# Project Notes

*Maintained by Hermes — last updated June 2025*

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## 1. Kandinsky (Multimodal Transformer)
- **Repo:** https://github.com/samherring99/kandinsky
- **Local path:** `~/Desktop/Projects/kandinsky`
- **Description:** An anything-to-anything transformer combining text, image, and audio modalities. Trains on Pokemon BLIP captions paired with Gen 1 Pokemon audio cries. Uses audio tokenization adapted from nanoGPT.
- **Status:** Early POC. Training code exists (`model.py`) and dataset creation (`create_dataset.py`) works. Audio heads are producing the same sound — unclear if it's a training issue or data issue.
- **TODO:**
  - Debug why audio heads produce identical output
  - Investigate if model needs more training time
  - Design a data pipeline for better/more training data
  - General repo cleanup (requirements.txt, proper CLI, etc.)

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## 2. NightwingGameSim (LLM → GameBoy ROM Generator)
- **Repo:** https://github.com/samherring99/NightwingGameSim
- **Local path:** `~/Desktop/Projects/NightwingGameSim`
- **Description:** AI-powered pipeline that turns natural language prompts into playable GameBoy ROM files. Generates C code, compiles with GBDK, outputs `.gb` files. Supports Claude API, local Llama, and RAG backends.
- **Status:** Functional — generation pipeline works end-to-end with Claude 4 system prompt. Has tests, docs, examples, and retry logic.
- **TODO:**
  - Harden the repo, clean up structure
  - Build a better testing pipeline
  - Come up with better prompt ideas / examples

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## 3. ContentBasedMIR (Music Information Retrieval)
- **Repo:** https://github.com/samherring99/ContentBasedMIR
- **Local path:** `~/Desktop/Projects/ContentBasedMIR`
- **Description:** Music similarity analysis using Spotify API track data. Extracts 54 audio features per song and visualizes similarity matrices for music recommendation.
- **Status:** Early stage. Can download Spotify track analysis data and plot similarity matrices. Needs significant expansion.
- **TODO:**
  - Expand analysis pipeline with more features
  - Integrate with text message data for personalized recommendations
  - Build out visualization and exploration tools
  - General modernization (dependencies, structure)

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## 4. MessageRetrieval (iMessage RAG/SQL)
- **Repo:** https://github.com/samherring99/MessageRetrieval
- **Local path:** `~/Desktop/Projects/MessageRetrieval`
- **Description:** Natural language querying over iMessage data using SQL generation (text2SQL) instead of vector embeddings. Uses LLM-as-Judge pattern for scoring and ranking retrieved messages.
- **Status:** Has initial text2SQL pipeline and summarization tool. Recently worked on with Claude Code. Needs testing.
- **TODO:**
  - Test out the recent Claude Code work
  - Build "iMessage Jarvis" — answer questions about texts
  - Improve SQL generation prompts and accuracy
  - Better error handling and UX

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## 5. Grailed Embedding Search
- **Repo:** https://github.com/samherring99/grailed-embedding-search
- **Local path:** `~/Desktop/Projects/grailed-embedding-search`
- **Description:** Semantic similarity search over Grailed fashion listings using CLIP embeddings and FAISS. Search by image URL or text description to find visually similar products.
- **Status:** Functional core pipeline. CLIP ViT-B/32 embeds product cover photos into 512-dim vectors, indexed with FAISS cosine similarity. Has CLI, batch embedding, persistent index save/load, and logging.
- **Recent work (June 2025):**
  - PR #1 — Initial cleanup: docstrings, type hints, `.gitignore`, `requirements.txt`, README rewrite
  - PR #2 — Feature improvements: persistent FAISS save/load, batch embedding, CLI (`cli.py`), proper logging throughout, lazy Grailed client, `fetch_details` toggle
- **TODO:**
  - Embedding cache (avoid re-embedding known product URLs)
  - Async/threaded image downloads for faster batch indexing
  - Search result visualization (matplotlib grid of cover photos)
  - Filter by category, designer, price range before search
  - Web UI (Gradio or Streamlit)

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## 6. NightwingNBA (Sports Analytics)
- **Repo:** https://github.com/samherring99/NightwingNBA
- **Local path:** `~/Desktop/Projects/NightwingNBA`
- **Description:** NBA game prediction system. Builds a database of game data, trains a PyTorch model, and makes daily predictions. Has full pipeline: build DB → write data → train → predict.
- **Status:** Functional pipeline exists. Has database building, training, prediction, and daily update scripts.
- **TODO:**
  - Explore and potentially revive
  - Update data sources if stale
  - Improve model accuracy
  - Add visualization/reporting

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## 7. Stable Audio Sample Explorer
- **Repo:** https://github.com/samherring99/stable-audio-sample-explorer
- **Local path:** `~/Desktop/Projects/stable-audio-sample-explorer`
- **Description:** Tool for exploring audio samples generated by Stable Audio.
- **Status:** 🪦 **Dead** — no active work needed per Sam.

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## 8. NightwingArt (Art Tools)
- **Repo:** https://github.com/samherring99/NightwingArt
- **Local path:** `~/Desktop/Projects/NightwingArt`
- **Description:** Collection of art tooling scripts — video editing, clip splicing with beat matching, damage effects, and general image manipulation.
- **Status:** Maintenance mode. Tools exist for various effects. Work happens as-needed.
- **TODO:**
  - Add tools as needed for new art projects

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## 9. Claude-based VST Building ⚠️ *Needs new repo*
- **Description:** Generate VST audio plugins for DAWs from English language prompts. LLM-powered audio plugin creation.
- **Status:** Concept only — no repo exists yet.
- **TODO:**
  - Create repo
  - Research VST SDK / JUCE framework
  - Design prompt → code → compile pipeline

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## 10. Government Auction Site Scraper ⚠️ *Needs new repo*
- **Description:** Tool that monitors and scrapes government auction sites in San Francisco for deals.
- **Status:** Concept only — no repo exists yet.
- **TODO:**
  - Create repo
  - Research SF government auction sites and their structure
  - Build scraper + notification system

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## Priority Assessment

| Project | Activity Level | Suggested Priority |
|---------|---------------|-------------------|
| NightwingGameSim | Active | 🔴 High |
| MessageRetrieval | Active | 🔴 High |
| Kandinsky | Active | 🟡 Medium |
| ContentBasedMIR | Exploratory | 🟡 Medium |
| Grailed Embedding Search | Early | 🟡 Medium |
| NightwingNBA | Dormant | 🟢 Low |
| NightwingArt | As-needed | 🟢 Low |
| VST Builder | Concept | 🔵 Future |
| Gov Auction Scraper | Concept | 🔵 Future |
| Stable Audio Explorer | Dead | ⚫ None |



