| name | voice-dictation-setup |
| description | Opinionated end-to-end setup for clean voice dictation input — confirm Easy Effects is running, ensure a noise-reduction + autogain preset is active, run a level test, and report whether the chain is dictation-ready. |
| needs_user_vars | [{"name":"EE_LIBRARY_PATH","type":"path"}] |
voice-dictation-setup
A one-shot guided flow for "make my mic dictation-ready." Composes
other skills in this plugin; doesn't reimplement them.
Steps
1. Confirm Easy Effects is running
if command -v easyeffects >/dev/null 2>&1; then
EE_RUN="easyeffects"
elif flatpak info com.github.wwmm.easyeffects >/dev/null 2>&1; then
EE_RUN="flatpak run com.github.wwmm.easyeffects"
else
echo "Easy Effects not installed."; exit 1
fi
pgrep -f easyeffects >/dev/null || $EE_RUN --hide-window &
sleep 1
2. Identify the active mic
pactl get-default-source
Confirm with the user that this is the mic they want to use for
dictation. If wrong, point them at pavucontrol or KDE / GNOME sound
settings to switch the default, then resume.
3. Ensure a noise-reduction preset is loaded
Run the list-presets skill (mentally — don't recursively invoke;
just call its commands inline) and look for a preset whose name
suggests it includes:
- An RNNoise / NoiseTorch / DeepFilter / Speex stage (denoise)
- A high-pass at ~80–100 Hz
- An autogain or compressor stage
Common names: "Speech Processing", "Voice Dictation", "Clean Voice",
"NR + AutoGain". If none exists in $EE_DATA/input/:
- Check the user's library (
$LIB/input/) — if a candidate is there,
call install-preset.
- If nothing suitable exists anywhere, surface the gap to the user
and offer to create a basic preset. (Authoring presets is best done
in the Easy Effects GUI; the plugin doesn't try to synthesize one.)
Once a candidate is identified, load it via the load-preset skill
pattern:
$EE_RUN -l "$preset_name"
$EE_RUN -a input
4. Test levels
Run the test-input-level skill flow with duration_sec=6. Ask the
user to read a sentence aloud during the window.
5. Verdict
Tell the user one of:
- Ready — preset loaded, peak in [-12, -6] dB, RMS in [-20, -16]
dB, no DC offset issue. Dictation should perform well.
- Loaded but too hot/quiet — preset is fine, but gain is wrong.
Suggest the specific adjustment (autogain target, OS mixer level).
Offer to re-test.
- No suitable preset — user needs to author one in the GUI.
Sketch the chain (HPF → RNNoise → Autogain) and stop.
6. Optional: bind it to the mic
If the user is happy and wants this to load automatically for that
mic from now on, offer to call bind-mic-autoload with the chosen
preset and the active source's node.name + port.
