “Timer” push — even with the app minimized.
Reminders in Homer Node
The Home tab of the Homer Node window has a Reminders section: a list with a countdown and the time it fires, × (“Cancel”) on each, Cancel all when there are several. You can add one from the computer too: “What to remind about”, then “in, min” or “at” HH:MM — up to a day ahead; quick buttons 5, 15, 30 min and 1 h. This computer's speaker rings, every speaker of the home says the phrase, and the phones get a push. If the computer has no “Speaker” role, there are no reminders here — turn the role on in the node settings.
Timers live in the memory of the speaker brain: restarting the speaker clears them. The longest is a day. A voice alarm for a specific time is better set through Alice: in a Russian home, «Хомер, разбуди в семь» (“Homer, wake me at seven”) is passed to the Station.