Building a Windows Desktop AI Assistant (Python,
Voice I/O, 3D Avatar)
A complete tech stack for this project includes Python 3.9+ on Windows, with specialized libraries for
speech, AI, and GUI. For voice input, use libraries like SpeechRecognition (which supports Google STT,
Azure, Vosk, Whisper, etc.) 1 2 . For high-accuracy speech-to-text, consider cloud APIs (e.g. Google Cloud
Speech or Microsoft Azure Speech) via their Python SDKs or REST APIs. For text-to-speech, options include
pyttsx3 (offline SAPI/Win32 voices) 3 and cloud services (Azure Cognitive Services TTS, Google TTS,
ElevenLabs, etc.). For example, Azure’s Speech SDK can produce lifelike voices and even emit viseme timing
data for lip-sync 4 5 . The assistant logic can leverage an AI model (e.g. OpenAI’s GPT-4 via the OpenAI
API) for understanding and code generation. Task automation uses Python’s built-in modules:
subprocess or [Link] to launch programs 6 , [Link] to open URLs 7 , and
smtplib / email for sending emails. GUI automation tools like PyAutoGUI can automate clicks or typing
if needed. For 3D avatar rendering, you can use a game/graphics engine: e.g. Ursina Engine (built on
Panda3D) 8 or a Unity/Unreal app. Ready-made avatar models can come from Ready Player Me
(customizable glTF avatars) 9 . The Python UI can be built with PyQt/PySide (rich desktop GUI, can embed
3D views) or Tkinter (simpler). The assistant will run in a Python app (packaged via PyInstaller into an
.exe for distribution 10 ) with libraries installed via pip .
Voice Input (Speech Recognition)
Capture microphone audio (e.g. via pyaudio ) and convert it to text. Use the SpeechRecognition library,
which wraps many backends (Google, Azure, IBM, Vosk, Whisper, etc.) 1 2 . For example, calling
recognizer.recognize_google(audio) sends audio to Google’s API. Offline options include Whisper
or VOSK models. Azure’s Speech SDK (via [Link] ) can also do STT in
Python. By converting spoken commands into text, the assistant can then parse and act on them. Typical
steps: - Listen continuously or on hot-word, - Run speech-to-text (Google/Azure/Whisper), - Pass resulting
text to the command parser or LLM.
Voice Output (Text-to-Speech)
Convert response text to speech. Offline synthesis can be done with pyttsx3 (works on Windows with SAPI5
voices) 3 . It lets you select system voices and adjust rate/volume. For higher-quality voices, use cloud
APIs: for example, Microsoft’s Azure TTS or Google Cloud TTS (called via their Python SDKs). These services
can return audio streams or files which you play (e.g. with playsound or via the audio device). Azure TTS
can also generate viseme data (mouth-shape IDs with timestamps) for lip-sync 4 . In code, you would fetch
or generate the audio (and visemes), then play it through the speakers. Libraries like Sounddevice or
winsound may help play back the audio buffer. For realistic voices, services like ElevenLabs (via their API)
are popular (e.g. “ElevenLabs Python SDK”). The PyGPT project notes that common choices are Azure,
Google, ElevenLabs or OpenAI for TTS and Whisper/Google/Azure for STT 5 .
1
Task Automation (Applications, Web, Email, Code)
The assistant executes commands by running system actions. Use Python’s standard libraries and APIs for
each task: - Open applications: use [Link](...) or on Windows
[Link]("path\to\[Link]") 6 . For example, [Link]("C:\\Program Files\
\[Link]") opens that program. - Open websites: use import webbrowser;
[Link]("[Link] 7 . This launches the default browser to the URL. - Send
email: use Python’s smtplib and email libraries. For example, connect to Gmail SMTP
( [Link] ) with SSL, [Link](from, to, msg) 11 . (Alternatively, Gmail/Outlook
REST APIs can be used for OAuth-based access.) - Write code or documents: you can programmatically
create/edit files. E.g., create a .py file and write code text to it. For AI-assisted coding, send the user’s
prompt to an LLM (OpenAI GPT), get back code, and optionally launch a text editor via [Link] to
show it. - GUI automation: modules like PyAutoGUI can move the mouse, click buttons, or type keys to
control other apps. - Other tasks: any custom scripts (e.g. taking screenshots, playing media) can be called
similarly. Tasks can be organized in a tasks/ package (e.g. open_app.py , send_email.py ,
search_web.py , etc.), each exposing functions the main assistant can call when a command is
recognized.
3D Avatar and Lip Sync
A 3D avatar requires a rendering engine and animation control. One approach is to use an existing 3D
engine (Unity, Unreal, or an open-source Python engine like Panda3D/Ursina 8 ). You load a rigged 3D
human model (e.g. from Ready Player Me 9 or Mixamo). To sync lip movements to speech, use the TTS
output’s timing or viseme data. For example, Azure’s Speech service can emit a stream of viseme_id with
timestamps 4 ; each viseme corresponds to a mouth pose (see Azure docs). You map those IDs to the
avatar’s blend-shapes or jaw bone transforms in the 3D engine. Nvidia’s Audio2Face (Omniverse) can even
drive a character’s face from live audio 12 . Alternatively, open-source tools like Wav2Lip or MuseTalk can
generate lip-synced animations from audio 13 , though they require GPU compute. In practice, a simpler
route is: send the text to the TTS engine, receive back viseme timing, and in your 3D scene animate the
avatar’s jaw/mouth at those times. (StackOverflow discussions suggest using Microsoft’s Viseme events
from Speech SDK in tandem with a 3D character 4 .) Polywink and ReadyPlayerMe are mentioned as avatar
sources with lip-sync support 9 . You could run the 3D avatar in a separate window or embed it in the GUI
(e.g. via Qt’s 3D/WebGL view) and update its animation in real-time as audio plays.
UI Framework
For the desktop interface, PyQt5/PySide6 is recommended for a polished, cross-platform GUI. PyQt
supports complex widgets and can embed an OpenGL/Qt3D view for the avatar, or a QWebEngineView to
host a WebGL avatar page. Tkinter is simpler and built-in but less modern-looking. Kivy is another option
for a custom GUI (touch-friendly but heavier). In PyQt, you might create a main window
( main_window.py ) with two panels: on the left, controls/logs; on the right, the avatar viewport. You can
use Qt’s multimedia or sound modules to play audio. Whichever framework, ensure the voice I/O and avatar
animation run in separate threads or async tasks so the UI stays responsive.
2
Sample Folder Structure
A suggested project layout:
assistant/
│
├─ [Link] # App entry: initialize UI and assistant logic
├─ [Link] # Configuration (API keys, settings, voice preferences)
│
├─ voice/
│ ├─ [Link] # Microphone capture and speech-to-text
│ └─ [Link] # Text-to-speech and audio playback (and viseme
extraction)
│
├─ tasks/
│ ├─ open_app.py # Functions to open specific programs/files
│ ├─ [Link] # Web browsing/search functions
│ ├─ [Link] # Functions to send email (using smtplib or API)
│ └─ [Link] # Interface to LLM or code-writing utilities
│
├─ avatar/
│ ├─ [Link] # 3D avatar model file (e.g. from ReadyPlayerMe)
│ └─ [Link] # Code to load model and apply viseme-driven animations
│
├─ ui/
│ ├─ main_window.py # GUI layout (PyQt window, controls)
│ └─ avatar_view.py # Widget/class that renders and updates the 3D avatar
│
├─ [Link] # Pin all Python dependencies
└─ [Link]
Each file’s purpose:
• [Link] : Launches the application, sets up the event loop. It ties together the voice I/O, command
parser, and GUI.
• [Link] : Stores constants like API keys (OpenAI, Azure) and TTS/voice preferences.
• voice/[Link]: Captures microphone input (e.g. via PyAudio) and calls a recognizer (Google/
Whisper/Azure) to return text.
• voice/[Link]: Converts text responses to audio. Might interface with pyttsx3 or Azure SDK, output
audio, and emit viseme events if available.
• tasks/: Each module handles a category of actions. E.g., open_app.py has functions that call
[Link] on known programs; [Link] uses webbrowser ; [Link] wraps SMTP
calls; [Link] might call OpenAI’s API to generate code.
• avatar/[Link] : Loads the 3D model (using your chosen engine) and listens for viseme or
phoneme cues to animate the avatar’s face/mouth in sync with the TTS.
3
• ui/main_window.py: Defines the GUI structure (menus/buttons/console log), and starts background
threads for listening to voice.
• ui/avatar_view.py: Embeds the 3D viewport into the GUI and provides an interface to drive
animations (e.g. a method update_viseme(viseme_id) ).
System Architecture Overview
The assistant has several interacting components:
• Input: The microphone audio is continuously captured. Audio is passed to a speech recognition
module which returns text.
• Processing: The text is analyzed to determine the intent. Simple commands (like “open browser” or
“send email”) are routed to the corresponding tasks/ function. Complex queries are sent to an
LLM (e.g. ChatGPT) via API for an answer or code snippet.
• Action: The assistant executes the task (launch app, open URL, send email).
• Output: It generates a text response (confirmation or answer). That text is sent to the TTS module,
which produces speech audio. Simultaneously, the TTS module provides viseme timing data.
• Avatar Animation: The avatar renderer receives the viseme IDs/timestamps and moves the avatar’s
mouth/jaw accordingly. The rendered 3D avatar appears on the screen lip-syncing with the audio.
• GUI: The main window runs its own event loop, displaying logs and the avatar. Background threads
or async calls handle voice I/O and 3D updates to keep the UI responsive.
Overall flow: User speaks → Speech-to-text → Command parsing/AI → Text response → TTS+audio
output → Avatar lips move, while the interface displays status. (See examples of voice assistant loops in
tutorials 14 15 .) Each component can run in parallel threads or asynchronous loops to manage real-time
interaction.
Deployment/Packaging
To distribute the assistant on Windows, bundle it into an executable. The standard tool is PyInstaller. For
example, run pyinstaller --onefile [Link] --name MyAssistant to produce a standalone
.exe 10 . Include the [Link] and any model/asset files. If you used a custom 3D engine
(like Unity) for the avatar, you might need to build that separately or embed it (e.g. a Unity built executable
that runs alongside the Python logic). Keep in mind large libraries (TensorFlow, PyTorch, speech models) can
bloat size. PyInstaller hooks can include your SSL certs or data files. Test the bundled app on a clean
Windows VM.
With this stack and architecture, you have all components for a voice-driven Python AI assistant with task
automation and a 3D lip-sync avatar 4 10 .
Sources: Official docs and tutorials (Python webbrowser 7 , speech_recognition 1 2 , pyttsx3
3 ), sample projects (GeeksForGeeks voice assistant 14 15 , PyGPT assistant 5 , GitHub guide 10 ), and
Azure/Microsoft articles on TTS visemes 4 and community Q&A 9 16 . Each component (voice I/O, tasks,
UI, 3D) should be developed and tested modularly.
4
1 2 SpeechRecognition · PyPI
[Link]
3 GitHub - nateshmbhat/pyttsx3: Offline Text To Speech synthesis for python
[Link]
4 Get facial position with viseme - Azure AI services | Microsoft Learn
[Link]
5 PyGPT – Open‑source Desktop AI Assistant for Windows, macOS, Linux
[Link]
6 Open document with default OS application in Python, both in Windows and Mac OS - Stack Overflow
[Link]
7 webbrowser — Convenient web-browser controller — Python 3.13.7 documentation
[Link]
8 ursina engine
[Link]
9 javascript - Make a realtime realistic 3D avatar with text-to-speech, Viseme Lip-sync, and emotions/
gestures - Stack Overflow
[Link]
10 GitHub - kamalleaner/Voice-Based-Assistanccce: Voice-Based-Assistanccce is a Python voice assistant
(speech_recognition, pyttsx3) that automates desktop tasks: open apps, web search, screenshots and email.
[Link]
11 Sending Emails With Python – Real Python
[Link]
12 13 16 AI-Powered Conversational Avatar System: Tools & Best Practices - DEV Community
[Link]
14 15 Voice Assistant using python - GeeksforGeeks
[Link]
