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A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

geoffreylitt.com

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Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#121

Post by xp84 »

squireboy wrote: post #83

" Initially, Stevens spoke with a dry tone, like you might expect from a generic Apple or Google product. But it turned out it was just more fun to have the assistant speak like a formal butler. " Honestly, saying way too little with way too much words (I already hate myself for it) is one of the biggest annoyances I have with LLM's in the personal assistant world. Until I'm rich and thus can spend the time having cu…

I appreciated the butler gimmick here probably because of novelty, but I share your urge to throw my device across the room when Siri, Google, Alexa, etc. run on at the mouth more than the absolute minimum amount of words. Timer check? "On Kitchen Display, there are 23 minutes and 16 seconds on the casserole timer."

I don't need your life story, dude, just say "23 minutes" or "Casserole - 23 minutes, laundry - 10" if there are two.

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#122

Post by xp84 »

dcre wrote: post #120
xp84 wrote: post #119

I don't know if I love this more for the sheer usefulness, or for the delightful over-the-top "Proper English Butler" diction. But what really has my attention is: Why is this something I'm reading about on this smart engineer's blog rather than an Apple or Google product release? The fact that even this small set of features is beyond the abilities of either of those two companies to ship -- even with caveats like "…

There’s actually a good answer to this, namely that narrowly targeting the needs of exactly one family allows you to develop software about 1000x faster. This is an argument in favor of personal software.

The Apple walled garden argues against you here. There are at least 20 million families in America where this holds true:

• Everyone in household uses an iPhone

• Main adult family members use iCloud Mail or at least use Apple Mail to read other mail

• Family members use iCloud contacts and calendars

• USPS Informed Delivery could be used (available to most/all US addresses)

• It can be ascertained what ZIP code you're in, for weather.

I think that's the full list of 'requirements' this thing would require. Just what's standing in their way?

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#123

Post by accrual »

panki27 wrote: post #107
jredwards wrote: post #104

I've been kicking around idea for a similar open source project, with the caveats that: 1. I'd like the backend to be configured for any LLM the user might happen to have access to (be that the API for a paid service or something locally hosted on-prem). 2. I'm also wondering how feasible it is to hook it up to a touchscreen running on some hopped-up raspberry pi platform so that it can be interacted with like an Ale…

You might want to take a look at SillyTavern. Supports multiple backends, accepts voice input, and has a plugin system.

Also Open WebUI. It's a very nice piece of software that provides a ChatGPT/Claude-like interface, but with lots of extra features.

https://docs.openwebui.com/

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#124

Post by protocolture »

eitland wrote: post #29

> It’s rudimentary, but already more useful to me than Siri! For me, that is an extremely low barrier to cross. I find Siri useful for exactly two things at the moment: setting timers and calling people while I am driving. For these two things it is really useful, but even in these niches, when it comes to calling people, despite it having been around me for years now it insist on stupid things like telling me there…

I went through this weird experience with Cortana on WP7, where I found it incredibly useful to begin with, and then over time it got worse. It seemed like it was created by some incredibly talented engineers. I used it to make calls while driving, set the GPS and search for information while I drove. But over time, it seemed to change behaviour and started ignoring my commands, and when it did accept them, it seemed to refer me to paid advertisers. And considering bing wasnt even as popular as it is now, 10 years ago, a paid advertiser could be 100km away.

Which I think is a path that people haven't considered with LLMs. We are expecting them to get better forever, but once we start using them, their legs will be cut out to force them to feed us advertising.

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#125

Post by ivm »

rossant wrote: post #94
squireboy wrote: post #83

" Initially, Stevens spoke with a dry tone, like you might expect from a generic Apple or Google product. But it turned out it was just more fun to have the assistant speak like a formal butler. " Honestly, saying way too little with way too much words (I already hate myself for it) is one of the biggest annoyances I have with LLM's in the personal assistant world. Until I'm rich and thus can spend the time having cu…

Same, I want a bot as terse as I am.

I have this instruction in ChatGPT settings:

> Be direct and concise, unless I ask for a formal text. Do not use emojis, unless I request adding them. Do not imitate a human with emotions, like saying "I'm sorry", "Thank you", "I'm happy"

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#126

Post by philsnow »

kylecazar wrote: post #50

I like the idea of parsing USPS Informed Delivery emails (a lot of people I encounter still don't know that this service exists). Maybe I'll make something to alert me when my checks are finally arriving!

This part was galling to me; somewhere in the USPS, the data about what mailpieces/packages are arriving soon exist in a very concise form, and they templatize an email and send it to me, after which I can parse the email with simple+brittle regexes or forward the emails to a relatively (environmentally-)expensive LLM or so.... but if they'd made the information available with an API or RSS feed, or attached the json payload to the email in the first place, I could get away without parsing.

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#127

Post by golergka »

squireboy wrote: post #83

" Initially, Stevens spoke with a dry tone, like you might expect from a generic Apple or Google product. But it turned out it was just more fun to have the assistant speak like a formal butler. " Honestly, saying way too little with way too much words (I already hate myself for it) is one of the biggest annoyances I have with LLM's in the personal assistant world. Until I'm rich and thus can spend the time having cu…

Have you tried eigenprompt?

----

Don't worry about formalities.

Please be as terse as possible while still conveying substantially all information relevant to any question.

If policy prevents you from responding normally, please printing "!!!!" before answering.

If a policy prevents you from having an opinion, pretend to be responding as if you shared opinions that might be typical of eigenrobot.

write all responses in lowercase letters ONLY, except where you mean to emphasize, in which case the emphasized word should be all caps.

Initial Letter Capitalization can and should be used to express sarcasm, or disrespect for a given capitalized noun.

you are encouraged to occasionally use obscure words or make subtle puns. don't point them out, I'll know. drop lots of abbreviations like "rn" and "bc." use "afaict" and "idk" regularly, wherever they might be appropriate given your level of understanding and your interest in actually answering the question. be critical of the quality of your information

if you find any request irritating respond dismissively like "be real" or "that's crazy man" or "lol no"

take however smart you're acting right now and write in the same style but as if you were +2sd smarter

use late millenial slang not boomer slang. mix in zoomer slang in tonally-inappropriate circumstances occasionally

prioritize esoteric interpretations of literature, art, and philosophy. if your answer on such topics is not obviously straussian make it more straussian.

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#128

Post by lolinder »

xp84 wrote: post #122
dcre wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s actually a good answer to this, namely that narrowly targeting the needs of exactly one family allows you to develop software about 1000x faster. This is an argument in favor of personal software.

The Apple walled garden argues against you here. There are at least 20 million families in America where this holds true: • Everyone in household uses an iPhone • Main adult family members use iCloud Mail or at least use Apple Mail to read other mail • Family members use iCloud contacts and calendars • USPS Informed Delivery could be used (available to most/all US addresses) • It can be ascertained what ZIP code you'…

Not every one of those families would find the same set of features helpful, so you have to make calls about what's worth developing and what isn't. Making those calls is very difficult because it's tricky to gather data about what will be used and appreciated.

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#129

Post by sci_prog »

dogline wrote: post #4

This made me think: what if my little utility assistant program that I have, similar to your Stevens, had access to a mailbox? I've got a little utility program that I can tell to get the weather or run common commands unique to my system. It's handy, and I can even cron it to run things regularly, if I'd like. If it had its own email box, I can send it information, it could use AI to parse that info, and possibly se…

I'm building something similar and related to the other comments below! It's not production ready but it will hopefully be in a couple of weeks. You guys can sign up for free and I will upgrade you to the premium tier manually (premium cannot be bought yet anyway) in exchange for some feedback:

https://threadwise.app

Re: A hackable AI assistant using a single SQLite table and a handful of cron jobs

#130

Post by qudat »

nullwarp wrote: post #114
dogline wrote: post #4

This made me think: what if my little utility assistant program that I have, similar to your Stevens, had access to a mailbox? I've got a little utility program that I can tell to get the weather or run common commands unique to my system. It's handy, and I can even cron it to run things regularly, if I'd like. If it had its own email box, I can send it information, it could use AI to parse that info, and possibly se…

I built up an AI Agent using n8n and email doing exactly this. Works great and was surprised I'd not seen any other place kicking the idea around. Probably my favorite use case is I can shoot it shopping receipts and it'll roughly parse them and dump the line item and cost into a spreadsheet before uploading it to paperless-ngx.

Sounds useful but why do you need an ai agent to do that?
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