openclaw-voice-transcription

A tiny Pixi-managed local Whisper setup for OpenClaw audio / voice-note transcription.

This is the simple working pattern Charles and CTBot ended up using:

• keep Telegram as the chat channel
• use a local Whisper CLI for transcription
• run Whisper inside a Pixi environment so ffmpeg is available on PATH

What this is

This repo is not a full OpenClaw install.

It is just the little helper environment that gives OpenClaw a reliable local speech-to-text command for Telegram voice notes and other audio files.

Requirements

• Pixi
• an existing OpenClaw setup
• a machine where local transcription is acceptable

Create the environment

pixi install

Optional smoke test:

pixi run whisper --help

Repo layout

• pixi.toml — the Pixi environment
• transcripts/ — output directory for Whisper text files
• examples/openclaw-audio-config.json — example OpenClaw audio transcription config snippet

Basic usage

The included task writes transcript text files into transcripts/:

pixi run transcribe -- your-audio-file.ogg

Or call Whisper directly:

pixi run whisper --model small --output_format txt --output_dir transcripts your-audio-file.ogg

Wiring it into OpenClaw

The key detail is to point OpenClaw at Pixi, not directly at a bare Whisper binary.

That keeps the Pixi-managed environment intact, including ffmpeg.

See:

• examples/openclaw-audio-config.json

The important bit is using a command shaped like:

{
  "type": "cli",
  "command": "pixi",
  "args": [
    "run",
    "-m",
    "/Users/YOUR_USERNAME/voice-transcription",
    "-x",
    "whisper",
    "--model",
    "small",
    "--output_format",
    "txt",
    "--output_dir",
    "/Users/YOUR_USERNAME/voice-transcription/transcripts",
    "{{MediaPath}}"
  ]
}

Replace YOUR_USERNAME with the actual user running OpenClaw.

Notes

• This is intentionally small and practical.
• It is aimed at the “make local voice note transcription actually work” problem, not at being a general speech stack.
• Model choice is currently small because that was the working compromise in the original setup.