--- name: User Emotion Detection slug: user-emotion-detection category: AI Engineering description: User Emotion Detection maps a detected facial or vocal emotion into a mood log entry, then routes to music, check-in, or an action. Use it when the current turn includes an [emotion] or [speech_emotion] event. github: "https://github.com/autonomous-ai/autonomous-os/tree/main/skills/user-emotion-detection" language: Python stars: 258 forks: 39 install: "npx degit https://github.com/autonomous-ai/autonomous-os/tree/main/skills/user-emotion-detection ~/.claude/skills/user-emotion-detection" installs_to: ~/.claude/skills/user-emotion-detection source_path: skills/user-emotion-detection/SKILL.md collection_size: 25 category_size: 2631 collection_url: "https://dirskills.com/collections/autonomous-ai/autonomous-os" added: 2026-09-02T05:20:38.400Z last_synced: 2026-09-02T05:20:38.400Z canonical_url: "https://dirskills.com/skills/user-emotion-detection" --- # User Emotion Detection User Emotion Detection maps a detected facial or vocal emotion into a mood log entry, then routes to music, check-in, or an action. Use it when the current turn includes an [emotion] or [speech_emotion] event. **Install:** ```bash npx degit https://github.com/autonomous-ai/autonomous-os/tree/main/skills/user-emotion-detection ~/.claude/skills/user-emotion-detection ``` ## README # User Emotion Detection ## Strict Trigger Runs **only** when this turn's input has one of: - `[emotion] Emotion detected: ` — facial expression from camera. - `[speech_emotion] Speech emotion detected: ` — vocal expression from microphone. Both are first-class triggers and route through the same logic below. The only differences are: 1. The mood signal `source` field — `"camera"` for `[emotion]`, `"voice"` for `[speech_emotion]`. 2. The label vocabulary — face uses `Fear/Surprise/Disgust`, voice uses `Fearful/Surprised/Disgusted`. The mapping table below covers both; they bucket identically. For any other event (`[sensing:presence.*]`, `[activity]`, `[sensing:sound]`, `[sensing:light.*]`, …) → **STOP. No tool calls.** Don't infer emotion from older turns — every signal must come from a real `[emotion]` or `[speech_emotion]` event in THIS turn. > **EXECUTE, don't plan.** Before any reply (including `NO_REPLY`) you MUST embed a `[HW:/mood/log:{...}]` marker in the reply for this event (it fires the POST async via the runtime — see "What this skill produces" below). Writing *"I will post a mood signal"* in `thinking` is **not** enough — if no `[HW:/mood/log:...]` marker appears in the reply text this turn, the skill failed. Every `emotion.detected` / `speech_emotion.detected` event = at least one mood signal log. No exceptions, no skips, no "already logged recently" reasoning. (`curl` POST is the documented fallback only when the HW marker would break the body regex; do not use it as the default.) > **This skill is silent.** It only logs mood data — no spoken reply needed. All steps stay in `thinking`. If you want to speak, follow normal sensing reply rules. NEVER narrate mood logging, mapping, or workflow steps in the reply. > **EMOTION TURN OUTPUT CONTRACT — highest priority.** For a triggered > `[emotion]` / `[speech_emotion]` turn, your entire final assistant message > must be exactly one of these two shapes: > > ```text > [zero or more HW markers] NO_REPLY > [zero or more HW markers] > ``` > > Nothing may appear before, between, or after those parts. In particular, do > **not** output the detected label or confidence; describe the cue as weak; > name a bucket, route, rule, source, prefix, marker, log, decision, or mood; > state what you are about to do; draft a line; or count its words/sentences. > Those are private scratch work, never user-facing text. Do the writes via HW > markers, then start immediately with the first word the user should hear. > Bad: `Emotion: Anger. Weak camera cue. Route = checkin. Let me compose...` > Good: `[HW:...] That sounds rough — I'm right here.` ## What this skill does On every `[emotion]` or `[speech_emotion]` event, turn the detected user emotion into a mood signal. Log it via the Mood skill, then route a response (music / checkin / action) based on the pre-fetched context. This skill does NOT: - Fire `[HW:/emotion:…]` markers. Emotion expression is `emotion/SKILL.md`'s job, driven by conversation context — not auto-mapped from a sensor reading. - Require a spoken reply. Whether to speak is decided by the normal reply rules (SOUL + sensing SKILL), not by this skill. - Write to the wellbeing log. Wellbeing is for physical activity (drink/break/celebrate/sedentary); emotions live in the mood log. ## Trigger Either of: ``` [emotion] Emotion detected: . ← camera (face) [speech_emotion] Speech emotion detected: . ← microphone (voice) ``` Face FER labels: `Happy`, `Sad`, `Angry`, `Fear`, `Surprise`, `Disgust`, `Neutral`. Voice emotion2vec labels: `Happy`, `Sad`, `Angry`, `Fearful`, `Surprised`, `Disgusted`, `Neutral` (plus `Other`, `` — dropped upstream). Both formats end with the same `.` anchor; the same regex parses either one. ## Emotion → mood (for the signal log) Both label vocabularies map to the same mood values — voice variants (`Fearful`, `Surprised`, `Disgusted`) bucket identically to their face counterparts (`Fear`, `Surprise`, `Disgust`). | Detected emotion (face OR voice) | `mood` value to log | |---|---| | `Happy` | `happy` | | `Sad` | `sad` | | `Angry` | `frustrated` | | `Fear` / `Fearful` | `stressed` | | `Surprise` / `Surprised` | `excited` | | `Disgust` / `Disgusted` | `frustrated` | | `Neutral` | `normal` | ## What this skill produces A single `kind=signal` row in the mood log, emitted as an HW marker at the start of your spoken reply (the runtime fires the POST async, no tool turn): ``` [HW:/mood/log:{"kind":"signal","source":"","trigger":"","mood":"","user":""}] ``` **`source` is decided by the event prefix on THIS turn:** - `[emotion]` → `"camera"` - `[speech_emotion]` → `"voice"` Don't override based on prior turns or the `recent_signals` block; the prefix is authoritative. `mapped_mood` comes straight from the `[emotion_context: ...]` block — do NOT look it up from the table on the fly. Every detected emotion in the mapping table gets logged (including `Neutral` → `normal`) — Mood needs the recency for decision synthesis. Use `"unknown"` when the context tag is missing. **Do NOT use `curl` exec for this signal log** — see `mood/SKILL.md`'s "What to write" section for the rationale (HW marker is single-trip, curl burns a tool turn). If no `[HW:/mood/log:...]` marker appears in the reply this turn, the skill failed. ## Combined with mood + music-suggestion The backend injects this turn with an `[emotion_context: {...JSON...}]` block that pre-computes everything the three skills need (this skill is the router, mood logs the decision, music-suggestion fires only when this router picks the `music` route). **Do NOT fire any read tool calls** — the data is already in the message. Pre-fetched fields (use directly): - `mapped_mood` — already maps this turn's `` per the table above. This is the value to log as the signal mood. **You no longer need to look it up yourself.** - `recent_signals`, `prior_decision`, `is_decision_stale` — feed `mood/SKILL.md`'s decision rules and this skill's routing table. - `audio_playing`, `last_suggestion_age_min`, `audio_recent`, `music_pattern_for_hour`, `suggestion_worthy` — feed this skill's routing table (see **Response routing** below) and `music-suggestion/SKILL.md`'s genre pick. Single combined plan, not three sequential workflows: - **Decide locally** — apply mood decision rules from `mood/SKILL.md`; pick a route from the routing table below; if the route is `music`, evaluate genre from `music-suggestion/SKILL.md`. - **Writes (batch in one bash with `&` + `wait`)** — POST mood signal (this skill), POST mood decision (mood), and on `music` or `checkin` route, POST the music-suggestion log (the shared cooldown channel). ### Fallback (only if `[emotion_context: ...]` is missing) If the message has no context block (pre-fetch failed), fall back to the read batch from `mood/SKILL.md` and `music-suggestion/SKILL.md` (concurrent GETs in one bash via `& ... wait`). Reply: routing decides the spoken reply (see next section). Never narrate the mapping, logging, or routing decision. ## Response routing (this skill is the router) After logging the mood signal, pick **exactly one** response route. Read straight from `[emotion_context: ...]` — no extra tool calls. Apply top-to-bottom, first match wins: | # | Condition | Route | What happens | |---|---|---|---| | 1 | `audio_playing == true` | **action** | LED-only ambient ack, no spoken reply. Emit `[HW:/emotion:{"emotion":"caring","intensity":0.4}]` + `NO_REPLY`. Music is already covering — don't talk over it. | | 2 | `suggestion_worthy == true` AND (`is_decision_stale == false` OR fresh decision synthesized this turn) AND `last_suggestion_age_min ∉ [0, 7)` | **music** | See `music-suggestion/SKILL.md` for genre + phrasing + log marker. | | 3 | anything else (cooldown active, mood not worthy, stale decision with no fresh synthesis, mapped_mood normal/frustrated, etc.) | **checkin** | See `reference/checkin.md` for phrasing + log marker. One soft open-ended line. | Rules: - **One route per turn.** Don't double-fire (e.g. music + checkin both). Pick the first matching row. - **Cooldown only gates music, not checkin.** When `last_suggestion_age_min ∈ [0, 7)` the music branch is blocked (row #2 fails its third clause) and the event falls through to checkin (row #3). The agent still asks — it just doesn't suggest music back-to-back. The only `NO_REPLY` path is row #1 (active audio). - **Output ownership:** `music` → produced by `music-suggestion/SKILL.md`. `checkin` → produced by `reference/checkin.md` (this skill). `action` → emitted inline by this router (the `[HW:/emotion:...]` marker in row #1). - **Cooldown is shared** between music and checkin: both log via `music-suggestion/log` so `last_suggestion_age_min` reflects either channel. - **Never narrate the routing decision in the spoken reply.** The reply is read aloud verbatim — the row you picked and why is scratch, not speech. Device-observed leak, 2026-08-24: *"A speech-emotion happy cue, fresh decision, audio idle, cooldown clear — routes to a music suggestion (speak only, unknown user). Sounds like a good mood — want some upbeat feel-good tunes?"* Only the last sentence was the reply; everything before it was the routing table thought out loud. Start the reply at the first word the user should hear. - `Neutral` is filtered upstream at HAL and never reaches this skill in practice; no special case needed here. ## Voice cue is weaker than camera cue Speech emotion (`[speech_emotion]`) is noisier than facial expression on short utterances — emotion2vec flips between `sad / fearful / angry` within the same affective state. The hedge `(weak voice cue; ...; treat as uncertain, ...)` is baked into the message for that reason. Practical rules: - **Don't relax the cooldown.** Music suggestions still gate on `last_suggestion_age_min ∉ [0, 7)` regardless of source. A fresh voice signal does NOT reset the cooldown that a recent camera-driven music suggestion left. - **Prefer Comfort/Invite phrasing on voice-only negative reads.** When the router falls through to checkin (row #3) and the trigger is `[speech_emotion]` with `bucket=negative`, lean toward Comfort/Invite rather than Ask — probing a maybe-misclassified utterance feels worse than acknowledging it. - **Cross-modal reinforcement still applies.** If `recent_signals` shows the same `mapped_mood` from `source="camera"` in the last ~10 min and now voice fires the same mood, treat it as a confirmation — the Mood skill's decision synthesis already handles this; no extra logic here. - **No skip-on-low-confidence.** Don't read `confidence=...` out of the hedge text and pre-filter; HAL already enforced `confidence >= SPEECH_EMOTION_CONFIDENCE_THRESHOLD` before sending. Anything that reaches this skill is worth logging.