PyBites: Code Challenge 56 - Calculate the Duration of a Directory of Audio Files

There is an immense amount to be learned simply by tinkering with things. - Henry Ford

Hey Pythonistas,

It's time for another code challenge! This week we're asking you to work with directory, files and audio meta data!

The Challenge

Write a script that receives a directory name and retrieves all mp3 (or mp4 or m4a) files. It then sums up the durations of each file and prints them in a nice table with a total duration.

This could look like the following:

    $ module_duration.py ~/Music/iTunes/iTunes\ Media/Music/Manu\ Chao/Manu\ Chao\ -\ Esperanza/
    Manu Chao - Bixo.m4a                    : 112
    Manu Chao - Denia.m4a                   : 279
    Manu Chao - El Dorrado 1997.m4a         : 89
    Manu Chao - Homens.m4a                  : 198
    Manu Chao - Infinita Tristeza.m4a       : 236
    Manu Chao - La Chinita.m4a              : 93
    Manu Chao - La Marea.m4a                : 136
    Manu Chao - La Primavera.m4a            : 112
    Manu Chao - La Vacaloca.m4a             : 143
    Manu Chao - Le Rendez Vous.m4a          : 116
    Manu Chao - Me Gustas Tu.m4a            : 240
    Manu Chao - Merry Blues.m4a             : 216
    Manu Chao - Mi Vida.m4a                 : 152
    Manu Chao - Mr Bobby.m4a                : 229
    Manu Chao - Papito.m4a                  : 171
    Manu Chao - Promiscuity.m4a             : 96
    Manu Chao - Trapped by Love.m4a         : 114
    --------------------------------------------------
    Total                                   : 0:45:32

What will you learn?

Why do we think this is cool? There are a couple of subtasks here:

1. You learn how to do a common sysadmin task of listing files in a directory (check out the os, glob and pathlib modules).

2. You learn how to convert and calculate mm:ss (minutes/seconds) timings, which will hone your datetime skills.

3. As far as we know Python cannot extract audio meta data natively (yet), so you probably want to try a tool like FFmpeg which is cool because then you need to know how to call an external command with Python and parse its output. You probably want to check out subprocess for this:

   The subprocess module allows you to spawn new processes, connect to their input/output/error pipes, and obtain their return codes. - docs

Good luck and have fun!

PyBites Community

A few more things before we take off:

• Do you want to discuss this challenge and share your Pythonic journey with other passionate Pythonistas? Confirm your email on our platform then request access to our Slack via settings.

• PyBites is here to challenge you because becoming a better Pythonista requires practice, a lot of it. For any feedback, issues or ideas use GH Issues, tweet us or ping us on our Slack.

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