Toggle all microphones mute status with on-screen indicator

toggle_mic_mutes.py

#!/usr/bin/env python3

import pulsectl
import dbus
import time

def show_notification(title, message, icon_name):
    """
    Show a KDE desktop notification using D-Bus directly.

    Args:
        title: The notification title
        message: The notification message body
        icon_name: Name of the icon to display
    """
    print(f"{title}: {message}")

    try:
        # Connect to the D-Bus session bus
        bus = dbus.SessionBus()

        # Get the notifications service
        notify_service = bus.get_object(
            'org.freedesktop.Notifications',
            '/org/freedesktop/Notifications'
        )

        # Get the notifications interface
        notify_interface = dbus.Interface(
            notify_service,
            'org.freedesktop.Notifications'
        )

        # Send the notification
        notify_interface.Notify(
            "Mic Toggle",      # App name
            0,                 # Replace id (0 = new notification)
            icon_name,         # Icon name
            title,             # Title
            message,           # Body
            [],                # Actions
            {},                # Hints
            2000               # Timeout in ms (2 seconds)
        )
    except Exception as e:
        # Fall back to print if D-Bus fails
        print(f"Notification failed: {e}")
        print(f"{title}: {message}")


def toggle_all_mics():
    """
    Toggle mute status of all input devices (microphones) in the PulseAudio system.
    Shows an on-screen notification of the action.
    Returns True if mics are now muted, False if unmuted.
    """
    with pulsectl.Pulse('mic-toggle') as pulse:
        # Get all source (input) devices that are actually microphones
        all_sources = pulse.source_list()

        # Filter for actual microphone devices - exclude monitors and non-mic devices
        microphones = list(filter(lambda x: "input" in x.name.split(".")[0].lower(), all_sources))

        # If no microphones found, show notification and exit early
        if not microphones:
            show_notification(
                "Mic Toggle",
                "No microphones found in the system",
                "microphone-sensitivity-muted"
            )
            return False

        # Check if any mics are already unmuted to determine current state
        any_unmuted = any(mic.mute == 0 for mic in microphones)

        # If any mic is unmuted, we'll mute all
        # If all mics are muted, we'll unmute all
        new_mute = 1 if any_unmuted else 0

        # Apply mute/unmute only to microphone sources
        for mic in microphones:
            print(f"{mic.description}\n\tMuted: {mic.mute}\n\tDesired state: {new_mute}")
            if mic.mute == new_mute:
                continue

            pulse.source_mute(mic.index, new_mute)
            print(("\tMuting " if new_mute else "\tUnmuting ") + str(mic.index))

            # Fast iteration through mics via the Pulse interface seems to be time-sensitive, so delay a bit to get consistent results
            time.sleep(0.15)

        # Show notification based on action
        icon = 'microphone-sensitivity-muted' if new_mute else 'microphone-sensitivity-high'
        message = 'All microphones muted' if new_mute else 'All microphones unmuted'
        show_notification("Mic Toggle", message, icon)

        return new_mute == 1  # Return True if we muted, False if we unmuted

if __name__ == "__main__":
    status = toggle_all_mics()

Some system update after originally publishing this introduced a race condition when toggling, so I added a small delay when iterating through mics. My own testing showed 1/10 of a second was enough to produce consistent results, so I added 50% and called it a day :)

Also added a check of current mic state to avoid trying to set a mute/unmute flag unncessarily, and added some additional terminal logging to help with debugging.