Make VoiceAttack press a key when it recognises ANY speech?

[TheGreyOne]

 I use mumble, discord, teamspeak... any other number of voice-chat programs. What I'd like to do is use VoiceAttack as a *voice recognition* system for "hands-free-push-to-talk" because frankly every single 'voice activity' system in those chat programs has proven to be completely *terrible*

 I don't want to have to input a specific keyword, just have VoiceAttack immediately hold down a key (and stop after say 1/2 a second of silence) when it recognizes *any* speech whatsoever.

--

There are quite a few nice "almost" options in the forum here, but none quite do what I'm after (that I've seen.)

Is what I'm wanting currently possible?

[Gary]

Hi, there.

Out of the box, there is no way to recognize just speech and invoke an event (trigger).  However, there are ways to get the audio level ({STATE_AUDIOLEVEL}) or speech active status ({STATE_SPEECHACTIVE}) at any time if you are willing to build a plugin or inline function that monitors that level and reacts accordingly (plugins and inline functions are the way VA users can extend the functionality of VA to suit specific needs).

[TheGreyOne]

Hmm, thanks for that. I'll take a look at what my options are on that front.

[TheGreyOne]

So I experimented with writing up a small inline command.

It's terribly buggy, but it does work (mostly!)

It executes an arbitrary external command (VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE), so you can have it send key presses to specific windows of your choosing etc.

There's a couple of "todo"s that I couldn't work out how to solve immediately (I'm probably not finding the 'right' documentation sadly.)

If anyone wants to use it (edit: as a base for a fixed "proper" version, or better; point out my failures so I can fix them ), feel free.

Code: [Select]

using System;
using System.Threading;
using System.Diagnostics;

public class VAInline
{
public void main()
{
bool buttonPressed = false;

try // avoid any weird exceptions causing problems.
{
// todo: get this time from VA?
float timeToKeepRecording = 0.3f; // time in seconds after our last recognised speech, that we keep the 'push to talk' key pressed.

Stopwatch sw = new Stopwatch();

bool exit = false;

VA.WriteToLog("Beginning Voice Toggle","green");

while(!exit)
{
if(exit || VA.Stopped) // if we or VA wants us to stop, abandon our task.
break;

if(VA.ParseTokens("{STATE_SPEECHACTIVE}") == "1") // we currently hear speech:
{
if(buttonPressed == true)
{
// restart our timer.
sw.Stop();
sw.Reset();
sw.Start();
}
else
{
// todo: just directly press down button combo?
// press down our button
if(VA.CommandExists("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE"))
{
VA.ExecuteCommand("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE");
VA.WriteToLog("Voice Toggle Enabled","green");
}
buttonPressed = true;
sw.Start();
}
}
else // we currently do NOT hear speech:
{
// if we are current holding down our button, and we've not heard new speech in a while
if(buttonPressed == true && sw.Elapsed.Seconds > timeToKeepRecording)
{
// then stop our button press, and stop our timer.
if(VA.CommandExists("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE"))
{
VA.ExecuteCommand("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE");
VA.WriteToLog("Voice Toggle Disabled","green");
}
buttonPressed = false;
sw.Stop();
}
}

// don't do anything for a little while... no need to waste cpu cycles.
Thread.Sleep(10);
}
}
catch
{
VA.WriteToLog("Voice Toggle Failed","red");

// release our button
if(buttonPressed == true && VA.CommandExists("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE"))
VA.ExecuteCommand("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE");
}

VA.WriteToLog("Voice Toggle Exitin","purple");
}
}


[Pfeil]

I made some modifications; Ended up with this:

VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE [true;false]

Code: [Select]

Begin Text Compare : [{CMDACTION}] Equals 'Plugin'
    Do nothing (ignore command)
    Begin Text Compare : [{CMD}] Ends With 'on'
        Press down Left Alt key
    Else
        Release Left Alt key
    End Condition
Else
    Set integer [~PTTHoldTime] value to 300
    Inline C# Function: Voice Toggle
End Condition


Where "Voice Toggle" contains:

Code: [Select]

using System;
using System.Threading;
using System.Diagnostics;

public class VAInline
{
bool buttonPressed = false;

public void main()
{
//Check if the required command exists, otherwise exit
if(!VA.CommandExists("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE true") || !VA.CommandExists("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE false"))
{
VA.WriteToLog("Voice Toggle Error: Command 'VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE [true;false]' does not exist, startup aborted","red");
return;
}

try // avoid any weird exceptions causing problems.
{
float timeToKeepRecording = VA.GetInt("~PTTHoldTime") ?? 300; // time in seconds after our last recognised speech, that we keep the 'push to talk' key pressed. Default is 300ms if not set in the VoiceAttack command.

Stopwatch sw = new Stopwatch();
bool speechDetected = false;

VA.WriteToLog("Beginning Voice Toggle","green");

while(true)
{
if(VA.Stopped) // if VA wants us to stop, abandon our task.
{
break;
}

if(VA.ParseTokens("{STATE_SPEECHACTIVE}") == "1") // we currently hear speech:
{
speechDetected = true;

if (!buttonPressed)
{
pushToTalk(true);
}
}
else // we currently do NOT hear speech:
{
if (speechDetected && !sw.IsRunning)
{
sw.Start();
speechDetected = false;
}
else if (buttonPressed && sw.ElapsedMilliseconds > timeToKeepRecording)
{
pushToTalk(false);
sw.Reset();
}
}

// don't do anything for a little while... no need to waste cpu cycles.
Thread.Sleep(10);
}
}
catch(Exception e)
{
VA.WriteToLog("Voice Toggle Exception: " + e,"red");
}
finally
{
pushToTalk(false);
VA.WriteToLog("Voice Toggle Exiting","purple");
}
}

void pushToTalk(bool targetState)
{
VA.ExecuteCommand("VOICE_ACTIVATED_TOGGLE " + targetState);
VA.WriteToLog("Voice Toggle " + (targetState ? "Enabled" : "Disabled"),"green");
buttonPressed = targetState;
}
}

I noticed you're using a toggle command, which means that state the push-to-talk key ends up in cannot be guaranteed, so this instead explicitly sets that state.

[TheGreyOne]

Ah, perfect! I wasn't sure how to build the explicit command for holding/releasing the key, which definitely was causing me bugs on my end.

Thank you very much for the improvements. I'll definitely play around with it a little when I've got some more free time.