Speechfire

Overview

Speechfire is a Firefox extension that provides offline speech-to-text functionality. It uses a local server for processing and supports multiple languages.

Key Features

• 🦊✨ Firefox and Chrome support
• 🖥️ Local server for offline processing
• 🌐 Multilingual support
• ⌨️ Hotkey (Alt+A) to start/stop recording

Prerequisites

Running Linux or Windows

MacOS has some convoluted requirements to get Whisper running, so it isn't supported. Just use the system dictation tool - it works for everything.

FFmpeg

Whisper requires FFmpeg, so you need to have it installed. It's used for a lot of things, you won't regret installing it! You can install it using package managers:

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt install ffmpeg

# Windows (using Chocolatey)
choco install ffmpeg

Installation

1. Set up Python environment

   python -m venv speechfire
   source speechfire/bin/activate  # On Windows: speechfire\Scripts\activate
   pip install -r requirements-lock.txt # confirmed working
   # or
   pip install -r requirements.txt # latest versions, may break

2. Install Extension

• Add the extension via the official Firefox Add-ons site or Chrome Web Store
  • Or install from source:
    • Manually install extension-firefox.xpi in Firefox
    • Manually install extension-chrome.zip in Chrome

Docker (Optional)

If you prefer Docker, you can run the server without installing Python locally:

docker compose up --build

Notes:

• The image pre-downloads the Whisper model, so build time and size scale with the chosen model.
• The container binds to 0.0.0.0 by default. If you want localhost-only access, set SERVER_HOST=127.0.0.1 or use docker-compose.override.yml.

Usage

1. Start the server

   python server.py

   Or use the system tray icon:

   # On Windows:
   python system-tray/start_tray_windows.py
   # On Linux:
   python system-tray/start_tray_linux.py

   After launching the system tray application:

   1. Right-click on the tray icon
   2. Select "Start Server" from the menu

2. Use the extension

   • Focus on a text field in Firefox
   • Press Alt+A to start/stop recording
   • Transcription will appear in the focused field
   • If your server is on a different host/port, set Server URL in the extension popup

3. Stop the server

   • Press Ctrl+C in the terminal
   • Or use the system tray icon menu

Icon Guide

• Extension icon:
  • Recording
  • Not recording
• System Tray:
  • Server running
  • Server not running

Troubleshooting

Changing the Extension Hotkey

If you need to change the default Alt+A hotkey:

• Go to Firefox Settings → Extensions & Themes → Manage Extensions
• Click the gear icon ⚙️ next to Speechfire
• Select "Manage Extension Shortcuts"
• Set your preferred key combination

Additional Notes

• For Linux system tray support:

  sudo apt install python3-gi python3-gi-cairo gir1.2-gtk-3.0 gir1.2-appindicator3-0.1
  pip install PyGObject

• You can also create a file to launch the system tray application at startup