ProPresenter Lyrics Export

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Extract and export worship song lyrics from ProPresenter 7

View the Project on GitHub adamswbrown/propresenterlyricexport

Service Generator Guide

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Automate your Sunday service playlist creation from PDF service orders in minutes — or pre-plan services weeks in advance.

Note: Service Generator is an optional advanced feature. The core functionality of ProPresenter Lyrics Export is extracting lyrics from existing playlists. Service Generator extends this by helping you build playlists from PDF service orders or by manually planning services ahead of time.

Table of Contents

  1. How to Enable Service Generator
  2. What is Service Generator?
  3. How It Works (6-Step Workflow)
  4. Workflow Details
  5. Plan Service (Pre-Planning Workflow) - Pre-plan services ahead of time
  6. Troubleshooting
  7. Understanding Service Libraries
  8. Service Library Structure
  9. PDF Format Requirements - How to structure your PDFs
  10. Service Order Sources
  11. Getting Help

How to Enable Service Generator

Desktop App:

  1. Open the desktop app
  2. Look for the “Service Generator” tab at the top of the window
  3. Click to open the Service Generator interface

CLI: Service Generator is only available in the desktop app. CLI users should use the standard export commands.

What is Service Generator?

Service Generator takes a PDF service order (from Planning Center, Proclaim, ChurchPlanner, etc.) and automatically populates your ProPresenter playlist with:

Time saved: What normally takes 15-20 minutes of manual playlist building now takes 2-3 minutes.

Service Generator Main Interface

Watch It In Action

See a complete end-to-end run of Service Generator — from PDF upload to a fully built ProPresenter playlist:

How It Works (6-Step Workflow)

Step 1: Setup (One-Time Configuration)

Configure which libraries and playlists to use:

ProPresenter Setup Required:

Before using Service Generator, create a playlist folder in ProPresenter to hold your generated service playlists:

  1. Open ProPresenter
  2. Go to the Playlists panel
  3. Right-click and select New Folder
  4. Name it something like “Services” or “Weekly Services”
  5. This folder will appear as a target location when selecting your Target Playlist

Service Generator will create new playlists inside this folder each week.

How to find your libraries:

  1. In the desktop app, look at available libraries (loaded during connection)
  2. You’ll typically have: “Worship,” “Service Content,” “Kids,” “Announcements,” etc.
  3. Select the ones that match your workflow

Once configured, these settings are saved and remembered for future uses.

Select Library

Create Playlist

After selecting or creating a working playlist, you’ll see two workflow options:

Step 2: Upload PDF

  1. Click “Select PDF” or drag-and-drop a PDF file
  2. Choose your service order (from Planning Center, Proclaim, etc.)
  3. The app loads and prepares the document

Supported PDF formats:

Upload PDF

Step 3: Parse

The app automatically extracts from your PDF:

What you see: A preview list of everything extracted from the PDF, organized by section.

Parse PDF Results

Step 4: Match Songs

Each extracted song is matched against your Worship Library:

For each song:

What to do:

  1. Accept green matches - Leave as-is
  2. Review yellow/red matches - Click the dropdown to select the correct song
  3. Search Library - Click “Search Library” to search the relevant ProPresenter library (worship or kids) and pick any song
  4. Save as Alias - Click “Save as Alias” to remember overrides for future services (worship songs only)
  5. Skip items - Some items might not be songs (announcements, etc.)

Step complete when: All songs are matched or explicitly skipped.

Match Songs Results

Search Library (Override a Song)

If the right song isn’t in the dropdown (e.g., the order of service says “Be Thou My Vision” but you use a modern version called “You Are My Vision”):

  1. Click “Search Library” next to the song
  2. Type the name of the song you actually want to use
  3. Press Enter or click Search
  4. Click the correct result to select it

The search is automatically scoped to the relevant library — worship songs search only the worship library, kids videos search only the kids library, and Bible verses search only the service content library. This prevents cross-library confusion.

The selected song replaces the original match and is labelled as “(Override)”. You can then click “Save as Alias” to remember this mapping, so next time the order of service lists “Be Thou My Vision”, it will automatically match to “You Are My Vision.”

Note: “Save as Alias” is only available for worship songs, not kids videos (which are mapped differently).

Song Aliases (Persistent Overrides)

Song aliases let you permanently map an order-of-service title to a specific ProPresenter presentation. This is useful when:

To create an alias:

  1. In Step 4 (Match Songs), select the correct song (via dropdown or Search Library)
  2. Click “Save as Alias”
  3. The alias is saved and will auto-match in all future services

To manage aliases from the CLI:

# List all aliases
propresenter-lyrics alias list

# Add a new alias (interactive)
propresenter-lyrics alias add "Be Thou My Vision"

# Remove an alias
propresenter-lyrics alias remove "Be Thou My Vision"

Aliases are stored at ~/.propresenter-words/aliases.json and shared between the Desktop App and CLI.

Song Search (CCLI/Song Library)

Can’t Find a Worship Song? Use CCLI Song Select

If Service Generator can’t find a worship song in your library, it shows “Copy Song Name” and “Search CCLI” buttons. The key message is: make sure the song has been imported into ProPresenter first.

Step-by-step:

  1. Copy the song name — Click “Copy Song Name” next to the unmatched song
  2. Search CCLI — Click “Search CCLI” to open CCLI Song Select in your browser
    • Log in and paste the song name to find it
    • Note the CCLI Song Number (7-8 digit code)

CCLI Song ID Location

  1. Import into ProPresenter — Open ProPresenter, search by CCLI number, and import the song into your Worship library

ProPresenter CCLI Song Search

  1. Rescan — Return to Service Generator and click “Rescan Libraries” to find the newly imported song

Tips:

Can’t Find a Kids Song? Search YouTube

Kids songs are typically YouTube videos. When a kids song isn’t found, the app shows “Copy Song Name” and “Search YouTube” buttons. The key message is: make sure it’s been imported into ProPresenter first.

Note: The matcher also automatically searches all libraries as a fallback if the Kids library doesn’t have a match.

Step-by-step:

  1. Copy the song name — Click “Copy Song Name” to copy the title to your clipboard
  2. Search YouTube — Click “Search YouTube” to open a YouTube search with the song name
  3. Import into ProPresenter — Download or link the video, then import it into your Kids library in ProPresenter
  4. Rescan — Return to Service Generator and click “Rescan Libraries”

You can also skip unmatched kids items — they won’t be added to the playlist.

Step 5: Bible (Verses & Presentations)

Match scripture references to your Service Content library:

For each verse reference (e.g., “John 3:16”):

Bible Search

Found Bible Verse Match

Get Verse Details

When no match is found, the key message is: make sure the verse has been imported into ProPresenter first. The app shows:

Tip: Bible verse matching looks for presentations containing translation markers like “(NIV)”, “(ESV)”, “(NLT)”, etc. in their names. This ensures only Bible verse presentations are matched, not worship songs or other content in the same library.

Adding Bible Verses to ProPresenter

If a Bible verse isn’t found in your Service Content library, you need to create it in ProPresenter:

  1. Copy the reference — Click “Copy Reference” to copy it to your clipboard (e.g., “Luke 12:35-59”)
  2. Open ProPresenter — Press Cmd+B to open the Bible panel
  3. Search for the verse — Paste the reference and find the passage
  4. Create a presentation — Save it to your Service Content library
  5. Rescan — Return to Service Generator and click “Rescan” to find the new presentation

Watch this short video to learn how:

Skipping Verses

If you don’t need verse presentations in your playlist (or want to add them manually later), click “Skip Verses” to bypass the verse step entirely. You can always go back from the Build step if you change your mind.

Step complete when: All verses are matched, or the step is explicitly skipped.

Step 6: Build

The app automatically creates your playlist with:

  1. Opening section (pre-roll, announcements)
  2. Songs in correct order with matched library items
  3. Bible passages inserted at the right moments
  4. Service sections and transitions
  5. Kids content separated and properly organized

Result:

Service Build Preview

Final touches:

Workflow Details

Song Matching

The fuzzy-match engine searches for songs in three ways:

  1. Exact title match - Looks for exact song names
  2. Partial match - Finds songs with similar titles
  3. Phonetic match - Handles spelling variations

Examples:

High confidence (>90%):

Manual review (70-90%):

No match (<70%):

Bible Matching

Scripture references are matched against presentations in your Service Content library:

Typical references:

Matching logic:

  1. Exact book/chapter/verse match
  2. Same book and chapter (any verse)
  3. Same book (any chapter)

Common issues:

Worship Slot Detection

The app automatically identifies worship segments:

How it works:

Manual override:

Special Services Detection

Service Generator automatically detects special services and adjusts handling accordingly.

Special services detected:

What happens when a special service is detected:

  1. Warning banner appears - “⚠️ Special Service Detected: This is a [service type] service. Service Generator may handle videos and structure differently.”

  2. Videos handled correctly - In special services, videos are not automatically assumed to be kids content
    • Example: “Remembrance Hymn (Video)” in a Remembrance service is matched as a worship song, not kids content
    • Only videos explicitly marked with “kids” keyword (e.g., “John 3:16 Song (Kids Video)”) go to the kids library
  3. Structure awareness - Special services may have different structure than regular Sunday worship
    • Notification shows: “Found X items in PDF (remembrance service)”
    • Helps you understand why the layout might be different from usual

Practical example:

Regular Sunday Remembrance Sunday
PRAISE: Jesus Loves Me PRAISE: Remembrance Hymn (Video)
→ Matched to Kids Library → Matched to Worship Library (not kids!)
Result: Kids content slide Result: Hymn video presentation

If you see unexpected video behavior in special services, remember that the app intelligently distinguishes between:

Video Placement Recognition

Service Generator recognizes that videos can appear throughout a service, not just in the kids section. Videos are automatically placed in the appropriate worship slot based on their position in the service order.

Common video placements:

Placement Example Handling
Early (10-25%) Opening worship song video Matched to appropriate library based on content
Middle (40-60%) Mid-service reflection video Placed in Praise 2 slot or after sermon
End (80%+) Closing/finishing video Placed at end of worship (Praise 3 or closing)
Special services Remembrance hymn video, Christmas carol video Not assumed to be kids content

Real data from 62 services:

Examples:

  1. Christmas Service - “Glory in the Manger” at 83% (finishing video)
    • Placed in Praise 3 slot to wrap up service
  2. Regular Sunday - “If God is for me” at 50% (transition video)
    • Placed after prayer/reflection, before final song
  3. Remembrance Sunday - “Remembrance Hymn” at 71% (closing reflection)
    • Placed in Praise 3 slot as closing meditation

How it works:

Library routing:

Examples:

  1. Christmas Service - “Glory in the Manger” at 83% (finishing video)
    • Searched in Service Content library
    • Placed in Praise 3 slot to wrap up service
  2. Remembrance Sunday - “Remembrance Hymn” at 71% (closing reflection)
    • Searched in Service Content library (not kids!)
    • Placed in Praise 3 slot as closing meditation
  3. Regular Sunday - “If God is for me” at 50% (transition video)
    • Searched in Service Content library
    • Placed in Praise 2 slot (bridges sermon and closing worship)

Tips:

Before Running Service Generator

  1. Ensure your libraries are set up:
    • Create a “Worship” library with your songs
    • Create a “Service Content” library with verses and announcements
    • Create a “Kids” library if you have kids content
    • Create your target playlist (can be empty)
  2. Add missing presentations first:
    • If you know a song isn’t in your library, add it before running
    • Same for Bible verses - create them in Service Content first
    • This makes matches more successful
  3. Use consistent naming:
    • Song titles in Planning Center should match your library
    • Bible passages should be in format “Book Chapter:Verse”

During the Workflow

  1. Don’t rush yellow/red matches
    • Review them carefully
    • Better to skip and add manually than use wrong song
  2. Use the search feature
    • Click the match row to open a search dialog
    • Type to find the right song/verse
    • Helpful for typos or variations
  3. Mark as manual carefully
    • “Manual” means you’ll add it to ProPresenter later
    • Make a note of which items are manual
    • Don’t forget to add them!

After Building

  1. Review the playlist
    • Check the order makes sense
    • Verify songs are the right versions
    • Look for any oddities
  2. Add remaining items
    • Birthday Bucket presentation
    • Sermon presentation
    • Kids Talk presentation
    • Any other special segments
  3. Customize if needed
    • Adjust song order (drag in ProPresenter)
    • Add or remove items
    • Add transition slides
  4. Test before Sunday
    • Open the playlist in ProPresenter
    • Preview each song to ensure correct content
    • Check any custom formatting

Plan Service (Pre-Planning Workflow)

Plan Service lets you pre-plan services weeks or months in advance without needing a PDF. This is ideal when you already know the songs for an upcoming service and want to get the playlist ready ahead of time.

How to Use Plan Service

  1. Complete Step 1 (Setup) as usual — configure libraries, template, and select/create a working playlist
  2. Click “Plan Service” instead of “Upload PDF”
  3. You’ll see a planning form with:
    • Service Name — e.g., “St Andrews - 25th September”
    • Service Date — Pick the date for this service
    • Notes — Optional notes about the service
    • Template Slots — Each section from your template:
      • Praise 1 — Opening worship songs
      • Praise 2 — Mid-service worship
      • Praise 3 — Closing worship
      • Kids — Children’s songs/videos
      • Reading — Bible passages / scripture

Adding Songs to Slots

For each slot, click ”+ Add Song” (or “+ Add Scripture” for Reading):

  1. Type a song name in the search box
  2. Press Enter or click Search — searches across all configured libraries
  3. Click a result to add it to that slot
  4. Add multiple items per slot if needed

Can’t find a song? The same tools from the PDF workflow are available:

Saving Plans

Click “Save Plan” to persist your plan to disk. Saved plans appear on the Setup step under “Saved Plans” where you can:

Plans are stored in ~/.propresenter-words/planned-services.json and persist across app sessions.

Building from a Plan

When you’re ready to build the actual ProPresenter playlist:

  1. Click “Build Playlist” on the Plan step
  2. Review the summary on the Build step (same as the PDF workflow)
  3. Click “Add Items” to populate your ProPresenter playlist

The build process works identically to the PDF workflow — songs are inserted into the correct template sections based on their slot assignments.

Typical Plan Service Workflow

  1. Weeks before: Service leader decides on songs for upcoming service
  2. Plan ahead: Open Plan Service, assign songs to slots, save the plan
  3. During the week: Edit the plan if songs change — load, modify, save again
  4. Service day: Load the saved plan, click Build Playlist, done!

Troubleshooting

No songs found in library

Problem: “No matches” shown for all songs

Solutions:

  1. Verify the Worship Library is correct (check its name)
  2. Ensure songs are actually in the library
  3. Check song titles match what’s in Planning Center
  4. Try manual search for one song to debug

Bible verses not matching

Problem: Verse references show “No match”

Solutions:

  1. Verify Service Content library has the verses
  2. Ensure verse presentations include translation in the name (e.g., “John 3:16 (NIV)”) — this is how the app identifies Bible verses vs. other content
  3. Check verse format in the PDF (should be “John 3:16” style)
  4. Use “Search Library” to manually find and select the verse
  5. Use “Open Bible Gateway” fallback to manually create presentation

Wrong songs getting selected

Problem: High confidence match is wrong

Solutions:

  1. Songs probably have similar titles in your library
  2. Check if you have duplicates with different versions
  3. Manually override each one in Step 4
  4. Consider renaming songs to be more distinct

PDF won’t upload

Problem: “Invalid PDF” or upload fails

Solutions:

  1. Ensure it’s a valid PDF file (not corrupted)
  2. Try opening it in another PDF reader
  3. Try a different service order (different format)
  4. Check file size (should be <50MB)

Understanding Service Libraries

Service Generator relies on three types of libraries in ProPresenter. Understanding what each does will help you set it up correctly.

Worship Library

What it is: Your main library containing all worship songs and hymns

What it contains:

What Service Generator does:

Example: PDF says “Come Thou Fount” → App finds “Come Thou Fount” presentation → Adds to Praise 1 section

Kids Library

What it is: A separate library for children’s songs and activities

What it contains:

What Service Generator does:

Example: PDF says “Kids Video: Sing Wherever I Go” → App finds in Kids library → Adds to Kids Talk section

Service Content Library

What it is: A library containing Bible verses, videos, announcements, and service elements

What it contains:

What Service Generator does:

Important:

Examples:

Library Setup Checklist

Before using Service Generator, ensure you have:

Service Library Structure

Before using Service Generator, you’ll want to organize your ProPresenter libraries to match how the app routes different content types. Service Generator intelligently places songs, scripture references, and videos into the appropriate library based on their type.

Service Generator works best when you have three libraries set up:

1. Worship Library (Primary - for songs)

2. Service Content Library (Secondary - for videos and ceremony elements)

3. Kids Library (Tertiary - for children’s content)

How Service Generator Routes Content

Service Generator automatically:

  1. Songs → Matched in your Worship library
  2. Scripture references (e.g., “John 3:16”) → Matched in your Service Content library
  3. Kids items (marked with “Kids” keyword) → Matched in your Kids library
  4. Videos (marked with “(Video)” in PDF):
    • If marked “Kids Video” → Kids library
    • Otherwise → Service Content library (for hymn videos, closing videos, etc.)

Setting Up Your Libraries

In ProPresenter Preferences → Libraries:

  1. Create or identify your Worship library (e.g., “Worship Songs”, “Songs”)
  2. Create or identify your Service Content library (e.g., “Service Elements”, “Videos”, “Ceremony”)
  3. Create or identify your Kids library (e.g., “Kids Content”, “Children’s”)

Then in Service Generator settings, specify which library ID corresponds to each:

Why This Structure Matters

Organizing your libraries this way means:

PDF Format Requirements

Service Generator is designed to work with standard PDF service orders. Here’s what it looks for and how to format your PDFs if you’re creating them from scratch.

What Service Generator Extracts

The app automatically detects:

  1. Song titles
    • Looks for lines with song names (typically after “Songs:”, “Praise 1:”, etc.)
    • Matches them against your Worship or Kids library
  2. Scripture references
    • Detects patterns like: “John 3:16”, “Romans 12:1-2”, “Psalms 56:1-13”
    • Matches them against your Service Content library
  3. Worship sections
    • Recognizes common headers: “Praise 1”, “Praise 2”, “Praise 3”, “Kids Talk”, “Kids Song”, “Kids Video”
    • Automatically categorizes songs into the right section
  4. Special markers
    • Detects “Kids” items for the Kids Library
    • Identifies announcements and service content
    • Recognizes prayers and special segments

PDF Format Best Practices

Service Generator expects PDFs to be structured with clear sections and items. If you’re creating your own service order PDFs (not using Planning Center/Proclaim), follow these guidelines:

Expected PDF Structure

The app looks for a hierarchical structure with:

  1. Date header - Service date (e.g., “Sunday, February 4, 2026”)
  2. Section headers - Clear labels for different parts of the service (e.g., “Praise 1”, “Prayer”, “Kids Talk”)
  3. Items under each section - Songs, scripture, videos, announcements

Example PDF Layout

SUNDAY SERVICE ORDER - February 4, 2026

Opening - Pre Roll
  Announcements (Before and After Service)
  Call to Worship

Praise 1
  Come Thou Fount

Prayer
  Prayer Together

Kids Talk
  Kids Video: Sing Wherever I Go

Praise 2
  Jesus Paid It All

Reading
  John 3:16-17

Sermon
  Message by Pastor [Name]

Praise 3
  Amazing Grace

Closing
  Altar Call
  Announcements (After Service)

The parser expects:

Song Titles

Scripture References

Video Items

Kids Items

Section Headers

What Format Works Best

Most Compatible:

Less Compatible:

Why PDF Structure Matters

Service Generator’s parsing accuracy depends on:

  1. Clear sections - Can identify where songs, kids items, and videos are
  2. Consistent formatting - Can distinguish items from labels
  3. Proper naming - Can match songs and videos to your libraries
  4. Reasonable formatting - Works with standard PDFs but not heavily-designed layouts

If your PDFs come from Planning Center or Proclaim, they’re already formatted correctly. For custom PDFs, following the structure above will give best results.

File Size and Quality

Service Order Sources

Service Generator works with PDFs from these services:

How to export from Planning Center:

  1. Open your service
  2. Click “…” menu
  3. Select “Print / Download”
  4. Choose PDF format
  5. Download the file

How to export from Proclaim:

  1. Open your service
  2. Click “File” → “Export”
  3. Choose PDF format
  4. Save the file

Getting Help

Still have questions?