2. Settings

List of modifiable settings

There are multiple settings that you can change by modifying variables in the SETTINGS section of nala.py. Here is a brief list of them along with what they can be changed to and their descriptions.

Variable	Options	Description
transcription_type	‘sphinx’, ‘google’	The type of transcription. Default is ‘sphinx’ (and if google and the path to the environment variable cannot be found, it will revert back to sphinx).
wake_type	'sphinx', 'snowboy', 'porcupine'	Wakeword detector used to detect user queries. Default is ‘porcupine’ as it is the most accurate wakeword detector.
query_time	2	Time in seconds of each query when Nala is activated. The default query time is 2 seconds (from trial-and-error).
multi_query	True, False	Multi-query capability allows you to separate queries with AND in the transcript, so it doesn’t stop after one query. Default is True.
query_save	True, False	Ability to save queries once they have been propagated. Otherwise, they are deleted. This is useful if you want to cache query data or build a dataset. Default is True.
register_face	True, False	Store face when user registers to authenticate later with facial recognition. Default is True.
sleep_time	30	The time (in minutes) that Nala will sleep if you trigger the “Go to sleep” action query. Default is 30 minutes.

You also need to set some environment variables if you'd like to use a few actions. Specifically, it requires access to the root account to do things like shutdown or restart the computer. If you don't want to do this, it's totally fine too, you just won't be able to do these commands.

Training new transcription models

[insert book here]

There are two options for transcription:

Google Speech API (GSA) or PocketSphinx.

Nala by default queries wake words with pocketsphinx to not drive up costs with GSA. Then the queries are done with google speech API to make sure they are accurate.

To set up a google speech account, search here. You'll need to set this up as an environment variable as discussed previously.

Training new wakewords

Pocketsphinx, Snowbird, or Porcupine. Defaults to Porcupine because it's the most accurate.

Note that Snowbird and Porcupine require licenses for commercial use of their models.