mycroft.conf
mycroft.conf is a JSON-formatted file that is saved locally on your Mycroft Device, such as Picroft or Mark 1. mycroft-conf contains information about the Device itself, like what type of Device and Enclosure it is, as well as information about user preferences. If you haven't specified preferences, then mycroft.conf will contain some default values. Your Device, and Skills installed on your Device, use mycroft.conf to provide additional functionality.
mycroft_web_cache.json is is a JSON-formatted file that is saved locally on your Mycroft Device, such as Picroft or Mark 1. mycroft_web_cache.json is a cached copy of the settings on your home.mycroft.ai account, such as your Location (which determines Time Zone), which Voice you have selected and your preference for Measurements such as temperature and distance.
Both of these files are regularly used in troubleshooting, so it's useful to know what information they hold, and where they are stored on your Device.
When you update settings at home.mycroft.ai, your Device will periodically pull them down. However, this may not be fast enough to do what you want to do. To refresh your mycroft.conf from home.mycroft.ai, Speak:
Hey Mycroft, update config
Mycroft will then pull the files down to your Device.
The mycroft.conf file is stored in different locations on different Devices, including:
/etc/mycroft/mycroft.conf~/.mycroft/mycroft.conf
Mycroft implements an order of precedence; settings at a User level override those at a System level.
Here is an example System level mycroft.conf from a Mark 1 Device:
pi@mark_1:/etc/mycroft $ cat mycroft.conf{"enclosure": {"platform": "mycroft_mark_1","platform_build": 9,"port": "/dev/ttyAMA0","rate": 9600,"timeout": 5,"update": true,"test": false},"VolumeSkill": {"default_level": 6,"min_volume": 0,"max_volume": 83}}
This file is stored at:
/var/tmp/mycroft_web_cache.json
on the Device.
Here is an example mycroft_web_cache.json. NOTE: Your settings will be different.
{"date_format": "DMY","tts": {"google": {"created_at": 1504481866992,"updated_at": 1514794901075},"module": "mimic","fatts": {"created_at": 1504481866991,"updated_at": 1514794900939},"mimic": {"created_at": 1504481866989,"voice": "ap","updated_at": 1514794900809},"espeak": {"created_at": 1504481866987,"updated_at": 1514794900679},"marytts": {"created_at": 1504481866986,"updated_at": 1514794900548}},"opt_in": true,"created_at": 1504481866955,"updated_at": 1514794898083,"listener": {"energy_ratio": 1.5,"created_at": 1504481866996,"updated_at": 1514794901398,"channels": 1,"sample_rate": 16000,"multiplier": 1,"threshold": 1e-90,"phonemes": "HH EY . M AY K R AO F T","wake_word": "hey mycroft"},"time_format": "full","skills": {"directory": "~/.mycroft/skills","created_at": 1504481866994,"updated_at": 1514794901226,"stop_threshold": 2},"stt": {"google": {"credential": {"created_at": 1504481866970,"updated_at": 1514794899383},"created_at": 1504481866970,"updated_at": 1514794898989},"ibm": {"credential": {"created_at": 1504481866958,"updated_at": 1514794898334},"created_at": 1504481866958,"updated_at": 1514794898218},"mycroft": {"credential": {"created_at": 1504481866965,"updated_at": 1514794898856},"created_at": 1504481866965,"updated_at": 1514794898469},"module": "mycroft","wit": {"credential": {"created_at": 1504481866981,"updated_at": 1514794900417},"created_at": 1504481866981,"updated_at": 1514794900031},"openstt": {"credential": {"created_at": 1504481866976,"updated_at": 1514794899900},"created_at": 1504481866976,"updated_at": 1514794899521}},"location": {"coordinate": {"latitude": -38.149918,"created_at": 1504500674753,"updated_at": 1504500674753,"longitude": 144.361719},"city": {"created_at": 1504500674710,"state": {"country": {"created_at": 1486125571309,"code": "AU","name": "Australia","updated_at": 1486125571309},"created_at": 1489950675941,"code": "VIC","name": "Victoria","updated_at": 1489950675941},"code": "Newtown","name": "Newtown","updated_at": 1504500674710},"created_at": 1504500674709,"updated_at": 1504500674709,"timezone": {"code": "Australia/Melbourne","name": "Australian Eastern Standard Time (Victoria)","dst_offset": 3600000,"created_at": 1489950676105,"updated_at": 1489950676105,"offset": 36000000}},"enclosure": {"created_at": 1504481866997,"rate": 9600,"updated_at": 1514794901541,"timeout": 5,"port": "/dev/ttyAMA0"},"system_unit": "metric"}
The Advanced Settings allow you to change the Wake Word that Mycroft responds to using the PocketSphinx listener. You might want to change the Wake Word to a phrase that's easier for you to speak, or more culturally appropriate.
First, choose the phrase that you wish to set as your Wake Word. For the purposes of this example, we're going to use the phrase:
yo mike
instead of
hey mycroft
We then need to identify the phoneme sounds for this Wake Word using the CMU Dictionary.
Y OW . M AY K .
Remember that the period, or full stop, indicates the end of a word.
Phonemes are basic units of sound. They are a way to represent the different sounds in speech in a standard way. English spelling varies so much that it cannot be used for this purpose. For example, the "j" sound in "juice" is the same as the "g" sound in "giant".
You can see the similarity when these words are written as phonemes:
JH UW S .= juiceJH AY AH N T .= giant
The period, or full stop, indicates the end of the word.
Other settings are available to further tune how sensitive the Speech to Text (STT) engine is in recognizing the Wake Word.
Sample rate (Hz): The rate at which the audio stream is sampled. The default is 16KHz. You shouldn't need to change this, unless the microphone you are using needs a much higher or lower sample rate.
Channels: The audio channel that should be sampled for the Wake Word. The default is 1, and you shouldn't have to change this unless your microphone is not operating on audio channel 1.
Wake Word: In plain English text, the Wake Word that Mycroft should listen for.
Phonemes: The phonemes corresponding to the Wake Word. If your Wake Word phrase is more than one word, remember to include a period (.) at the end of each phoneme.
Threshold (scientific notation): The level of sensitivity at which the Wake Word should trigger Mycroft to respond. To increase the sensitivity, reduce the Threshold. The Threshold is given in scientific notation. Use this handy converter to convert between decimal and scientific notation.
Threshold multiplier (float): This multiplier acts on the Threshold, and may be an easier way to make adjustments rather than scientific notation.
Dynamic Energy Ratio (float): Dynamic Energy Ratio (DER) is one signal feature used in speech recognition to identify characteristics of audio, such as whether a person has stopped or started speaking. DER is similar to signal-to-noise-ratio. A high ratio indicates a high difference in signal between speech and no speech, and a low ratio indicates a small difference in signal between speech and no speech.
If Mycroft is being too sensitive, reduce this value. If Mycroft is not being sensitive enough, increase this value.
For the "Yo Mike" example we started with, an example ~/.mycroft/mycroft.conf file might look like:
{"max_allowed_core_version": 19.2,"listener": {"wake_word": "yo mike","threshold": 1e-18},"hotwords": {"yo mike": {"module": "pocketsphinx","phonemes": "Y OW . M AY K ."}}}
Mycroft doesn't automatically fetch the new settings. You need to tell Mycroft to fetch the new settings by speaking
Hey Mycroft, configuration update
Mycroft will then pull the new Settings configuration down.
