Scribe 
Scribe is a speech-to-text CLI and tray app that pipes transcribed text into the focused window. It supports local and cloud-based APIs, batch and streaming workflows.
- Five backends, one interface. Records from your mic and transcribes via Vosk (local, streaming), Whisper (local, batch), Whisper FUTO (local, batch — ACFT-tuned for short dictations), OpenAI (cloud, batch or streaming), or Groq (cloud, batch).
- Four ways to deliver the transcript. Paste into the focused window (default), copy to the clipboard, print to the terminal, or append to a file.
- Tray or terminal. Runs as a system tray icon with a single Record button, or as an interactive terminal TUI — same menu in both.
- Hotkey-friendly. Hooks into your desktop's keyboard shortcuts via
SIGUSR1(toggle recording) andSIGUSR2(cancel), plus built-in global hotkeys on X11 / Windows. - Cross-platform. Tested on Ubuntu (X11 and Wayland), macOS, and Windows; works under Termux for clipboard / terminal output.
Installation
Linux / macOS:
sudo apt-get install portaudio19-dev xclip # Ubuntu; macOS: brew install portaudio
pip install scribe-cli[all]
export GROQ_API_KEY=YOURAPIKEY # or OPENAI_API_KEY, or skip and run local
Windows (PowerShell) — no system packages needed; sounddevice bundles
PortAudio and the clipboard is native, so skip the apt/brew step:
py -m venv .venv
.\.venv\Scripts\Activate.ps1 # if blocked: Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope CurrentUser RemoteSigned
pip install scribe-cli[whisper] # local Whisper; or [all], or a cloud backend
$env:GROQ_API_KEY = "YOURAPIKEY" # or OPENAI_API_KEY, or skip and run local
See the installation page for the full per-platform walkthrough (extras, Ubuntu / GNOME tray libs, the Windows quickstart).
Quickstart
scribe
This launches the system tray icon. Press Record, speak, press Stop — the
transcription lands in the focused window. Scribe picks the first backend whose
key / dependency is present, in order groq → openai → whisper-futo →
whisper → vosk. Override the defaults or drop the tray entirely:
scribe --backend whisper --model small # local, no API key
scribe --frontend terminal # interactive TUI menu
scribe --mode clipboard # copy to clipboard, no keystroke
See the quickstart for more.
Documentation
Full documentation lives at https://perrette.github.io/scribe/:
- Installation & dependencies — PortAudio, extras, Ubuntu / GNOME tray libs, Windows.
- Quickstart — your first dictation.
- Backends in detail — model lists, streaming recipes, vocabulary biasing, the realtime model.
- Output modes & typer backends —
keystroke vs clipboard, Wayland /
eitype,--type-direct. - System tray & global hotkeys —
menu tree, icon states,
SIGUSR1/SIGUSR2. - Desktop entry & autostart (
scribe-install) — GNOME / KDE launcher integration. - Fine tuning & CLI reference — every
scribe --helpflag with examples.
From the same author
A few other open-source tools I maintain.
Scientific writing & data
- texmark — write scientific articles in Markdown and convert them to journal-ready LaTeX/PDF.
- papers — command-line BibTeX bibliography and PDF library manager.
- datamanifest — declarative, reproducible dataset management. (See also the datamanifest.toml format spec and the DataManifest.jl Julia port.)
Speech to Text (dictate) and Text to Speech (read-aloud) tools
- bard — text-to-speech reader.
Compatibility
| OS | Status |
|---|---|
| Ubuntu 24.04 | Primary dev platform (GNOME, X11 and Wayland). |
| macOS | Works. |
| Windows 11 | Tested and working on Python 3.14 (64-bit / win_amd64). Dependencies resolve pre-built wheels; no C toolchain or Python downgrade needed. |
Wayland keystroke injection is convoluted but solved.
1 maintainer
Metadata
1 maintainer
Release files for scribe-cli 1.2.1
For a detailed explanation of source distributions (sdists) and built distributions (wheels), please see the package formats documentation.
Source distribution (sdist)
| File | Size | Uploaded | |
|---|---|---|---|
| scribe_cli-1.2.1.tar.gz | 2.2 MB | Details |
Built distribution (wheel)
| File | Interpreter | ABI | Platform | Reset |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| scribe_cli-1.2.1-py3-none-any.whl | Python 3 | none | any | Details |
Total release size: 4.2 MB
Release files / scribe_cli-1.2.1.tar.gz
| Download URL | scribe_cli-1.2.1.tar.gz |
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| Size | 2.2 MB |
| Tags | Source |
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| Tags | Python 3 |
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| Uploaded via |
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