This project brings back Snowboy Hotword Detection on modern Android devices using Kotlin, Java, and Jetpack Compose.

Snowboy was officially shut down in 2020, making it very hard to implement in today's Android ecosystem. I resolved multiple compatibility issues and successfully integrated Snowboy into a fully working Android app.

• 🎤 Offline hotword detection (.umdl and .pmdl models supported)
• 📱 Built with Kotlin + Java hybrid
• 🖼️ Jetpack Compose UI integration
• ⚙️ Supports arm64-v8a and armeabi-v7a architectures
• 📦 Includes JNI & assets for easy setup
• ✅ Runs on latest Android Studio & SDK

• Languages: Kotlin, Java
• UI Framework: Jetpack Compose
• Native Integration: JNI (.so libraries from Snowboy)
• IDE: Android Studio (Arctic Fox or newer)

Snowkey
└── app
    ├── manifests
    │   └── AndroidManifest.xml
    ├── kotlin+java
    │   └── ai.kitt.snowboy
    │       ├── audio
    │       ├── ui.theme
    │       │   └── AssetHelper.java
    │       ├── Constants
    │       ├── Demo.java
    │       ├── MainActivity.kt
    │       ├── snowboy
    │       ├── SnowboyAppResCopy.java
    │       ├── SnowboyDetect.java
    │       ├── snowboyJNI
    │       └── SnowboyVad.java
    ├── ai.kitt.snowboy (androidTest)
    ├── ai.kitt.snowboy (test)
    ├── assets
    ├── jniLibs
    │   ├── arm64-v8a
    │   └── armeabi-v7a
    ├── res
    │   ├── drawable
    │   ├── layout
    │   ├── mipmap
    │   ├── raw
    │   ├── values
    │   └── xml
    └── Gradle Scripts

git clone https://github.com/ak-123459/SnowKey.git
cd Snowkey

• Open the project in Android Studio
• Let Gradle sync complete

Place .umdl or .pmdl files into:

app/src/main/assets/

Ensure native libs are available inside:

app/src/main/jniLibs/arm64-v8a/
app/src/main/jniLibs/armeabi-v7a/

• Connect a real device (with microphone access)
• Run the project from Android Studio

1. Open the app
2. Allow microphone permission
3. Say the hotword (e.g., "snowboy")
4. Detection logs appear in Logcat
5. Triggered actions are handled in MainActivity.kt

• [✅] Multi-hotword support
• [✅] Integration with Voice Assistants
• [✅] Migration to TensorFlow Lite
• [✅] Background service implementation
• [✅] Custom model training support

• Snowboy by KITT.AI
  (original project, discontinued 2020)
• Community archives for prebuilt .so binaries
• Modern Android integration: this project

This project is for educational & research purposes only.
Snowboy binaries remain under KITT.AI's original licensing.

Akash Prasad Mishra
📧 [email protected]
🔗 LinkedIn | GitHub

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