Automic VaultAutomic Vault

brew

Install kew with Homebrew, apk, apt, Nix, pacman, zypper

Command-line music player. Version 4.1.7 via Homebrew; verified 2026-07-03.

Install commandSecurity notes

install

Additional install commands

macOS

Homebrewverified · 100%
brew install kew

local Homebrew formula metadata

Linux

Alpine Linux apkverified · 92%
sudo apk add kew

Alpine Linux edge package indexes · kew · source: dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org

Debian aptverified · 92%
sudo apt install kew

Debian stable package indexes · kew · source: deb.debian.org

Nixverified · 92%
nix profile install nixpkgs#kew

nixpkgs package indexes · pkgs/by-name/ke/kew/package.nix · source: api.github.com

Arch Linux pacmanverified · 92%
sudo pacman -S kew

Arch Linux sync databases · kew · source: geo.mirror.pkgbuild.com

openSUSE zypperverified · 92%
sudo zypper install kew

openSUSE Tumbleweed package metadata · kew · source: download.opensuse.org

overview

Package summary

Command-line music player

Commands and aliases

  • kew

history

Project history and usage

kew is a terminal music player centered on local music libraries, fast fuzzy-ish command invocation, and privacy-oriented offline playback. Its appeal is deliberately old-school: play albums and folders from a shell, but with modern terminal luxuries such as covers, visualizers, themes, desktop integration, and playlist editing.

Project history

The project was developed by ravachol and documented on GitHub as a terminal music player. Its README emphasizes auto-generated playlists from artist, album, or song words, no telemetry by default, gapless playback, sixel-capable cover art, spectrum visualization, MPRIS-style desktop integration, and broad Unix-like platform support.

Release discussions show a rapid evolution from a small Linux terminal player into a broader shell music app. The v3.0 release-candidate discussion called out macOS support and dependency changes; later release notes for 4.0 described a redesigned audio module, ASCII visualizations, Discord integration, macOS media-key support, AIFF support, and Arch Linux packaging.

Adoption history

kew moved from a niche terminal-audio project into distribution packaging quickly enough to appear in Homebrew and Linux distribution package sets. That adoption pattern fits terminal music tools: a small upstream repo becomes much easier to try once package managers hide the codec and desktop-integration dependencies.

How it is used

Users run kew with words from an artist, album, song, directory, or playlist name; kew builds a queue from the first matching library location. It is used by people who want local-library playback without a heavyweight GUI or recommendation service.

Why package nerds care

kew sits in the lineage of terminal music players, but it is notable for combining shell-first invocation with visual terminal features that became more practical as sixel-capable and GPU-accelerated terminals spread. For packagers, the interesting part is dependency stitching across audio codecs, metadata libraries, cover rendering, notifications, and OS-specific media controls.

Timeline

  • 2024: Public discussion introduced kew to a wider terminal/Linux audience as a small local-library music player.
  • 2025: v3.0 release-candidate notes documented macOS support and larger dependency changes.
  • 2026: Homebrew packaged kew as a command-line music player, while the upstream README directed active development and issue tracking to Codeberg.

Related projects

  • kew belongs near other terminal music players and local-library tools rather than streaming clients. Its README also points packagers toward Repology and downstream package repositories as part of the project workflow.

security posture

Risk level: green

narrow executable package without higher-risk signals.

Risk classifier

green risk · low confidence · appliance

Why

  • narrow executable package without higher-risk signals

Signals

  • metadata:no-higher-risk-signals

Install behavior

  • No Homebrew post-install hook is recorded in formula metadata.
  • Homebrew bottle metadata is available for 6 platform targets.
  • Installs with 11 runtime dependencies.
  • Build metadata lists 1 build dependencies.

Recommended review

Before unattended agent use, check whether the tool reads plaintext credentials, writes remote state, publishes artifacts, or shells out to plugins.

local files

Configuration and credential file locations

These source-backed paths show where this package keeps local settings or durable credentials. Automic Vault can use them as review targets for secret scanning, migration, and command approval.

Configuration files

Config paths the tool may read or write during local use.

Linux
~/.config/kew/kewrc~/.config/kew/kewstaterc
macOS
~/Library/Preferences/kew/kewrc~/Library/Preferences/kew/kewstaterc

executables

Installed executables

CommandKindExposureNote
kewcliglobal executable

freshness

Version and freshness

These signals separate page generation age, package-manager activity, and upstream release comparison. Version lag is warned only when an evidence URL and comparable versions are present.

page generated2026-07-08
manager version4.1.7
manager updated2026-07-03
local dataok
upstreamcurrent
latest detectedv4.1.7

https://github.com/ravachol/kew

  • okNo freshness warnings were generated.

install metadata

Package metadata

Package keybrew:kew
Version4.1.7
Package managerHomebrew
Package manager pagehttps://formulae.brew.sh/formula/kew
Homepagehttps://github.com/ravachol/kew
Repositoryhttps://github.com/ravachol/kew
Upstream docshttps://github.com/ravachol/kew#readme
LicenseGPL-2.0-or-later
Source archivehttps://github.com/ravachol/kew/archive/refs/tags/v4.1.7.tar.gz
Last updated2026-07-03T03:58:02Z
Pulseupdated
Dependencieschafa, faad2, fftw, gdk-pixbuf, gettext, glib, libogg, libvorbis, opus, opusfile, taglib
Build dependenciespkgconf
Uses from macOScurl
Bottleavailable (on arm64_linux, arm64_sequoia, arm64_sonoma, arm64_tahoe, sonoma, x86_64_linux)
Homebrew post-installnot defined
Servicenone declared

registry facts

Source database details

Source DatabaseHomebrew formula API
Taphomebrew/core
Full Namekew
Version Scheme0
Revision0
Head VersionHEAD
Bottle Stable Root URLhttps://ghcr.io/v2/homebrew/core
Deprecatedno
Disabledno
Keg Onlyno
URL Keys
  • head
  • stable

source database matches

Other package-manager records

Matches are pulled from external package-manager indexes and kept separate from local Automic Vault package links.

Debian apt95%

kew 3.2.0+ds-1

play music from the commandline

https://github.com/ravachol/kew

sudo apt install kew
  • Section: sound
  • Architecture: amd64
  • 12 dependencies
  • normalized package name match
  • Matched by: Kew
Debian stable package indexes · deb.debian.org · Debian stable package indexes: kew from https://deb.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/main/binary-amd64/Packages.xz
Nix95%

kew

nix profile install nixpkgs#kew
  • normalized package name match
  • Matched by: Kew
nixpkgs package indexes · api.github.com · nixpkgs package indexes: pkgs/by-name/ke/kew/package.nix from https://api.github.com/repos/NixOS/nixpkgs/git/trees/master?recursive=1
Ubuntu apt95%

kew 2.4.2+ds-1build1

play music from the commandline

https://github.com/ravachol/kew

sudo apt install kew
  • Section: universe/sound
  • Architecture: amd64
  • 11 dependencies
  • 1 optional deps
  • normalized package name match
  • Matched by: Kew
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS package indexes · archive.ubuntu.com · Ubuntu 24.04 LTS package indexes: kew from https://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/noble/universe/binary-amd64/Packages.gz
apk95%

kew 3.7.3-r0

A terminal music player with album art & visualizer

https://codeberg.org/ravachol/kew

sudo apk add kew
  • License: GPL-2.0-or-later
  • Architecture: x86_64
  • Source Package: kew
  • 1 dependencies
  • 1 provides
  • normalized package name match
  • Matched by: Kew
Alpine Linux edge package indexes · dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org · Alpine Linux edge package indexes: kew from https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/edge/testing/x86_64/APKINDEX.tar.gz
apk95%

kew-doc 3.7.3-r0

A terminal music player with album art & visualizer (documentation)

https://codeberg.org/ravachol/kew

sudo apk add kew-doc
  • License: GPL-2.0-or-later
  • Architecture: x86_64
  • Source Package: kew
  • normalized package name match
  • Matched by: Kew
Alpine Linux edge package indexes · dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org · Alpine Linux edge package indexes: kew-doc from https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/edge/testing/x86_64/APKINDEX.tar.gz
pacman95%

kew 4.0.0-1

Music for the Shell

https://codeberg.org/ravachol/kew

sudo pacman -S kew
  • License: GPL-2.0-only
  • Architecture: x86_64
  • 9 dependencies
  • normalized package name match
  • Matched by: Kew
Arch Linux sync databases · geo.mirror.pkgbuild.com · Arch Linux sync databases: kew from https://geo.mirror.pkgbuild.com/extra/os/x86_64/extra.db.tar.gz
zypper95%

kew 3.7.3-1.4

A command-line music player

https://github.com/ravachol/kew

sudo zypper install kew
  • License: GPL-2.0-only
  • Category: Unspecified
  • Architecture: x86_64
  • Source Package: kew
  • 16 dependencies
  • 1 provides
  • normalized package name match
  • Matched by: Kew
openSUSE Tumbleweed package metadata · download.opensuse.org · openSUSE Tumbleweed package metadata: kew from https://download.opensuse.org/tumbleweed/repo/oss/repodata/be8d3611d25469107f32075a1697e69ec57a2b850b42348a658cc671ad5ec2b50760d02c3e59524d50da9a11d5be799bdaffba2e166e8ca8858512e3c0bd665d-primary.xml.zst
zypper95%

kew-lang 3.7.3-1.4

Translations for package kew

https://github.com/ravachol/kew

sudo zypper install kew-lang
  • License: GPL-2.0-only
  • Category: System/Localization
  • Architecture: noarch
  • Source Package: kew
  • 1 dependencies
  • 3 provides
  • normalized package name match
  • Matched by: Kew
openSUSE Tumbleweed package metadata · download.opensuse.org · openSUSE Tumbleweed package metadata: kew-lang from https://download.opensuse.org/tumbleweed/repo/oss/repodata/be8d3611d25469107f32075a1697e69ec57a2b850b42348a658cc671ad5ec2b50760d02c3e59524d50da9a11d5be799bdaffba2e166e8ca8858512e3c0bd665d-primary.xml.zst

package graph

Links come from deterministic package relationships, av.db category and tag curation, ecosystem matches, and package hub membership.

Related tools

  • chafaRuntime dependency declared by Homebrew.
  • faad2Runtime dependency declared by Homebrew.
  • fftwRuntime dependency declared by Homebrew.
  • gdk-pixbufRuntime dependency declared by Homebrew.
  • gettextRuntime dependency declared by Homebrew.
  • glibRuntime dependency declared by Homebrew.
  • pkgconfBuild dependency declared by Homebrew.

Same workflow

  • mocShares av.db curated category or tags: audio, cli, media, music-player, terminal.
  • vimpcShares av.db curated category or tags: audio, cli, media, music-player.
  • cmusShares av.db curated category or tags: audio, cli, media, music-player, terminal.
  • mp3blasterShares av.db curated category or tags: audio, audio-player, cli, media, terminal.
  • pianobarShares av.db curated category or tags: cli, media, music-player, terminal.
  • adplayShares av.db curated category or tags: audio, cli, media, music-player.

source trail

Generated from repository data

This page is generated by av-web from the private package SQLite artifact built by scripts/generate-pkg-sqlite.py.

Used sources

  • Geiger risk classifier
  • Nucleus package database
  • av.db category and tag curation
  • cross-ecosystem install command graph
  • curated configuration and credential file locations
  • curated package history
  • external package-manager database matches
  • package relationship graph
  • package version freshness
  • package-page enrichment