VoxCommando - Speech recognition and command utility (control XBMC by voice commands)

VoxCommando - Speech recognition and command utility (control XBMC by voice commands) - Printable Version

+- Kodi Community Forum (https://forum.kodi.tv)
+-- Forum: Support (https://forum.kodi.tv/forumdisplay.php?fid=33)
+--- Forum: Supplementary Tools for Kodi (https://forum.kodi.tv/forumdisplay.php?fid=116)
+--- Thread: VoxCommando - Speech recognition and command utility (control XBMC by voice commands) (/showthread.php?tid=73006)

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

- jitterjames - 2011-01-23

elitegamer360 Wrote:Hey James, Kudos to you man, I really, really love voxcommando and I do love your videos as well :-)

What I love most is your Amulet Remote video. So impressive its like the remote was made for voxcommando, too bad I can not buy one as the company does not ship outside the states! Hopefully they will consider this soon.

I just can't believe that I missed this all this time, such a great addition to the MCE remote.

I currently use my XBOX 360 wireless headset in conjunction with my MCE remote and the result is fantastic. Thread rated as well

Thank you,
EG.

Thanks EG. Glad you like it.

The Amulet is a lot more affordable now than it was just a few months ago.

Can you please provide a link to the exact headset that you are using. I didn't think the quality of the 360 wireless headset would be good enough. Glad to hear that it's working for you though. There aren't too many affordable options out there for wireless headsets that are good enough quality for speech recognition.

- elitegamer360 - 2011-01-26

jitterjames Wrote:Thanks EG. Glad you like it.

The Amulet is a lot more affordable now than it was just a few months ago.

Can you please provide a link to the exact headset that you are using. I didn't think the quality of the 360 wireless headset would be good enough. Glad to hear that it's working for you though. There aren't too many affordable options out there for wireless headsets that are good enough quality for speech recognition.

I was surprised myself because when playing online or chating I would always use the default headset that came with my XBOX 360 that plugs in the controller, and the quality of the mic is very bad. It gave me issues and was not really good when used on my PC.

So I bought this XBOX 360 Black Wireless Headset it was available for half this price when I bought it last week! it cost me £30 US$47 in total with the XBOX 360 wireless receiver from play.com

I was amazed how well it worked compared to the wired stock headset. I had a few issues when saying for example "Select" but after training my computer to better understand me its much better now.

I'm glad I did not buy this headset for PC only because with the XBOX 360 one I can use it on both PC and XBOX for roughly the same amount of money.

Cheers,
EG.

Quick question on Amulet - Pure3picshot - 2011-02-18

Definately looking into using Voxcommando looks very promising and great product. I had a quick question on the Amulet Remote. Currently I have to use my HTPC remote for XBMC and a seperate remote to control my DENON Reciever for audio. Does the Amulet Remote work as a universal remote to control other devices or only specific towards HTPC?

- jitterjames - 2011-02-18

It works as a universal "learning" remote. You can program multiple keymaps and then learn a code for any key from another remote. I have found that it works "imperfectly" in this respect at least with my TV. It can learn the codes but sometimes I have to press the button twice or hold it down for a little while to turn my TV on. This probably varies depending on the device (TV, Receiver) and brand.

Note that the amulet itself does not come with a usb IR receiver for your computer but you can buy one of these pretty cheap anywhere, or order one from Amulet.

If you have more specific questions about the Amulet and it's universal remote function you should probably post to the Amulet Devices forum, on their website.

VoxCommando (0.875) Official release - jitterjames - 2011-02-25

The latest version of VoxCommando (0.875) has been cleaned up and neatly packaged and is now available on the VC website here: http://www.voxcommando.com/downloads.asp

VoxCommando is officially not free anymore, but if you are not a registered user you can still access all of it's features in "trial" mode. Trial mode supports all the same features as the full version, you are only limited to a certain number of commands before you must restart the program. Once you have tried it, you can buy a license on the website using PayPal, and then activate the trial to upgrade to the full version.

There is now only one download, regardless of what program you will use VC with. When you first run the program you will be prompted to select a standard configuration (i.e. XBMC, iTunes, MediaMonkey, WMC)

To preview the new installer and interface, and to see a detailed guide to setting VC up to work with XBMC you can check out this new tutorial video on youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JBI6FIh-bU

(I recommend watching it full-screen at 720p resolution if you can)

Advanced users won't get much new information from this video, but I know you love the sound of my voice so check it out anyway!

This is the first in a series of videos for the new version that I am planning to make. I will post new videos here, as they are available, showing off some new features and advanced techniques.

For those of you who have not checked out any new versions of VoxCommando for a while, there is quite a bit that has been changine lately, but the two key features that I am excited about are

1) Events - (tutorial will come soon showing this off)
2) Automatic Help File Generator, that will create an html page showing all your voice commands. You can bring this page up anytime you want or print it for your room-mates or guests. This new feature will probably be refined in future versions, but it already works quite well, and is very easy to use.

Enjoy!

- dallasnights - 2011-02-25

how can you make this work with the ATV, I am using XBMC on my ATV and would love to use this great new app

Thanks

- jitterjames - 2011-02-25

running either XBMC or VoxCommando on an all terrain vehicle would be very dangerous and is not recommended. Rofl

If you mean Apple TV then you can run XBMC on the Apple TV but you still need to run VoxCommando on a computer running Windows 7 or Vista. Commands can be sent from VoxCommando to XBMC through your LAN

- dallasnights - 2011-02-25

very interesting, do you have a write up on how to that via your Windows PC to the Apple TV

Thanks so much

- jitterjames - 2011-02-25

You would just do everything the same as in the tutorial, but set the VC options to use the ip address of your Apple TV instead of 127.0.0.1, I mentioned this in the video. You probably also need to select "allow other computers to control xbmc" in XBMC's network settings. I don't have an Apple TV so I can't test this but it certainly works from one Windows PC to another. I am also pretty sure others have done with with XBMC running on linux.

- e2zippo - 2011-02-26

This looks really interesting indeed, will download and try it out!

Edit: worked really good, amazing piece of software!

Although i wonder how good it'll work once a movie is playing at high volume?

- jitterjames - 2011-03-02

You have to apply various strategies to avoid having VoxCommando listen to the output of your movie or other sounds from your computer.

The amulet remote solves this problem. If you are using a noise cancelling headset microphone it is usually not much of an issue either.

If you want to use an open air microphone you need to be able to switch it off when you are not using it, or it will most likely pick up unintentional commands. You can use a prefix so that commands will only be issued it you say the "magic" word first. This can reduce false commands dramatically but is still not perfect in a very loud environment, especially with voices coming from your computer.

Microphone arrays have some potential, although the array on the ps3eye proves to be only decent, not great. I am hoping that the Kinect microphone will do a good job of separating our voices from background sounds but we're still waiting for Microsoft to release the drivers.

You can switch modes (on, off, standby) easily with a remote to tell it when to listen. This can also combined with a function to reduce the output on your pc at the same time, so you push a button to talk, and your volume also gets cut down to say 25%, then when your command is complete, the volume is restored and VoxCommando stops listening.

Some people will argue that there is no point in using voice commands if you have to push a button on a remote, but that is not really true, because we have 100 times the power when using voices commands, over what is available on a remote. I personally still use the remote for adjusting volume, pushing play/pause, and generally browsing, but when I want to access a wider array of commands, open a new program, rate a song, start a certain playlist, or jump directly to the movie or TV show I want, I use voice commands. It is also very handy if you are not in front of a TV, lets say, just listening to music on your patio. It is much easier to control your music with voice in this case.

There is a fair amount of discussino on different microphone options on the VoxCommando forum here:
http://voxcommando.com/forum/index.php?board=8.0

xbmc voxcommander iphone - iorifly - 2011-03-03

I would like help on how to use voxcommander through the iphone?
Anyway wanted to control the xbmc voxcommander and through the iphone.

- jitterjames - 2011-03-03

you can try pocket audio to turn your iphone (or ipod touch) into a microphone for your windows PC. Must be on the same wifi lan an your PC running win7 or vista.

http://www.senstic.com/iphone/pocketaudio/pocketaudio.aspx

note that in some cases there is a conflict that crashes the windows speech engine when using pocket audio. Also if it does work, there is a delay of about 2-3 seconds which can be a bit annoying.

Amulet Remote Control & VoxCommando Review - steppedup - 2011-03-26

If you don't want to read further - two thumbs up - way up!

My setup - Nvidia ION HTPC, Windows 7, 64 bit, VoxCommano .875b (most current at this time), and the on-sale for $149 Amulet Remote. *(Normal remote is a fully customized Logitech Harmony One).

Purpose for the Amulet - primarily to handle my 21,000+ music library. *Using a normal remote blows goats quite frankly.

Physical design:

[li]A little too bottom heavy for my taste - but it has a very handy groove in the back of the remote that stops it from sliding down when you tilt it up to your mouth to use the microphone. * I'd like to see it a little more curvy at the top so it fits in your hand more like a microphone - which is the main reason everyone's going to buy this remote. [/li]
[li]The directional section that surrounds the Ok button is a little too ridged for my taste - almost sharp.

[/li]

[li]The red light that lights up when the microphone is very cool looking.[/li]

*

Usability out of the box with MCE - flawless. *If you like MCE, which I don't.

Usability out of the box with XBMC and VoxCommando - I wasn't happy with it at first - but after following the following tips and tricks it's working awesome.

TIPS AND TRICKS!!!!

1. *Follow this excellent guide - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JBI6FIh-bU for setting it all up. *When you find as I did that the voice recognition accuracy was not good enough to run XBMC - have no fear.

2. *Open up Amulet's speech training - Start/ All Programs/ Amulet Devices/ Speech Setup/ Speech Training. *

If, like me, you have lots of visitors to the house, Click on New *and create a new profile with your name. *Then select it, and Train that profile.

Or don't and just use the default profile. *That way when people go to use your remote, you can just laugh *at them, and tell them that they have to be smarter than the computer.....

Anyway - you'll then find that voxcommando works FLAWLESSLY in XBMC. *Two big thumbs up!

Even with the volume cranked up pretty high, the Amulet works very well to capture what you say - and VoxCommando handles XBMC.

On a side note - I was getting an error when I open VoxCommando: *

error creating group: *XBMC Request Music by Name - VoxCommando will continue to load, but commands in this group will not be available.

- So the command "Play hits by" artist wasn't working....since this is key to my original purpose of handling my music library, I had to get it fixed.

EDIT: *with JitterJames' help, I removed the Play Song command, and voxcommando started working. *Link to fix here: *
http://voxcommando.com/forum/index.php?topic=438.msg3008#msg3008

I very happily just paid for the license and am now LOVING both of them!

- Alethenorio - 2011-03-28

I thought I might add some thoughts here.

First I am looking into getting a amulet remote but am a bit disappointed the buttons require IR because that means I will need a looooong USB cable to drag a IR receiver all the way to the other side of my room (Where the TV is). I hope future versions come with full RF.

Secondly just when I am about to finally get around trying voxcommando, it goes into license mode Sad

, well I guess any good software deserves it however I am confused as to why there are 2 different licenses, does that mean that if I skip on 10$ I will no get any future updates to the product?

Regards
Alethenorio