Talon
6c17881cc0
iOS "voice chat" had echo and no noise suppression: real iOS AEC/NS/AGC come only from Apple's Voice-Processing I/O unit (VPIO), but the core plays/captures via miniaudio's plain RemoteIO units, so .voiceChat mode alone never engaged AEC. Core (ABI PATCH 1->2): - vc_set_mixed_output_sink + vc_set_external_playback. In external mode the AudioEngine opens no hardware playback device; a mixer-timer thread drives on_playback (decode+mix) on a ~20ms cadence and ships the final mix to the sink. start() also skips the hardware capture device when the MIC stream is external_feed (AudioParams.external_capture). - New white-box test test_external_playback (drives the timer with no hw). iOS/Swift: - StreamDescriptor.externalFeed; VoiceCatClient.setMixedOutputSink / setExternalPlayback wrappers. - IOSVoiceProcessingEngine: AVAudioEngine + setVoiceProcessingEnabled; mic tap -> feedPcm, mixed-sink lock-free ring -> AVAudioSourceNode (both share the VPIO unit so AEC has its reference signal). - IOSAudioRouter.currentConfigUsesVoiceProcessing scopes VPIO to the AEC presets; SessionState join/leave + reconcileVoicePath() switch paths; Voice Chat defaults to speaker; Settings surfaces AEC/NS state. Known: pending on-device verification; a few bugs to fix afterward.
VoiceCat
Self-hosted, native voice & text chat in the spirit of classic TeamSpeak / Mumble —
channel-based voice, channel + private text, one server you run yourself. Plain TCP
(control) and UDP (media), no WebRTC. Encrypted by default. A shared C++ core
(libvoicecat) drives native clients (Swift on macOS/iOS, C# on Windows) and the server.
Status: Design complete in
docs/. M1–M5 are implemented — real TLS control plane, encrypted UDP voice (Opus), multi-stream, TOFU identity pinning, channel tree, permissions, moderation, disconnect/keepalive/reaper. Windows WinForms C# client shipped (M4). macOS/iOS Swift client is next. SeePROGRESS.mdanddocs/roadmap.md.
Read the design first
The docs/ folder is the source of truth. Start at docs/README.md,
then architecture → protocol → voice → security → tech-stack → deployment →
roadmap.
Build
The default development preset is dev — it builds everything (server + tools + tests)
with real vcpkg deps. It works on Windows, Linux, and macOS (vcpkg triplet auto-resolved).
# one-time vcpkg setup:
git clone https://github.com/microsoft/vcpkg && ./vcpkg/bootstrap-vcpkg.sh # .bat on Windows
export VCPKG_ROOT=/path/to/vcpkg # Linux/macOS; or $env:VCPKG_ROOT on PowerShell
# configure + build + test:
cmake --preset dev
cmake --build --preset dev
ctest --preset dev # 21 behavior tests
Artifacts land in build/dev/bin/ (voicecat-server, vccli, voicecat-admin).
The skeleton preset (no vcpkg deps, stubs only) is a fast smoke check that needs no
third-party libraries:
cmake --preset skeleton && cmake --build --preset skeleton && ctest --preset skeleton
See docs/building.md for the full preset matrix (including release,
server-release, windows-client, and Apple platform scaffolding).
Layout
docs/ design spec (read this)
core/ libvoicecat — the shared C++ core
include/ voicecat.h (the C ABI all clients call)
proto/ voicecat.proto (control-plane wire format, source of truth)
src/ net/ crypto/ codec/ protocol/ session/ audio/ (stubs today)
server/ voicecat-server (headless; links the core)
tools/vccli/ headless test client — drives the protocol from M1 on
clients/ apple/ (Swift, M4) windows/ (C#, M4) — placeholders for now
tests/ CTest targets
License
Permissive-only dependencies (no GPL/LGPL) so the project can be redistributed freely,
including closed-source. Project license: TBD (see docs/tech-stack.md §5).