How To

How-to guides

Check a render before it goes out

$ mj qc render.mov broadcast-us

It checks the codec, size, frame rate, audio and loudness, and exits 1 if a check fails. The built-in specs are broadcast-us, broadcast-eu, web, social-vertical and prores-master; you can also write your own spec file (mj-man qc). Set a default once with mj config set qc_spec broadcast-us.

Free disk space

$ mj space
$ mj space clean leftovers --yes

mj space lists After Effects, Adobe media and Redshift caches by size and flags the ones left over from versions you no longer have. Cleaning takes a cache id, never a path, and refuses while the owning app is running (mj-man space).

Find projects that use a plugin or effect

First index your receipts (once, and again when new ones arrive):

$ mj index.add path="$HOME/AE/receipts"

Then:

$ mj audit.plugins target=S_Glow            # which projects use it
$ mj audit.plugins                          # every effect and how many projects use it

Trace a missing file or font

$ mj trace.asset format=missing
$ mj trace.asset format=font target="Brandon Grotesque"

Each match lists the project and the comp path, for example Main > Lower Third, down to the layer.

Notifications and status line

mj notify on|off|status toggles banners. mj status prints one line for a prompt. For the menu bar, copy integrations/swiftbar/mj.10s.sh into your SwiftBar folder.

Recipes and batches

A recipe is a text file of steps. Run one on every receipt in a folder:

$ mj batch recipes/check-scrapes.mjrecipe ~/AE/receipts
  ✓ spring.20261001T090000Z.scrape.json
  ✓ spring.20261001T163000Z.scrape.json

2 files: 2 ok, 0 failed

Run a script after every snapshot

mj config set post_snapshot_hook /absolute/path/script. The script must be a regular file you own, not writable by group or others, in a folder with safe permissions. It gets 30 seconds, runs in its own process group, and can never make a snapshot fail.

Verify and pin the install

The installer checks SHA256SUMS. To pin an exact release, set MJ_INSTALL_REF and MJ_INSTALL_SHA256; MJ_INSTALL_YES=1 runs unattended. Every operation is logged; check the log with audit.verify.

Read an error

Errors show a code such as STORE_UNAVAILABLE, what it means and what to do. mj explain works on any saved reply. The full list is docs/man/errors.md (mj-man errors).

Troubleshooting

docs/man/troubleshooting.md (mj-man troubleshooting), and always start with mj doctor.