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Dictate From a Button Tutorial

The keyboard shortcut is the fast path to dictation. But sometimes you want a second trigger: a button in your status bar, a key on a Stream Deck, or a keybinding managed by your window manager instead of by the app.

All of these work through two flags on the app's executable:

knowii-voice-ai --toggle-transcription   # start recording; run again to stop and transcribe
knowii-voice-ai --cancel                 # discard whatever is in progress

The app only ever runs once. Launching it again with a flag hands the instruction to the running instance and exits, so a button press is instant, never spawns a second app, and never pulls the window in front of what you are doing. Full reference: Controlling the desktop app.

In this tutorial, you will wire dictation to whatever trigger you like. Pick your platform below.

Prerequisites​

  • Knowii Voice AI installed, running, and transcribing (see the Getting Started Tutorial)
  • The knowii-voice-ai executable reachable from your trigger (on Linux deb/RPM installs it is on PATH; elsewhere use the full path from the CLI page)

Hyprland: a window manager keybinding​

Add to ~/.config/hypr/hyprland.conf:

bind = SUPER, D, exec, knowii-voice-ai --toggle-transcription
bind = SUPER SHIFT, D, exec, knowii-voice-ai --cancel

Reload Hyprland and dictation is on Super+D, managed by the compositor rather than the app. This is handy on Wayland setups where you prefer all global keys in one place.

Waybar: a panel button​

Add a custom module to ~/.config/waybar/config:

"custom/dictate": {
    "format": "🎙",
    "tooltip": "Dictate with Knowii Voice AI",
    "on-click": "knowii-voice-ai --toggle-transcription",
    "on-click-right": "knowii-voice-ai --cancel"
}

Add "custom/dictate" to your modules list and restart Waybar. Left-click toggles dictation, right-click cancels. The same pattern works in Polybar, i3blocks, or any bar that runs a command on click.

GNOME: a custom shortcut​

  1. Settings → Keyboard → View and Customize Shortcuts → Custom Shortcuts
  2. Add a shortcut: name it "Dictate", command knowii-voice-ai --toggle-transcription, and bind a key combination
  3. Optionally add a second one for --cancel

KDE Plasma: a custom shortcut​

  1. System Settings → Shortcuts → Custom Shortcuts (or Keyboard → Shortcuts on newer Plasma)
  2. Add a new command shortcut running knowii-voice-ai --toggle-transcription
  3. Bind your key; repeat for --cancel if you want a discard key

Stream Deck​

Assign a System → Open action (or the "Open Application" equivalent in your Stream Deck software) to a key, pointing at the executable with the flag:

  • Windows: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\knowii-voice-ai\knowii-voice-ai.exe --toggle-transcription
  • macOS: create a small shell script or an Automator app that runs /Applications/Knowii\ Voice\ AI.app/Contents/MacOS/knowii-voice-ai --toggle-transcription, and point the key at it

One key to start, press again to stop. A second key with --cancel makes a nice "never mind" button.

Windows: a desktop shortcut with a hotkey​

  1. Right-click the desktop → New → Shortcut
  2. Target: "%LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\knowii-voice-ai\knowii-voice-ai.exe" --toggle-transcription
  3. In the shortcut's Properties → Shortcut key, assign a combination

Windows shortcut hotkeys can be slow to fire; for something snappier, an AutoHotkey one-liner does the same job:

^!d::Run '"%LocalAppData%\Programs\knowii-voice-ai\knowii-voice-ai.exe" --toggle-transcription'

macOS: Shortcuts or Raycast​

  • Shortcuts app: create a shortcut with a "Run Shell Script" action running the executable with --toggle-transcription, then assign it a keyboard shortcut or put it in the menu bar.
  • Raycast / Alfred: add a script command with the same line; trigger it from the launcher or a hotkey.

Good to know​

  • --toggle-transcription always behaves as a toggle, even with Push To Talk enabled in the app: a button has no key to hold, so press once to start, once to stop. Your in-app shortcut keeps its configured behavior.
  • If the app is not running yet, the command starts it normally without recording; press your trigger again once it is up.
  • These triggers coexist with the in-app shortcut. Nothing needs to be disabled.

Next Steps​