wiseguru_ReWrite-Voice-Notes/wiki/Commands-and-Menus.md

Commands and menus

Every entry point ReWrite adds: command palette commands, the ribbon icon, right-click menus, and the Quick Record floating UI. Bind hotkeys to any command in Obsidian's Hotkeys settings.

Command palette

Command	What it does
Open	Opens the main modal with your last-used template selected. Same as the ribbon mic icon.
Quick record (last used)	Starts recording immediately with a floating mini-UI, using the last-used template. Press again (or its hotkey) to stop.
Quick record (set template)	Same one-shot capture, but always uses the template pinned in Settings, Templates, Quick record (set template). If none is pinned, it shows a notice and does nothing.
Process text with template	Runs a template over the current editor selection, or the whole note if nothing is selected. No audio. Progress shows via notices.
Reprocess audio file with template	Reruns the full pipeline over an audio file already in your vault. Opens an audio-file picker, then a template picker.
Process auto-ingest folders	Scans your configured ingest folders and processes every audio file found with the folder's preassigned template, one at a time, then moves each processed recording in with your other saved recordings. A sticky progress notice with Cancel tracks the batch. See Settings reference for setting up rules.
Real-time transcription (start/stop)	Live dictation: streams your mic to the provider and types the transcript at the cursor as you speak. No template, no LLM cleanup, no saved audio, just raw live text. Needs a Real-time provider (AssemblyAI or Deepgram) and its key set in the profile's Real-time transcription settings, configured independently of the batch transcription provider, plus an open Markdown note (see Providers). Run it again (or click Stop on the floating bar) to end.
Start whisper host / Stop whisper host	Starts or stops the local whisper.cpp server. Only visible on desktop when relevant (start: active profile uses whisper-local; stop: the host is running or starting). See Self-hosting: whisper.cpp.

Ribbon and status bar

• Mic ribbon icon: opens the main modal (same as the Open command).
• Whisper status bar item (desktop only): shows the local whisper.cpp server's live state when the active profile uses it. Click it to start or stop the server.

Right-click menus

• Editor menu ("ReWrite with template..."): right-click in a note to run a template over the selection or whole note, the same as the Process text command.
• Editor menu ("Reprocess audio with template..."): appears only when your cursor sits inside an ![[audio]] embed; reprocesses that linked audio file.
• File explorer menu ("Reprocess audio with template..."): right-click an audio file in the file explorer to reprocess it.

The main modal

Opened by the ribbon icon or the Open command. It has:

• A template selector at the top.
• Three input tabs: Record (capture in Obsidian), Paste (paste an existing transcript), and From note (pull the active note's selection or whole body).
• A collapsible Destination control to override, for this run only, where the output goes (cursor / new file / append) without editing the template on disk.
• A collapsible Context field, shown only for templates that enable it, for one-off background info (speakers, subject, setting). See Providers.
• An inline setup card that blocks recording or pasting until the active profile is configured, with a shortcut to fix it.

When you Record and press Stop, the modal closes right away and the rest of the work (transcribe, clean up, insert) runs in the background with progress shown via notices, the same as reprocessing a saved file. If something fails, a notice tells you why; your recording was already saved to the vault, so you can reprocess it. The Paste and From note tabs instead keep the modal open while they run and offer a Retry button on error, since their input is not saved anywhere.

The Record tab also has a Record in background checkbox (desktop only; the choice is remembered). When checked, pressing Record closes the modal immediately and hands the capture to the Quick Record floating bar, carrying the template, destination override, and context hint you set in the modal, so Obsidian stays fully usable during the recording itself. Switching templates from the floating bar's popover drops the carried destination and context (they belonged to the original template). Only one recording can be live at a time, shared with the Quick Record commands. On mobile the checkbox is hidden: the system suspends background capture, so the modal keeps recording in the foreground there.

Quick Record floating UI

Quick Record skips the modal entirely. When you start it, a small floating panel appears with:

• A live timer.
• A template button that opens a popover to switch templates for this recording (dismisses on selection, Escape, or outside click).
• A Stop button, preceded by a stop-hotkey hint ("Press or click Stop") when the command is bound to a hotkey.
• A "No audio detected" warning if the mic stays silent for a few seconds (a muted or dead mic).

Both Quick Record commands share one in-flight recording, so either one stops a recording the other started. If the active profile is not configured, or audio capture is unavailable, Quick Record opens the main modal instead. If the pipeline errors after capture, the modal opens so you can retry; the saved audio file is your recovery path.

Real-time transcription floating bar

The Real-time transcription (start/stop) command shows its own small floating bar: a pulsing dot, the rolling in-progress phrase, and a Stop button. Finalized phrases are typed at your cursor as you speak, like dictation; the in-progress phrase is only previewed on the bar, never inserted until the provider finalizes it. Stopping flushes the last phrase, then closes the connection. This mode is deliberately minimal (no template, no cleanup pass, no saved audio): it is for quick live dictation, not the full ReWrite pipeline.

Long-form audio

Lectures, meetings, interviews, and podcasts use the same pipeline. Drop the file anywhere in your vault and Reprocess it with the Lecture or Podcast template. For multi-hour recordings, choose a provider with a high ceiling such as AssemblyAI or Rev.ai (OpenAI Whisper and Groq cap at 25 MB; Mistral Voxtral at 30 minutes), and turn on Identify speakers to keep speaker labels through cleanup. See per-provider limits in Providers. Only process audio you have the right to use.

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