Building a DIY Voice Satellite for Home Assistant Pt. 1

2024-08-19 21:52:00 +0000

Intro

In the realm of home automation, there are few platforms as flexible or capable as Home Assistant. In this post, I’ll go through the steps I used to setup a voice satellite (think Amazon Echo Dot) with a custom local wake word and also act as a target for automated text-to-speech notifications. These steps are HEAVILY influenced from the amazing Slacker Labs and his write-up here. Please check out his YouTube for more great content.

Prerequisite Hardware:

  • Raspberry Pi Zero 2 with microSD card
  • ReSpeaker 2-Mic HAT
  • 3 watt 4 Ohm speaker, preferably with a JST connector

Creating a Custom Wake Word

As cool as saying “Hey Jarvis” is, I wanted to let my nerd flag fly a bit more. See, I grew up on episodes Star Trek: The Next Generation, therefore I wanted my voice assistant to be named Geordi, after the chief engineer, Geordi La Forge, of the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D).

Luckily, Home Assistant has a great write up here which works wonderfully. Once your custom wake word is generated and you have the .tflte file you’ll need to rename it to wake_word_v0.1.tflite, replacing wake_word with whatever you configured above. In my case, the file is hey_geordi_v0.1.tflite.

Configure the Raspberry Pi Zero 2

Follow the steps in Slacker Lab’s write up to install the Raspberry Pi Lite OS. Make sure to assign the hostname and user to be something recognizable and also set your region specific information. Raspberry Pi’s typically default to en-GB settings since they’re a UK based company. Bonus points if you use an SSH key in place of a password.

Note: Do not connect the ReSpeaker HAT to the Pi since we still need to install the drivers.

Once connected to the Pi over SSH, run the following commands:

Update the package databases

sudo apt-get update

Install Git and Python Virtual Environment packages

sudo apt-get install --no-recommends git python3-venv

Clone the Wyoming-Satellite Files

git clone https://github.com/rhasspy/wyoming-satellite.git

Navigate to the Wyoming-Satellite Directory

cd wyoming-satellite

Install the ReSpeaker drivers

sudo bash etc/install-respeaker-drivers.sh

Assuming no errors occur, reboot the Pi so the drivers are loaded. You can attach the ReSpeaker HAT now but be sure to do so while while the Pi is powered off.

Install and Configure the Wyoming Satellite Service

Reconnect to the Pi over SSH and enter the following commands:

Navigate to the Wyoming-Satellite Directory

cd wyoming-satellite

Install Dependencies and Python Environment

python3 -m venv .venv
.venv/bin/pip3 install --upgrade pip
.venv/bin/pip3 install --upgrade wheel setuptools
.venv/bin/pip3 install \
  -f 'https://synesthesiam.github.io/prebuilt-apps/' \
  -r requirements.txt \
  -r requirements_audio_enhancement.txt \
  -r requirements_vad.txt

Verify ReSpeaker HAT is Detected

arecord -L

You should see a line starting with plughw:CARD=seeed2micvoicec,DEV=0. This indicates that the HAT is successfully identified.

Create the Wyoming-Satellite Service

sudo systemctl edit --force --full wyoming-satellite.service

Copy and Paste the Service Configuration.
NOTE: If you’re not using the pi user, be sure to replace that values with your username in the ExecStart and the WorkingDirectory lines. Also, change my-satellite to whatever you want the device to be called.

[Unit]
Description=Wyoming Satellite
Wants=network-online.target
After=network-online.target

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStart=/home/pi/wyoming-satellite/script/run --name 'my satellite' --uri 'tcp://0.0.0.0:10700' --mic-command 'arecord -D plughw:CARD=seeed2micvoicec,DEV=0 -r 16000 -c 1 -f S16_LE -t raw' --snd-command 'aplay -D plughw:CARD=seeed2micvoicec,DEV=0 -r 22050 -c 1 -f S16_LE -t raw' --mic-auto-gain 5 --mic-noise-suppression 2
WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/wyoming-satellite
Restart=always
RestartSec=1

[Install]
WantedBy=default.target

To save this file and exit, press CTRL-O and then CTRL-X.

Enable the Wyoming-Satellite Service

sudo systemctl enable --now wyoming-satellite.service

Check that the Service is Running

journalctl -u wyoming-satellite.service -f

or

sudo systemctl status wyoming-satellite

Install and Configure Wake Word

Assuming you’re still connected via SSH, run the following:

sudo apt-get install --no-install-recommends libopenblas-dev

Navigate to your Home Directory

cd ~/

Clone the Wyoming-OpenWakeWord Files

git clone https://github.com/rhasspy/wyoming-openwakeword.git

Transfer Your Custom Wake Word
You’ll need to transfer the .tflite file you generated to the Rapsberry Pi. From your host computer where you downloaded the file run:

scp wake_word_v0.1.tflite username@hostname:.

Replace username and hostname with whatever user is configured on the Pi and it’s hostname respectively.

Move Custom Wake Word to Correct Folder
The file will now be at the root of your home directory, and it needs to be moved to the models folder in wyoming-openwakeword.

mv wake_word_v0.1.tflite wyoming-openwakeword/wyoming_openwakeword/models/.

Navigate to the Wyoming-OpenWakeWord Folder

cd wyoming-openwakeword

Run the Setup Script

script/setup

Create the Open Wake Word Service

sudo systemctl edit --force --full wyoming-openwakeword.service

Copy and Paste the Service Configuration
NOTE: If you’re not using the pi user, be sure to replace that values with your username in the ExecStart and the WorkingDirectory lines.

[Unit]
Description=Wyoming openWakeWord

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStart=/home/pi/wyoming-openwakeword/script/run --uri 'tcp://127.0.0.1:10400'
WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/wyoming-openwakeword
Restart=always
RestartSec=1

[Install]
WantedBy=default.target

Link Wake Word Service to Satellite Service

sudo systemctl edit --force --full wyoming-satellite.service

Edit Satellite Service
Add the following line under the [Unit] block

Requires=wyoming-openwakeword.service

Add Wake Word to Service
Add the following line (inserting your wake word) to the end of the ExecStart command

--wake-uri 'tcp://127.0.0.1:10400' --wake-word-name 'hey_geordi'

Press CTRL-O followed by CTRL-X to save and exit

Reload and Restart Services

sudo systemctl daemon-reload && sudo systemctl restart wyoming-satellite.service

In Part 2, we’ll configure the LEDs, install the Snapcast client, and complete the configuration in Home Assistant.

Recent Posts: