adapter-mac - Speech To Text & Text To Speech

Native macOS application for system-wide speech-to-text and text-to-speech conversion. Must have brute agent running locally.

Features

• Automatic speech-to-text capture and automatic paste into any focused input with keyboard press (F12)
  • Floating recording window with live waveform visualization
• Automatic text-to-speech generation of currently selectect text with a keyboard press (also F12)
  • Floating playback window for text-to-speech with stop, pause, and seek controls
• Brute AI agent session creation from speech with a keyboard press(F11)
• Smart context detection:
  • Text selected → Text-to-Speech (plays audio)
  • No selection → Speech-to-Text (records audio, transcribes, pastes result)
• Menu bar presence with settings window
  • Selectable TTS engines in Settings: automatic, native macOS speech, and edge-tts

Requirements

• macOS 13.0+
• Xcode 14.0+
• Microphone permissions
• Accessibility permissions (for global shortcuts and text insertion)
• Optional: edge-tts in PATH or a common local install location for higher-quality online TTS

Quick Start

1. Start the backend (required for speech-to-text):

   ./scripts/start-backend.sh

2. Open in Xcode:

   open adapter-mac.xcodeproj

3. Build and Run (Cmd+R in Xcode)

4. Grant permissions when prompted:

   • Microphone access
   • Accessibility access

5. Open Settings and confirm the backend URL if needed.

6. Test it:

   • Select any text → Press F12 → Listen to speech
   • No selection → Press F12 → Speak → Press F12 again → Text pasted
   • Press F11 → Speak → Press F11 again → New brute session starts from the transcript

Setup

Backend Setup

adapter-mac depends on the A2gent brute backend for Whisper transcription. Speech-to-text will not work unless that service is running.

cd ~/git/a2gent/brute
make run

Or use the helper script:

./scripts/start-backend.sh

Default transcription endpoint:

http://localhost:5445/speech/transcribe

Test the endpoint:

./scripts/test-whisper.sh

Text-to-Speech Privacy

adapter-mac supports:

• edge-tts for higher-quality voices via Microsoft online TTS
• native macOS speech synthesis as a local fallback

When edge-tts is selected or used by the automatic engine, the selected text is sent to Microsoft's online text-to-speech service to generate audio. If you prefer local-only speech synthesis, choose the native macOS voice option in Settings.

Architecture

• Swift + AppKit for native macOS experience
• AVFoundation for audio recording and playback
• Carbon for global keyboard shortcuts
• Accessibility API for text selection detection and insertion
• brute backend integration for speech-to-text

flowchart TD
    AD["AppDelegate"] --> AX["AccessibilityService"]
    AD --> AS["AudioService"]
    AD --> RW["RecordingWindow"]
    AD --> PW["PlaybackWindow"]
    AD --> WS["WhisperService"]

    AS --> EDGE["edge-tts (online)"]
    AS --> NSS["macOS speech synthesis (local fallback)"]
    AS --> PLAYER["AVAudioPlayer"]

    WS --> BRUTE["brute backend"]

Loading

Usage

1. Click menu bar icon to configure settings
2. Press configured shortcut:
   • With text selected: Converts text to speech and plays audio
   • Without selection: Opens recording window
3. While recording, press shortcut again to stop and transcribe
4. Transcribed text is automatically pasted at cursor position
5. Use the brute session shortcut to record a fresh prompt and send it straight into a new brute session

License

Private project