From e7fa532bc63bb7a6511c15de8105118568b7289a Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Peter Steinberger <steipete@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 8 Mar 2026 13:51:57 +0000
Subject: [PATCH] fix: land mac talk-mode taskHint (#38445) (thanks @dmiv)

---
 .secrets.baseline                                  |  4 ++--
 CHANGELOG.md                                       |  1 +
 apps/macos/Sources/OpenClaw/TalkModeRuntime.swift  | 11 ++++++++---
 .../TalkModeRuntimeSpeechTests.swift               | 14 ++++++++++++++
 4 files changed, 25 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-)
 create mode 100644 apps/macos/Tests/OpenClawIPCTests/TalkModeRuntimeSpeechTests.swift

diff --git a/.secrets.baseline b/.secrets.baseline
index 2e441d46085..675827f0b00 100644
--- a/.secrets.baseline
+++ b/.secrets.baseline
@@ -11481,7 +11481,7 @@
         "filename": "src/agents/models-config.e2e-harness.ts",
         "hashed_secret": "7cf31e8b6cda49f70c31f1f25af05d46f924142d",
         "is_verified": false,
-        "line_number": 130
+        "line_number": 131
       }
     ],
     "src/agents/models-config.fills-missing-provider-apikey-from-env-var.e2e.test.ts": [
@@ -13034,5 +13034,5 @@
       }
     ]
   },
-  "generated_at": "2026-03-08T05:05:36Z"
+  "generated_at": "2026-03-08T13:49:29Z"
 }
diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 8ed3a3077a9..3ab145db819 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -14,6 +14,7 @@ Docs: https://docs.openclaw.ai
 - Mattermost replies: keep `root_id` pinned to the existing thread root when an agent replies inside a thread, while still using reply-target threading for top-level posts. (#27744) thanks @hnykda.
 - Agents/failover: detect Amazon Bedrock `Too many tokens per day` quota errors as rate limits across fallback, cron retry, and memory embeddings while keeping context-window `too many tokens per request` errors out of the rate-limit lane. (#39377) Thanks @gambletan.
 - Android/Play distribution: remove self-update, background location, `screen.record`, and background mic capture from the Android app, narrow the foreground service to `dataSync` only, and clean up the legacy `location.enabledMode=always` preference migration. (#39660) Thanks @obviyus.
+- macOS Talk Mode: set the speech recognition request `taskHint` to `.dictation` for mic capture, and add regression coverage for the request defaults. (#38445) Thanks @dmiv.
 
 ## 2026.3.7
 
diff --git a/apps/macos/Sources/OpenClaw/TalkModeRuntime.swift b/apps/macos/Sources/OpenClaw/TalkModeRuntime.swift
index a8d8008c653..77fffcd811b 100644
--- a/apps/macos/Sources/OpenClaw/TalkModeRuntime.swift
+++ b/apps/macos/Sources/OpenClaw/TalkModeRuntime.swift
@@ -70,6 +70,11 @@ actor TalkModeRuntime {
     private let minSpeechRMS: Double = 1e-3
     private let speechBoostFactor: Double = 6.0
 
+    static func configureRecognitionRequest(_ request: SFSpeechAudioBufferRecognitionRequest) {
+        request.shouldReportPartialResults = true
+        request.taskHint = .dictation
+    }
+
     // MARK: - Lifecycle
 
     func setEnabled(_ enabled: Bool) async {
@@ -176,9 +181,9 @@ actor TalkModeRuntime {
             return
         }
 
-        self.recognitionRequest = SFSpeechAudioBufferRecognitionRequest()
-        self.recognitionRequest?.shouldReportPartialResults = true
-        guard let request = self.recognitionRequest else { return }
+        let request = SFSpeechAudioBufferRecognitionRequest()
+        Self.configureRecognitionRequest(request)
+        self.recognitionRequest = request
 
         if self.audioEngine == nil {
             self.audioEngine = AVAudioEngine()
diff --git a/apps/macos/Tests/OpenClawIPCTests/TalkModeRuntimeSpeechTests.swift b/apps/macos/Tests/OpenClawIPCTests/TalkModeRuntimeSpeechTests.swift
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..c72749daba4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/apps/macos/Tests/OpenClawIPCTests/TalkModeRuntimeSpeechTests.swift
@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+import Speech
+import Testing
+@testable import OpenClaw
+
+struct TalkModeRuntimeSpeechTests {
+    @Test func `speech request uses dictation defaults`() {
+        let request = SFSpeechAudioBufferRecognitionRequest()
+
+        TalkModeRuntime.configureRecognitionRequest(request)
+
+        #expect(request.shouldReportPartialResults)
+        #expect(request.taskHint == .dictation)
+    }
+}