Subject: bug#79070: [PATCH] Fix macOS dictation post NSTextInputClient migration in v30

From: Gerd Möllmann <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2025 15:22:24 +0200

Eli Zaretskii <[email-masked]> writes:

>> Ok to install, Eli?
>
> Maybe.  I'm not sure I understand what are the conclusions from your
> experience, which eventually needed to use tcutil.  Are we sure this
> is just a fluke and not a more fundamental problem?

tccutil is a program that removes entries from a database containing
application-specific privacy settings. For example, if an app wants to
use the microphone or camera and such, it has to ask for permission, and
the result of that lands in that TCC database. 'tcc reset' clears such
entries.

It's very possible that I denied Emacs access to the microphone in the
past because I routinely do that :-). Also to the camera, of course, and
such things. That may have been years ago, because I migrate my settings
from machine to machine for a very long time. And if so, it would have
been for a different dictation system because that whole thing changed
some years ago, around macOS 14, not sure.

Anyway, the current dictation system apparently doesn't require special
privacy privileges, i.e. macOS doesn't ask for permission to use the
microphone for the current incarnation of dictation. But dictation also
doesn't work if one has "deny settings" in the TCC database. After
clearing these entries in with `tccutil reset`, Emacs now works like any
other app.

So it seems at least. That's about what I can say.