The harder problem isn't the software - that's solvable to a degree by most of us on this thread - it's the hardware. Alexa et al. are packed full of hardware t

The harder problem isn't the software - that's solvable to a degree by most of us on this thread - it's the hardware. Alexa et al. are packed full of hardware tweaks such as array based far-field microphones which can determine where the voice commands are coming from, and isolate them from background noise and their own audio output. Then there's the built-in proprietary Alexa/Google-home support in a lot of consumer goods as well. There's hardware widgets that you can get to effectively rebuild Alexa type hardware with an off the shelf SBC, but I think I'm on the ball here when I say most people don't want to do that, and/or don't have the hardware skills either. Personally, I live fine without a voice controlled home assistant. I am however able bodied, and I can press buttons and flick switches without much thought. If that were to change, then yeah, I can see a need for these things, but they really need to be able to work offline with no internet connection should you wish have them configured like that.