Think Different: How to Build a Speaking Robot using ChatGPT

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Prerequisites:

Here are the hardware and software prerequisites to develop a speaking robot with Raspberry Pi:

Hardware:

Raspberry Pi: This is the main component of the robot, which will run the software to control the robot’s behavior.
Microphone: The robot will need a microphone to listen to user input.
Speaker: The robot will need a speaker to output audio responses.
Power supply: The Raspberry Pi will need a power source, such as a USB charger or battery pack.
Optional: Additional hardware components like a camera, sensors, or motors can be added to enhance the robot’s functionality.

Software:

Raspberry Pi OS: This is the operating system that will run on the Raspberry Pi.
Python 3: The programming language that will be used to write the code for the robot.
Speech recognition libraries: Python libraries like SpeechRecognition or PocketSphinx can be used to convert speech to text.
Text-to-speech libraries: Python libraries like pyttsx3 or Google Text-to-Speech can be used to convert text to speech.
Chatbot API: A chatbot API like ChatGPT can be used to generate natural language responses to user input.
Optional: Libraries like OpenCV or TensorFlow can be used for computer vision or machine learning tasks.

Once you have all the necessary hardware and software components, you can start building and programming your robot!

To use ChatGPT API to make a small home robot with Raspberry Pi, you would need to follow these steps:

Sign up for an API key: You will need to sign up for an API key to use the ChatGPT API. You can do this by visiting the OpenAI website and following the instructions provided.
Install required software: You will need to install some software on your Raspberry Pi to be able to use the ChatGPT API. This includes Python and the requests library. You can install Python by running the following command in your terminal:

sudo apt-get install python3

To install the requests library, run the following command:

pip install requests

3. Write your code: You will need to write some Python code to interact with the ChatGPT API. This code will be responsible for sending a message to the API, receiving a response, and then processing the response to perform some action.

Here is some sample code to get you started:

import requests

# Set up API endpoint and headers
endpoint = 'https://api.openai.com/v1/engines/davinci-codex/completions'
headers = {'Content-Type': 'application/json',
           'Authorization': f'Bearer YOUR_API_KEY'}

# Define function to send message to API
def send_message(message):
    data = {'prompt': message,
            'max_tokens': 100,
            'temperature': 0.7}
    response = requests.post(endpoint, headers=headers, json=data)
    return response.json()

# Test function
response = send_message('Hello, ChatGPT!')
print(response['choices'][0]['text'])

This code sends a message “Hello, ChatGPT!” to the ChatGPT API and receives a response. The response is then printed to the console.

Connect to your robot: You will need to connect your Raspberry Pi to your robot hardware. This may involve wiring up sensors, motors, and other components.
Integrate your code with your robot: Once you have written your Python code and connected your Raspberry Pi to your robot hardware, you will need to integrate the two. This will involve adding code to control the robot based on the responses received from the ChatGPT API.

For example, you might use the ChatGPT API to generate a response to a question, and then use that response to control a motor or LED on your robot. The specifics of how you integrate your code with your robot will depend on the components you are using and what you want your robot to do.

To convert speech to text and text to speech on Raspberry Pi, you can use the SpeechRecognition and pyttsx3 libraries in Python. Here are the steps:

Install the required libraries:

pip install SpeechRecognition pyttsx3

Use the SpeechRecognition library to convert speech to text:

import speech_recognition as sr

# Create an instance of the recognizer
r = sr.Recognizer()

# Define a function to record audio and convert it to text
def record_and_recognize():
    with sr.Microphone() as source:
        print("Say something!")
        audio = r.listen(source)

    try:
        text = r.recognize_google(audio)
        print("You said: " + text)
        return text
    except sr.UnknownValueError:
        print("Sorry, I didn't understand that.")
        return ""
    except sr.RequestError as e:
        print("Could not request results from Google Speech Recognition service; {0}".format(e))
        return ""

This code uses the Recognizer class to record audio from the microphone and convert it to text using the Google Speech Recognition service.
Use the pyttsx3 library to convert text to speech:

import pyttsx3

# Create an instance of the Text-to-Speech engine
engine = pyttsx3.init()

# Define a function to speak a given text
def speak(text):
    engine.say(text)
    engine.runAndWait()

This code uses the init() function to create an instance of the Text-to-Speech engine, and the say() and runAndWait() functions to speak the given text.
Integrate the speech-to-text and text-to-speech functionality with your ChatGPT code:

import requests
import speech_recognition as sr
import pyttsx3

# Set up API endpoint and headers
endpoint = 'https://api.openai.com/v1/engines/davinci-codex/completions'
headers = {'Content-Type': 'application/json',
           'Authorization': f'Bearer YOUR_API_KEY'}

# Create an instance of the recognizer
r = sr.Recognizer()

# Create an instance of the Text-to-Speech engine
engine = pyttsx3.init()

# Define a function to record audio and convert it to text
def record_and_recognize():
    with sr.Microphone() as source:
        print("Say something!")
        audio = r.listen(source)

    try:
        text = r.recognize_google(audio)
        print("You said: " + text)
        return text
    except sr.UnknownValueError:
        print("Sorry, I didn't understand that.")
        return ""
    except sr.RequestError as e:
        print("Could not request results from Google Speech Recognition service; {0}".format(e))
        return ""

# Define a function to send message to API and speak the response
def send_message_and_speak(message):
    data = {'prompt': message,
            'max_tokens': 100,
            'temperature': 0.7}
    response = requests.post(endpoint, headers=headers, json=data)
    response_text = response.json()['choices'][0]['text']
    print(response_text)
    speak(response_text)

# Main loop
while True:
    # Record audio and convert it to text
    text = record_and_recognize()

    # If text is not empty, send message to API and speak the response
    if text != "":
        send_message_and_speak(text)

Yes, here are some additional suggestions to further develop your speaking robot with Raspberry Pi:

Use a wake word to activate the speech-to-text functionality. Instead of constantly listening for input, you can use a wake word to trigger the robot to start listening. You can use the Snowboy library to create a custom wake word model that runs on Raspberry Pi.
Use text-to-speech voices that sound more human-like. The pyttsx3 library provides a default voice that is not very natural-sounding. You can use other libraries like Google Text-to-Speech or Amazon Polly to generate more realistic-sounding voices.
Implement natural language processing (NLP) to improve the robot’s understanding of user input. The ChatGPT API is a great starting point, but it may not always produce the most accurate or relevant responses. You can use libraries like spaCy or NLTK to perform NLP tasks like named entity recognition or sentiment analysis.
Add additional hardware components to make the robot more interactive. For example, you can add a camera to the robot and use computer vision to detect objects or faces, or add sensors to detect environmental factors like temperature or humidity. This can help the robot better understand and respond to its surroundings.
Create a web interface to control the robot remotely. You can use a web framework like Flask to create a simple web app that lets you control the robot from a browser on your phone or computer. This can be useful if you want to interact with the robot from a distance, or if you want to share control of the robot with others.

To use a wake word with the code I provided earlier, you will need to modify the code to continuously listen for the wake word, and then activate the speech-to-text functionality once the wake word is detected. Here’s an example of how you can modify the code to use a wake word:

import speech_recognition as sr
import pyttsx3
import requests

# define wake word
WAKE_WORD = "hey robot"

# initialize text-to-speech engine
engine = pyttsx3.init()

# initialize speech recognition
r = sr.Recognizer()

# set microphone as audio source
mic = sr.Microphone()

# define ChatGPT API endpoint
url = "https://api.openai.com/v1/engines/davinci-codex/completions"

# set API headers and parameters
headers = {
    "Content-Type": "application/json",
    "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"
}
params = {
    "prompt": "",
    "max_tokens": 60,
    "temperature": 0.5
}

# define function to send request to ChatGPT API
def get_response(prompt):
    params["prompt"] = prompt
    response = requests.post(url, headers=headers, json=params)
    return response.json()["choices"][0]["text"]

# function to speak text
def speak(text):
    engine.say(text)
    engine.runAndWait()

# function to listen for wake word
def listen_for_wake_word():
    with mic as source:
        r.adjust_for_ambient_noise(source)
        audio = r.listen(source)
    try:
        # use Google's Speech Recognition to convert speech to text
        text = r.recognize_google(audio)
        if text.lower() == WAKE_WORD:
            return True
        else:
            return False
    except sr.UnknownValueError:
        return False
    except sr.RequestError:
        return False

# main loop
while True:
    # listen for wake word
    if listen_for_wake_word():
        # speak confirmation message
        speak("How can I assist you?")
        
        # listen for user input
        with mic as source:
            r.adjust_for_ambient_noise(source)
            audio = r.listen(source)
        try:
            # use Google's Speech Recognition to convert speech to text
            text = r.recognize_google(audio)
            # send text to ChatGPT API and get response
            response = get_response(text)
            # speak response
            speak(response)
        except sr.UnknownValueError:
            speak("I'm sorry, I didn't understand. Can you please repeat?")
        except sr.RequestError:
            speak("Sorry, my speech recognition service is down. Please try again later.")

In this modified code, the listen_for_wake_word() the function is called in an infinite loop, and it continuously listens for the wake word "hey robot". Once the wake word is detected, the robot speaks a confirmation message and starts listening for user input.

Note that this example uses Google’s Speech Recognition service to convert speech to text. You can replace this with the PocketSphinx library or another speech recognition engine if you prefer.

I am a Software Architect and AI/Robotics Engineer for the Renewable energy sector and smart cities.

If you have any suggestions kindly let me know. Thank you.