Command Line Reference

This page describes all the options available to run Plover from the command line. The command is available under slightly different names on each platform, relative to your installation directory:

• Windows: C:\Program Files (x86)\Open Steno Project\Plover 4.0.0\plover_console.exe

• macOS: /Applications/Plover.app/Contents/MacOS/Plover

• Linux: plover.AppImage

All of the above commands will be referred to as plover below.

--help

Display the help text and then exit.

--version

Display the running Plover version and then exit.

-g <gui>

Specify the GUI system to use. The options are as follows:

qt

Run the built-in Qt-based GUI. This is the default value.

none

Run Plover headless, i.e. without a GUI. You’ll only be able to control Plover from the command line or with steno commands.

-l <level>, --log-level <level>

Change the minimum level of logs being shown on standard output. Options are debug, info, warning, and error. By default, no logs are displayed.

-s <script>, --script <script>

Use another console script as the main entrypoint. This passes the remainder of the command line arguments to the console script. For example, to run the plugin installer:

plover -s plover_plugins

Pass -s without an argument to show the list of console scripts.

Plugin Installer

The plugin installer can be accessed through the plover_plugins console script:

plover -s plover_plugins

This is essentially a wrapper around pip; you can run commands to install and remove packages just like on a normal Python installation. For example, to install and uninstall the plover-treal plugin:

plover -s plover_plugins install plover-treal
plover -s plover_plugins uninstall plover-treal

To list all of the plugins available on your system:

plover -s plover_plugins list

To install a plugin you are working on locally:

cd plover_myplugin
plover -s plover_plugins install -e .

Note

Some users have had issues loading the plugin list with the Plugin Manager; this seems to have something to do with an outdated version of another package. This can be fixed with the following command:

plover -s plover_plugins install --disable-pip-version-check --upgrade Pygments

Sending Commands

The plover_send_command console script can be used to send commands to an existing Plover instance:

plover -s plover_send_command

It takes the command name and parameters as an argument, written as they would be in a dictionary definition. For example, to send the command {plover:toggle}, you can invoke this script as follows:

plover -s plover_send_command toggle

The following built-in commands are available:

resume

Enable steno output.

suspend

Disable steno output.

toggle

Toggle steno output on or off.

quit

Quit Plover.

focus

Bring the Plover window to the foreground.

configure

Open the configuration dialog.

add_translation

Open the Add Translation dialog.

lookup

Open the Lookup dialog.

suggestions

Open the Suggestions dialog.

reconnect_machine

Disconnect and reconnect the current machine. Equivalent to pressing the Reconnect button in the main window.

reload_dictionaries

Reload all dictionaries from disk without resetting the machine connection. Useful for picking up changes made to dictionary files outside of Plover.

reload_config

Reload the configuration file from disk and re-apply all settings, including dictionaries, machine type, keymap, system, and enabled extensions. Useful when the configuration file has been changed externally (for example, when syncing settings across machines).

set_config:<key>:<value>[,<key>:<value>,...]

Set one or more configuration options. Keys and string values should be quoted with single quotes. For example:

plover -s plover_send_command "set_config:'translation_frame_opacity':90"