TalkKey

Push-to-talk voice transcription for Windows. Hold a hotkey, speak, release. Your words appear at the cursor in any application.

How it works

1. TalkKey runs in the system tray
2. Hold Right Shift (or your configured key)
3. Speak
4. Release: audio is sent to OpenAI Whisper, transcribed text is typed into whatever window has focus

Requirements

• Windows 10/11
• Python 3.9+
• OpenAI API key

Setup

pip install -e .

Create a .env file in the project root:

OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-...

Or enter the key directly in the settings window after launch.

Running

talkkey

Opens the settings window and starts the tray icon. Close the window to minimize to tray; use Quit from the tray menu to exit.

CLI mode

Transcribe an audio file directly:

talkkey audio.mp3
talkkey audio.wav --language en
talkkey audio.mp3 --timestamps --output result.txt

Settings

Accessible from the tray icon → Settings:

Setting	Default	Description
Hotkey	Right Shift	Key to hold for push-to-talk
Microphone	System default	Input device
Hold to start	1.0 s	Minimum hold time before recording begins
Max duration	60 s	Auto-stops recording at this limit
Launch on startup	Off	Add to Windows startup

Settings are saved to %APPDATA%\TalkKey\config.json.

Stack

Component	Library
Hotkey listener	pynput
Audio recording	sounddevice + numpy
Transcription	OpenAI Whisper API
Text injection	pynput + pyperclip
GUI / tray	PySide6
Visual indicators	tkinter
Config	JSON (python-dotenv for .env fallback)
Windows autostart	Registry (winreg)

Project structure

src/talkkey/
├── main.py          # Entry point; dispatches GUI or CLI
├── app.py           # Controller + state machine (IDLE/RECORDING/TRANSCRIBING)
├── hotkey.py        # Global hotkey listener with min-hold-time logic
├── recorder.py      # Microphone capture → temp WAV
├── transcriber.py   # OpenAI Whisper API wrapper
├── paster.py        # Types transcribed text into the focused window
├── config.py        # Settings dataclass + JSON persistence
├── indicator.py     # Recording/transcribing overlay windows
├── autostart.py     # Windows registry startup helper
└── gui/             # PySide6 settings window + tray icon

Development

pip install -e ".[dev]"
pytest