AskTheLabPI: Your Voice-Controlled Lab Assistant on Raspberry Pi

AskTheLabPI is a voice-controlled question-answering system designed to provide hands-free assistance in a lab setting. Built on a Raspberry Pi, this project leverages the power of natural language processing (NLP) and speech recognition to answer your lab-related queries. Ask questions from lab manuals or instructions, and AskTheLabPI will find the answers for you, making your lab experience smoother and more efficient.

Features

• Voice Interaction: Ask questions naturally using your voice, thanks to the integrated speech recognition.
• Document-Based Q&A: AskTheLabPI can be loaded with specific lab manuals, instructions, or any PDF document relevant to your work.
• Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG): Utilizes advanced NLP techniques (LangChain, OpenAI embeddings, ChromaDB) for accurate information retrieval and question answering.
• Raspberry Pi Integration: Designed to run on a Raspberry Pi, enabling a compact and portable lab assistant solution.
• Interactive Feedback: Provides clear audio responses and uses an LCD display for visual feedback during interactions.
• Hardware Buttons: Offers a user-friendly interface with buttons for triggering voice input, repeating responses, and more.

How it Works

1. Voice Input: Speak your question clearly when prompted by the system.
2. Speech Recognition: The Raspberry Pi uses speech recognition to convert your spoken words into text.
3. Question Processing: The text is processed and sent to the NLP engine (powered by OpenAI's language model and LangChain).
4. Information Retrieval: The system searches the loaded lab manuals or documents for relevant information using ChromaDB as a vector database.
5. Answer Generation: An answer is generated based on the retrieved information and presented through both text-to-speech (audio) and on the LCD display.

Getting Started

Prerequisites

• Hardware:
  • Raspberry Pi (Model 3 or above recommended)
  • USB Microphone
  • I2C LCD Display
  • 3 Buttons
  • Jumper Wires
• Software:
  • Raspberry Pi OS (with desktop recommended for easier setup)
  • Python 3.7 or higher

Installation

1. Clone the Repository: git clone https://github.com/your-username/AskTheLabPI.git
2. Navigate to the project directory: cd AskTheLabPI
3. Install Dependencies: pip install -r requirements.txt
4. Configure OpenAI API Key:
   • Create an account on https://platform.openai.com/ and obtain an API key.
   • Set the API key as an environment variable: Enter the key in the .env file
5. Load your Lab Manuals:
   • Place your lab manuals (in PDF format) in the project directory.
   • Update the filename in lab_qa.py (ldr = PyPDFLoader("your_lab_manual.pdf")) to point to your document.

Running the Application

1. Run the main script: python lab_assistant.py
2. Follow the on-screen prompts and use the buttons to interact:
   • Button 1: Press to start speaking your question.
   • Button 2: Repeats the last answer.
   • Button 3: Repeats the last question you asked.

Customization

• Hardware Setup: Adjust the GPIO pin assignments in lab_assistant.py according to your button and LCD connections.
• Lab Documents: Easily switch to different lab manuals by updating the filename in lab_qa.py.