Version:            (using KDE 4.3.3)
Installed from:    I Don't Know

Project K.I.I.M
This is an idea of mine I've been thinking about for quite a while, the more I think about it, the more I like it.

{{{{Remember, this an idea only, there is NO work to implement this as of yet. I'm hoping people would be interested in it and help me work on it}}}}


Meet Kiim, or rather, KDE's Intelligent Information Manager. (K.I.I.M)

Kiim is (or rather, will be) an intelligent agent. To specify; a natural language front-end between the computer, you and your information.

Take Kontact, a hub around other tools; Kmail, Kopete, Akregator and other personal information tools. Imagine Kiim doing a very similar task. Tasks are added by telling her about them.

What would this mean?


It would mean, in the end, a system that talks to you; gives you the news, alerts and even possibly reads out emails. Can talk with someone when your away through Kopete, reminds you of appointments...makes appointments for you (example through Kopete;
Jack: Hey Dan, I'm going to the bowling alley in 20 minutes, wanna come?
When I come back, Kiim tells me Jack's message, depending on how much I 'trust' Jack, Kiim could make this an appointment. Also possible would be Kiim creating tasks based on what was said through email/IM)

The above example is quite simple; keywords are a Natural Language Processor's best friend, in this case, such keywords are;

Going/Bowling/20 minutes/?


Who would it serve?

Just about everyone! :D
The idea here is to get your computer working alongside you instead of you working within it.



Whats more, it could monitor system health, manage the installation of applications, play media, manage the computer...all through natural language. Imagine that!

What's more, it could perform face recognition to log you in. (god knows there are plenty of resources online that can be freely used)

It could use festival to speak.

Put it in context for me.


As I am apt to do as a writer, let's stare into the crystal ball here...

You get up, aching and groaning. You turn your computer on. The system boots up. The camera turns on;

"Good morning, John. Today is the 14th of May. You have 11 new messages, two from your Mother. Do not forget that in six hours you have an appointment with the Dentist."

You read the messages, replying to a few from friends and family.

"How long until the appointment?" you ask Kiim.

"Six hours, twenty seven minutes, John."

"Give me directions to it" (Home's current position has been given to Kiim)

"Here is a map and a list of directions. Estimated time of journey; 8 minutes" (In this case, Kiim assembled data about the local services, gathered from online services, such as Google Maps. The map and directions, as well as the estimated travel time, are also gathered via the same route)

"Please print it."

"As you wish...I have printed it" (The pause there was indicative of Kiim getting feedback from the printer saying it had finished it's task)
---------------------------------
7 Hours later
---------------------------------
"Good evening, John. I trust you went to your Dentist appointment?"

"I did" (Kiim marks it off as 'completed') "but I've been given another one at midday this Saturday" (Kiim creates a new task, and knows it is another Dentist appointment by the eariler conversation)

"Very well. I shall alert you when it is time."
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"Kiim, I fancy listening to MUSE, can you put some on, please?" (Kiim goes through the music library, finds MUSE and starts it, with the most played tracks first)

15 minutes later...

(music dips in volume, Kiim speaks) "John, there is an email from Kate, concerning photos. Shall I bring it up?"

"Yes Please"

(John reads through the email and notes that Kate wants a copy of the photos of their recent camping trip)

"Kiim, please send a copy of all photos with the tags 'Kate' and 'Camping' from the last three weeks to Kate."

"It is done" (Kiim went through the photos, found pictures (she knew they were pictures due to the extensions) tagged 'Kate' and 'Camping' and sent them to a contact named Kate in the address book.
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"Kiim, bring up the document I was working on yesterday."
(Kiim looks for documents with the creation date of yesterday)

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"Kiim, send all my documents from yesterday to the disk" ("The Disk" is taken to mean the most recently inserted USB Drive, Kiim looks for any documents that were modified/created yesterday)

"Done."

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"Kiim, translate this to Russian and send it Luba"

"....Translation done, sending....sent."

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"God, I hate my brother..."

"Why do you hate your brother?"

(Kiim calls upon a clone of ELIZA to do the talking Tongue 2)

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There is a lot more that can be done.

Umm...well, that made for interesting reading, but...why?

Kiim has a lot of potential, and as our world expands, we must find ways to automate tasks, keep our lives fairly simple and make sense out of more and more and MORE data. Kiim would be the groundbase for it.

Such a project has never been attempted before in the history of FOSS, or even in the history of proprietary software. It's a massive undertaking, I agree. Thanks to the world of FOSS, a good deal of work is not needed. We're not going to be building from scratch, mainly just linking things toghter under a (code-wise, rather simple) interface.

I can do a lot of things, I know a lot about AI tech and I can assist. But I need developers. I would LOVE it if developers think this is a really good idea and start to think about it. AI is rather lacking in the one place it would be most useful; the desktop. I want to change that, but I need people of whatever skill level. I want to help make KDE a great thing. I want to make Linux available to everyone.

As stated elsewhere, this would NOT need to be built from scratch. Most of it would just be linking it together.



But...surely the desktop as it stands could do all that?

The Desktop metaphor as it stands does not easily lend itself to automation. This is to create an interface that can be used by anyone, as long as they know how to type, it can be used by them. Also consider the practical benefits this would have to the disabled. It also comes to mind that this interface would not be out of place in a Home Automation system, or a touch-screen or gesture-based system. A future proof interface, basically put.


Well....maybe your on to something, got any specs?

I'm still in the process of writing them. Contact me through here, or through the PM system if you wish to discuss it further.

PS; I have spent the whole day writing and rewriting this post for clarity. If you've read all the way down here, thanks :)

Any and all feedback appreciated.



This feature request was originally submitted through KDE Brainstorm, and has been submitted to Bugzilla due to popular demand. Original idea: http://forum.kde.org/brainstorm.php?mode=idea&i=61978