[App_rpt-users] Voice control options

Sun Jan 6 17:31:37 UTC 2019

Hi Pierre

This was just a fresh IRLP install for testing and nothing more. Did the
updates. Added the SDK examples and then a few lines changed for
transmitter control. Anything with audio input and output should work fine,
so could be an IRLP box with sound card, EchoLink USB adapter, DMK USB
Radio Interface, NWDR UDRC/DRAWS, or transcoded input/output from AMBE. The
commands back to the system are being done via IFTTT HTTPS webhook request
right now and just a script that accepts authenticated commands.

I think you'll find it's fairly easy to build this functionality into
anything. All of the real work happens back in Google/Amazon's massive data
centers and these smart speaker devices are really just voice terminals.
They're just a small embedded platform like a Raspberry Pi with a
microphone array and speaker(s). On the device they're running wakeword
detection "Hey Google" | "Alexa" and then start streaming the audio back to
the data center for processing. Depending on the product (speaker, TV,
coffee maker) there could be code running there to handle the understood
command(s).

If you want to see some progress today, I'd start with
https://github.com/Picovoice/Porcupine and get Porcupine up and running. It
also comes with everything you need to get started including wakeword files
for "bumblebee" and other words you won't hear on a repeater in common
speech. Later you can generate your own custom wakeword files. When I
started with Picovoice all my code did was understand a wakeword and
respond with a beep tone over the air.

There's quite the debate over Google/Internet services being tied to radio.
I think the Picovoice Rhino is probably the best area to focus on for
on-device repeater control. It includes the Porcupine library for wakeword
detection so "OK Repeater" is possible and the intents (turn on the link
etc) are all handled within the controller platform, no internet. That's
probably where I'll focus my effort on - it will end up being a hybrid
system where the repeater controller has basic commands and I can still say
"OK Repeater, ask Google ..." and then we're using Google's web services as
a secondary method.

One of the first voice apps I've been working on is just a radio check. But
rather than asking other people on a repeater "how does this radio sound" I
can use a SDR on the repeater receiver and determine if the user requesting
a check is on frequency, what kind of deviation, DTMF deviation, signal
level in db and all that stuff you can do with a $10 RTL SDR. Getting those
voice services up and running will open up a pile of new things you can do
over the air with analog/digital radios.

Best regards
William

On Sun, Jan 6, 2019 at 10:08 AM Pierre Martel <petem001 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks William for the feedback.
>
> I find your implementation on the IRLP controler to be a piece of art.. ;-)
>
> Can I ask you what method did you used for the irlp controler? was it the
> original irlp software or did you used the irlp driver in app_rpt?
>
> did you implement a way to prevent the AI to respond to request sent by a
> networked audio feed?
>
> I am hyper excited by this and cant wait to test this.
>
> Pierre
> VE2PF
>
>
>
>
>
> Le dim. 6 janv. 2019 à 08:53, William Franzin <wfranzin at gmail.com> a
> écrit :
>
>> Good morning,
>>
>> We're also keen AllStarLink/app_rpt users/experimenters here in Winnipeg
>> and Dan mentioned a discussion about the work I did on here, so thought I'd
>> fill in the blanks. Also joined this list.
>>
>> I started with Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa and really just wanted
>> to control devices using voice, the "what's the weather" was just an added
>> bonus, but all that requires internet.
>>
>> I also liked the speed of running the assistant code in real-time, as you
>> speak that's actually a stream to Google/Amazon so the results you get are
>> immediate vs rec/upload/download/play.
>>
>> For the majority of ham radio actual "needs" in voice control the
>> Picovoice Rhino project speech-to-intent would do a great job. If you
>> haven't check it out: https://github.com/Picovoice
>>
>> Also watch their video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WadKhfLyqTQ
>> which I think is exactly what we'd want from a ham radio setup. Wakework
>> "Hey Repeater" "Turn on ..".
>>
>> All of that great capability runs entirely on the
>> device/server/reflector, no internet or web service call to Google/Amazon
>> is needed. And it produces this simple output too:
>>
>> {
>>   "type": "espresso",
>>   "size": "small",
>>   "numberOfShots": "2",
>>   "sugar": "a lot",
>>   "milk": "some"
>> }
>>
>>
>> We should do this, my 2010 Ford Escape has had Microsoft Sync voice
>> control and it's nothing new. Everything has voice control these days, and
>> it actually works really well now.
>>
>> The only challenge in ham is we need to come up with some standard
>> commands so if you're visiting here you know the repeater has this
>> capability and how to work it.
>>
>> If anything I'm just glad the videos I posted a while back got this topic
>> going again. Certainly not the first person to poke around with voice -
>> it's just really easy now to implement this.
>>
>> Thanks to all the folks working on AllStarLink/app_rpt too. I just built
>> a firmware image with AllStarLink for a Sierra Radio Systems CommServer
>> board and it was apt-get-easy
>> --let-me-drink-my-coffee-while-the-hard-work-gets-done ;)
>>
>> Thanks,
>> William VE4VR
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