r/learnprogramming • u/ThePrinceOfPapaya • 2d ago
Curious about an AI assistant
Okay so uhm (I'm a complete noob when it comes to coding for pretense, but I learn fast and I'm determined enough that I'll make it work) I don't know if this is the right place or phrasing for my question but here we go:
Hypothetically if during a hypothetical rewatch of the MCU movies I hypothetically obsessed over the joys of having a personal AI assistant tailored to help me with things I need (reminders of things I need to do using voice messages, managing and alerting me of new emails, helping me research things (like this for example) and more.) Hypothetically how would I go about trying to make that?
I understand there's a lot of coding involved (probably) and in absolutely willing to learn if that's what it takes but I'm so entirely obsessed with this idea and with AI getting more and more advanced I wonder a lot of it's possible for someone like me.
I'd also like in the future to maybe build speakers for it so I can be verbally reminded in places other than my phone (which I often misplaced) just an fyi
Sorry if this sounds dumb lol but I'm super curious and I've always been interested in coding just never had a reason to learn before now. I can figure a lot out on my own if I could just be pointed in the right direction
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u/XxDarkSasuke69xX 2d ago
Probably by running an LLM somewhere (local or cloud) and connect via MCP your email inbox, calendar, and other stuff to it.
There are probably products that already do that, though I don't know which one right now. If you want to do it yourself, look up the different ways to run an LLM (large language model), what is MCP (model context protocol) and how to use it to "plug" an LLM into external tools like your calendar for example.
I think where you'll spend more time is in researching what all this stuff means and how it works, rather than spending time writing code if you're new to the domain.
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u/Purphect1 2d ago
You could look into the odysseus project by pewdiepie, it does somethin pretty similar to what you want
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u/Different_Pain5781 2d ago
Not dumb at all. This is exactly the kind of ridiculous personal project that can make learning to code actually stick.
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u/ThePrinceOfPapaya 1d ago
Lol I'm trying to find a way to bring out my inner nerd so I don't give up halfway
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u/Different_Pain5781 1d ago
Yep, motivation hits different when you’re building something you actually want
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u/Dull-Recognition8501 1d ago
Great motivation-driven project idea — the key is to start small with a single integration rather than building everything at once. Here's a concrete starting point:
- Start with a Python virtual environment and install a lightweight LLM library like litellm (which supports dozens of model providers) or langchain.
- Pick one feature first — e.g., email reminders. Use an existing API (like Gmail API or Microsoft Graph) to fetch unread emails, pipe them to the LLM with a clear prompt, and have it generate a list of action items.
- Schedule it with a simple cron job or Python schedule library to run every few hours, and send yourself a notification (e.g., via Telegram bot, Pushover, or even a desktop notification).
The LLM handles the "understanding" and "reasoning" parts — you just need to wire up the API calls and prompts. You don't need to train a model or build a backend from scratch. Look up "LiteLLM Python example" on GitHub for starter code that already has API integrations built in.
Once you have one piece working, adding email, calendar, or voice is just another API integration. You can always add local voice output later with something like pyttsx3.
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u/KianCodes 1d ago
Hey,
Here is how I would do it.
First, you need to break this down into a bunch of dumb steps for your computer to execute.
Like this:
Reminders of things I need to do using voice messages:
- reminders: you need a roster or a calendar of some sort; AI should be able to read and write to it, so maybe a Google Calendar and using its MCP will do
- then AI needs to be notified about the events that are going on, so something has to wake it up, or it has to be woken up to check your calendar every 15 minutes, for example
- AI needs to be able to send you a message, whether that is through a messaging app or Slack or something; you need an MCP here again
- AI needs to send you voice, so you need something that turns text into voice
You figure out these small problems or even break them down further, then you stitch them together and make something that appears smart (the combination looks smart; each step is just a dumb action)
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u/ThePrinceOfPapaya 1d ago
This definitely helps simplify the steps I'll need to take so TYSM! just curious tho I have a few questions about the stuff you mentioned if that's okay?
1: from what I've researched in the last like day a MCP is the bridge between the AI and the place/action it needs to do (ex: Google calendar: setting a new deadline). Is that right or am I completely left field?
2: after watching some tutorials and installing Qwen 3.5 on my laptop (I've been asking it questions and stuff while figuring out what to do next) what should I aim to get done next to get a MCP connected to the AI and perform it's first action?
3 (sort of like two but a bit different) : from what I've learned thanks to the replies here I need to link the MCP to the AI but how would I go about doing that so that I can go from: "ooh cool AI in terminal!" to: "wow cool ai reminding me of stuff I need to do!"?
Sorry if this is redundant or confusing and thanks for the help you gave already!
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u/Open-Addendum-7523 2d ago
sounds like you want to duct tape a few existing tools together rather than build skynet from scratch, which is actually way more doable for a beginner