# Getting Started With Talon

## Talon Overview
Talon aims to bring programming, realtime video gaming, command line, and full desktop computer proficiency to people who have limited or no use of their hands, and vastly improve productivity and wow-factor of anyone who can use a computer.

- System requirements:
    - Windows 8 or newer
    - macOS High Sierra (10.13) or newer
    - Linux / X11 (Ubuntu 18.04+, and most modern distros if you switch to an X11 session). Wayland compositors lack the APIs necessary for Talon and Wayland support is not planned.
- Powerful voice control - Talon comes with a free speech recognition engine, and it is also compatible with Dragon with no additional setup.
- Multiple algorithms for eye tracking mouse control (depends on a single Tobii 4C, Tobii 5 or equivalent eye tracker)
- Noise recognition system (pop and hiss). Many more noises coming soon.
- Scriptable with Python 3 (via embedded CPython, no need to install or configure Python on your host system).
- Talon is very modular and adaptable - you can use eye tracking without speech recognition, or vice versa.


## Setup

1. Download and install [Talon](https://talonvoice.com) for your operating system.
2. Run the Talon app.
3. Talon will guide you through setup process.

## Where to Find Things in Talon
### The Talon Menu
You can open the Talon menu when Talon is running by clicking the Talon icon. 

![A picture of the Talon Logo](../TalonLogo.png)

The location of the icon depends on your operating system.
- macOS: you can find the icon on the top of the screen in the menubar. If you have too many apps with menubar icons, the Talon icon may not be visible.
- Windows: you can find the Talon icon in the tray icons by clicking an upward pointing arrow in the bottom right of the screen. 
- Linux: This will depend on your distro.

Features available in the menu include: the ability to quit Talon, turning speech recognition on and off, picking the speech engine, and picking the microphone.

### Talon Home Directory
The Talon home directory has your Talon related files. You can open the Talon home directory from the Talon menu by clicking `Scripting` and then the first option from the top of the `Scripting` menu. The text will depend on your operating system but will start with `Open `.

If you choose to save recordings through the Talon menu, you can find them in the `recordings` subdirectory.

Talon configuration files go in the `user` subdirectory. This will include all of your voice commands and any custom scripts. 


## Where to Go for More Information
### Voice Command Sets
You can find more information on voice_control [here](../voice_control/learning_voice_control.md). 

You can find more information on the community maintained voice command set Community in the [community maintained wiki](https://talon.wiki) and in the [Community README](https://github.com/talonhub/community/blob/main/README.md).