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Overview

A turn-based conversation is a communication system designed for applications where the user utters a single statement, and the agent is expected to respond fully. This model differs from streaming conversations that try to mimic natural human discourse. Instead, it fits applications triggered by some kind of user input. For example, consider a voice memo application where the user records a message, and the agent generates a complete response.

A turn-based conversation system is perfect for applications that don’t require interruptions and have a controlled conversation flow. Each user input is treated as a discrete event, giving the system time to generate and deliver a full and meaningful response.

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Turn-based quickstart

The example below demonstrates a turn-based conversation, using a ChatGPT agent for text generation, WhisperTranscriber for speech-to-text, and AzureSynthesizer for text-to-speech. User interactions trigger the beginning and end of the recording, signaling the system when to listen and when to respond. You can run it with

make turn_based_conversation

Remember to replace OPENAI_API_KEY and AZURE_SPEECH_KEY with your actual API keys and set the appropriate Azure region. You can also set these variables in a .env file and source it in your terminal. You can also customize the voice, system prompt, and initial message as needed. The code can be found here.

class Settings(BaseSettings):
    """
    Settings for the turn-based conversation quickstart.
    These parameters can be configured with environment variables.
    """

    openai_api_key: str = "ENTER_YOUR_OPENAI_API_KEY_HERE"
    azure_speech_key: str = "ENTER_YOUR_AZURE_KEY_HERE"

    azure_speech_region: str = "eastus"

    # This means a .env file can be used to overload these settings
    # ex: "OPENAI_API_KEY=my_key" will set openai_api_key over the default above
    model_config = SettingsConfigDict(
        env_file=".env",
        env_file_encoding="utf-8",
    )


settings = Settings()

if __name__ == "__main__":
    (
        microphone_input,
        speaker_output,
    ) = create_turn_based_microphone_input_and_speaker_output(
        use_default_devices=False,
    )

    conversation = TurnBasedConversation(
        input_device=microphone_input,
        output_device=speaker_output,
        transcriber=WhisperTranscriber(api_key=settings.openai_api_key),
        agent=ChatGPTAgent(
            system_prompt="The AI is having a pleasant conversation about life",
            initial_message="Hello!",
            api_key=settings.openai_api_key,
        ),
        synthesizer=AzureSynthesizer(
            api_key=settings.azure_speech_key,
            region=settings.azure_speech_region,
            voice_name="en-US-SteffanNeural",
        ),
    )
    print("Starting conversation. Press Ctrl+C to exit.")
    while True:
        try:
            input("Press enter to start recording...")
            conversation.start_speech()
            input("Press enter to end recording...")
            conversation.end_speech_and_respond()
        except KeyboardInterrupt:
            break
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