cenko.tech

Only works if your username is "user": fixing hardcoded home paths

A voice-control tool hardcoded /home/user in its scripts and systemd unit, so it broke for every other account. $HOME and systemd's %h fixed it.

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opencode-voice adds push-to-talk voice control for the OpenCode CLI on Hyprland/Wayland: hold a key, speak, release. It is a set of shell scripts, a Python transcription daemon and a systemd user service.

The symptom#

Reading the code, I noticed several scripts and the systemd unit pointed at /home/user/.... That only works if your login name is literally user. On any other account:

  • the scripts put a directory that does not exist on PATH,
  • OPENCODE_BIN points at a binary that is not there,
  • the systemd service cannot start, because its ExecStart path does not exist.

I reported it as issue #1. I found it by reading the code, not by running it on a second account, and the issue says so.

The fix#

Shell scripts get the home directory from $HOME, and systemd user units get it from the %h specifier.

# before
export PATH="/home/user/.opencode/bin:/home/user/.local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin"
OPENCODE_BIN="/home/user/.opencode/bin/opencode"

# after
export PATH="$HOME/.opencode/bin:$HOME/.local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin"
OPENCODE_BIN="${OC_VOICE_OPENCODE:-$HOME/.opencode/bin/opencode}"
# opencode-voice.service
# %h expands to the user's home; edit if the repo lives elsewhere.
ExecStart=%h/Projects/opencode-voice/voice-daemon.sh

OC_VOICE_OPENCODE is a new, optional override for people who installed OpenCode somewhere else. The default location is unchanged, and the README mentions the new variable.

Testing, honestly#

I was on Windows, so I could not run the project’s unit tests (they execute the shell scripts directly). What I did check:

  • bash -n on every script and python -m py_compile on the Python files.
  • A dry run as a pretend user: HOME=/home/alice OC_VOICE_DRYRUN=1 bash voice-cmd.sh "open opencode and start working" resolves the binary to /home/alice/.opencode/bin/opencode, and OC_VOICE_OPENCODE=/opt/oc overrides it.
  • grep -rn /home/user over the repository finds nothing.

The pull request listed what was and was not tested, and the maintainer merged it the same day.

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