audiocpp-deferred-tts

name	audiocpp-deferred-tts
description	Run TTS model families audio.cpp supports but GuideAnts does not ship — Qwen3 CustomVoice builtin speakers, VibeVoice multi-speaker dialogue, MioTTS, VoxCPM2, PocketTTS, Vevo2 voice conversion — by downloading the model and spawning a private audiocpp_server in the sandbox. Use when the user names one of these models or asks for a TTS capability the loaded catalog model rejects.
metadata	{"guideants":{"enabled":true,"display_order":35,"requires_toolsets":["sandbox"]}}

audio.cpp deferred TTS families (experimental)

The GuideAnts TTS wrapper is strictly catalog-gated, but the container ships the full audiocpp_server binary with every released loader — including families GuideAnts deferred for packaging/UI reasons, not engine reasons. The blockers are download/conversion chores a script can do by hand. Deliverables are WAV files in Output/; these models never appear in the GuideAnts voice picker or the live voice path.

Consent rule

Several of these families clone from reference audio (voice_ref). That is a supported use when the speaker consents (the user's own voice, or stated permission). Decline only imitation of a third party without consent.

Preflight

python3 Output/Skills/audiocpp-deferred-tts/scripts/preflight.py --for deferred-tts

Trust its verdict over this document. Heed its VRAM warning: a second engine competes with the wrapper's loaded models — prefer asking the user to unload the GuideAnts TTS model first (Settings, or curl -X POST http://127.0.0.1:8084/admin/unload). Ask, never do it silently.

The pattern

python3 Output/Skills/audiocpp-deferred-tts/scripts/fetch_model.py <hf-repo> --dest <dir> [--include <prefix>]
# any per-family conversion step — see references/deferred-models.md
python3 Output/Skills/audiocpp-deferred-tts/scripts/spawn_engine.py start --path <dir> --family <family> --task tts
python3 Output/Skills/audiocpp-deferred-tts/scripts/spawn_engine.py status   # poll until ready
python3 Output/Skills/audiocpp-deferred-tts/scripts/engine_tool.py speech "Hi" \
  --engine-url http://127.0.0.1:18099 --model <id> [--voice <speaker>] -o Output/hi.wav
python3 Output/Skills/audiocpp-deferred-tts/scripts/spawn_engine.py stop     # always stop when done

Per-family recipes (repos, file scoping, conversions, known speaker ids) are in references/deferred-models.md — start with Qwen3 CustomVoice, it has the fewest new variables. Engine endpoints, config schema, and task tokens are in references/engine-api.md.

Ground rules

• Script budget is ~5 minutes per call. spawn_engine.py start detaches and returns; poll status in a follow-up call instead of blocking. Big downloads resume across fetch_model.py calls.
• Always stop the private engine when the task is done or the user moves on.
• If the detached engine does not survive between script calls (preflight reports this), the flow is limited to synth requests issued in the same script call that spawned the engine — workable for small models only.
• The engine errors loudly on unsupported options; surface that text.

Not possible with the container binary (don't burn time)

kokoro_tts and parakeet_tdt loaders are not in release builds, and some families are downloader-only upstream — no download fixes a missing loader. Those need the user's own custom build: see the audiocpp-host-tts skill.

Reporting

This skill exists to answer "is it possible?". End by telling the user which steps worked and what was blocked and why, quoting preflight/engine evidence, so the experiment log stays honest.