aproman

Fix HDMI audio after suspend/resume on Linux systems running PipeWire + WirePlumber.

The Problem

When a Linux system resumes from suspend, HDMI audio devices often lose their connection. WirePlumber tries to link to stale node proxies, resulting in silence. The only manual fix is to open your audio settings and switch the card profile away (for example to off) and back, forcing a full teardown and rebuild of the audio nodes.

How It Works

aproman runs as a service (systemd or OpenRC) and:

1. Auto-detects your HDMI audio card, or uses the one saved in the config file
2. Monitors D-Bus for PrepareForSleep signals from systemd-logind (or elogind)
3. On wake, waits briefly for HDMI to renegotiate, then cycles the card profile off and back on. The profile cycle alone is usually enough to force WirePlumber to rebuild fresh nodes and restore audio.
4. Separately, monitors PipeWire via pw-dump for nodes entering an error state. If one is detected, restarts PipeWire to recover (with a 30-second cooldown to prevent restart loops). This reactive path is a safety net for cases where the profile cycle alone is not enough; it is deliberately kept off the happy resume path because restarting PipeWire churns every client connected to it, and some clients (e.g. quickshell-based shells) handle the churn poorly.

Requirements

• PipeWire with WirePlumber, or PulseAudio compatibility via PipeWire
• pactl
• dbus-monitor
• pw-dump (optional, for node error monitoring)
• A Linux distribution with systemd or OpenRC (elogind for OpenRC)

Installation

systemd

uv tool install aproman
aproman install-service
systemctl --user start aproman.service

This installs aproman to ~/.local/bin/, copies the systemd user service into place, and enables it.

OpenRC user service (0.60+, Alpine edge, etc.)

uv tool install aproman
aproman install-service
rc-service --user aproman start

On OpenRC 0.60 or newer, install-service automatically installs a user-level service to ~/.config/rc/init.d/aproman. Make sure ~/.local/bin is on your PATH.

OpenRC system service (older OpenRC)

sudo uv pip install --system --break-system-packages aproman
sudo aproman install-service
sudo rc-service aproman start

On OpenRC versions before 0.60, install-service installs a system-level init script to /etc/init.d/aproman and adds it to the default runlevel. The service uses supervise-daemon for process supervision with automatic restart.

To configure the user and environment for the daemon, create /etc/conf.d/aproman:

command_user="youruser"
supervise_daemon_args="--env XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/run/user/1000"

Replace 1000 with your user's UID (id -u youruser).

Alternative: install.sh (systemd)

git clone https://github.com/mwolson/aproman-py.git
cd aproman-py
./install.sh
systemctl --user start aproman.service

This copies aproman to ~/.local/bin/ and installs and enables the user service.

Optional: set defaults

After installing, you can optionally save your preferred card and profile so that aproman uses them instead of auto-detecting:

aproman list-cards
aproman set-default-card alsa_card.pci-0000_01_00.1

aproman list-profiles
aproman set-default-profile pro-audio

These write to ~/.config/aproman.conf and signal the running daemon to pick up the changes. Without defaults, aproman auto-detects the first HDMI card and uses its active profile at startup.

Usage

The service runs automatically. To check status:

systemd

systemctl --user status aproman.service
journalctl --user -u aproman.service -f

OpenRC (user, 0.60+)

rc-service --user aproman status

OpenRC (system, older)

rc-service aproman status

Commands

aproman uses subcommands for one-off operations. With no subcommand, it runs as a daemon.

aproman                              Run as a daemon (default)
aproman cycle                        Cycle the card profile off and back on
aproman get-default-card             Print the default card from the config file
aproman get-default-profile          Print the default profile from the config file
aproman install-service              Install and enable the service (systemd or OpenRC)
aproman list-cards                   List available audio cards
aproman list-profiles                List available profiles for the card
aproman set-default-card CARD        Save default card and signal the daemon
aproman set-default-profile PROFILE  Save default profile and signal the daemon
aproman uninstall-service            Disable and remove the service (systemd or OpenRC)

Daemon options

These flags apply to the daemon and to cycle:

--card CARD            PipeWire/PulseAudio card name (default: config file, then auto-detect HDMI)
--profile PROFILE      Desired audio profile (default: config file, then active profile)
--wake-delay SECONDS   Seconds to wait after wake before cycling (default: 3.0)

Configuration File

aproman reads defaults from ~/.config/aproman.conf (or $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/aproman.conf). The file uses one flag per line:

--card=alsa_card.pci-0000_01_00.1
--profile=pro-audio

Only --card and --profile are supported. Unrecognized flags cause an error at startup. Command-line arguments always take precedence over the config file.

When the daemon receives a reload signal (sent automatically by set-default-card and set-default-profile via the Unix socket, or manually via kill -HUP), it reloads the config file and updates the card and profile for future suspend/resume cycles.

One-Shot Fix

If audio breaks and the daemon missed the resume event (for example, after a service restart), you can manually trigger a single profile cycle:

aproman cycle

This sends a cycle request to the running daemon via its Unix socket. If the daemon is unavailable, it falls back to running the cycle directly.

When the card is stuck in the off state, cycle automatically selects the highest-priority available profile. You can override with --profile:

aproman --profile pro-audio cycle

Example: Custom Card and Profile

aproman set-default-card alsa_card.pci-0000_01_00.1
aproman set-default-profile output:hdmi-stereo

Uninstall

aproman uninstall-service
uv tool uninstall aproman  # or: rm ~/.local/bin/aproman
rm -f ~/.config/aproman.conf

Testing

bun run test                # unit tests
bun run test:integration    # Docker-based integration tests
bun run test:all            # both

Hooks

bun run hooks:check         # run checks against working tree
lefthook install            # install git hooks

The pre-commit hook runs uvx ruff check, uvx ty check, and the unit test suite.

License

MIT