🎓 CMUGPT (Nova Demo)

Because ChatGPT was taken, and we're from CMU, so... yeah.

A full-stack multimodal AI chat application with MCP (Model Context Protocol) support. Built with FastAPI, React, and enough caffeine to power a small data center.

---

🔐 Security Achievement Unlocked

🏆 ZERO API KEYS WERE HARMED (OR PUSHED) IN THE MAKING OF THIS REPOSITORY

That's right. Not a single API key. No OPENROUTER_API_KEY="sk-live-oops" anywhere in the git history. No secret tokens embedded in the code like digital Easter eggs of shame. We use .env files like civilized developers.

"But how do we know?" — You can grep this entire repo and find nothing but responsible environment variable usage. We're basically the security equivalent of parallel parking on the first try.

# What you WON'T find in our git history:
git log -p | grep -i "api_key\|secret\|password" 
# Returns: Nothing. Nada. Zilch. 🎉

---

🏗️ Architecture

┌─────────────────┐     ┌─────────────────┐     ┌─────────────────┐
│    Frontend     │────▶│     Backend     │────▶│    OpenRouter   │
│  React + Vite   │     │     FastAPI     │     │   (The AI bit)  │
│   Port 3000     │     │    Port 8001    │     │                 │
└─────────────────┘     └────────┬────────┘     └─────────────────┘
                                 │
                                 ▼
                        ┌─────────────────┐
                        │   MCP Servers   │
                        │ (Tool Calling)  │
                        └─────────────────┘

It's not microservices, it's "appropriately-sized services."

---

🚀 Features

• 🖼️ Multimodal Support — Send images, PDFs, audio. We accept all forms of digital communication except fax (we're not that retro).
• 🔄 Streaming Responses — Watch the AI think in real-time. It's like watching someone type, but smarter.
• 🛠️ MCP Integration — Model Context Protocol support for tool calling. Your AI can now use tools, which is either exciting or terrifying depending on your perspective.
• 🔐 Clerk Authentication — Because not everyone should have access to your AI (especially your ex).
• 💅 TailwindCSS + Liquid Glass UI — So pretty it hurts. Your retinas will thank us.
• ⚡ TanStack Query & Router — State management that doesn't make you question your career choices.

---

📁 Project Structure

cmugpt/
├── 🔙 backend/           # FastAPI backend (the brains)
│   ├── routers/          # API routes (chat, MCP)
│   ├── services/         # Business logic (where the magic happens)
│   └── models/           # Pydantic schemas (type safety go brrrr)
│
├── 🎨 frontend/          # React frontend (the beauty)
│   ├── src/
│   │   ├── components/   # UI components
│   │   ├── hooks/        # Custom hooks (useEverything)
│   │   ├── routes/       # TanStack Router pages
│   │   └── utils/        # Helper functions
│   └── public/           # Static assets
│
└── 🚀 modal/             # Modal deployment scripts
    └── (GPU goes brrr)   # For when you want to self-host LLMs

---

🏃 Getting Started

Prerequisites

• Node.js ≥ 18 (because we're not animals)
• Python ≥ 3.13 (living on the edge)
• uv — The fast Python package manager that makes pip feel like dial-up internet

Backend Setup

cd backend

# Install dependencies (faster than you can say "dependency hell")
uv sync

# Activate the virtual environment
source .venv/bin/activate

# Create your .env file (WHERE YOU PUT YOUR API KEYS, NOT IN GIT)
echo "OPENROUTER_API_KEY=your-key-here" > .env

# Run the server
uvicorn app:app --reload --host 0.0.0.0 --port 8001

Frontend Setup

cd frontend

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Create your .env file
echo "VITE_API_URL=http://localhost:8001" > .env

# Run the dev server
npm run dev

Now open http://localhost:3000 and prepare to be amazed (or at least mildly impressed).

---

🔧 Environment Variables

Backend (.env)

Variable	Description	Pushed to Git?
OPENROUTER_API_KEY	Your OpenRouter API key	ABSOLUTELY NOT 🚫

Frontend (.env)

Variable	Description	Pushed to Git?
VITE_API_URL	Backend API URL	Nope
VITE_CLERK_PUBLISHABLE_KEY	Clerk public key	Still no

Notice a pattern? Good. You're learning.

---

🤖 Supported Models

We use OpenRouter, which means you get access to:

• GPT-4o (when you want to burn money elegantly)
• Claude 3.5 Sonnet (the eloquent one)
• Llama 3.3 70B (open source supremacy)
• And many more (seriously, there are so many)

---

🛠️ MCP (Model Context Protocol)

This app supports MCP servers for tool calling.

Configure your MCP servers in backend/services/mcp_servers.json:

{
  "your_server": {
    "url": "https://your-mcp-server.example.com/mcp"
  }
}

---

🐳 Docker

Both frontend and backend come with Dockerfiles, because we believe in containerizing our problems:

# Backend
cd backend && docker build -t cmugpt-backend .

# Frontend  
cd frontend && docker build -t cmugpt-frontend .

---

🧪 Testing

# Frontend tests
cd frontend && npm run test

# Backend tests
cd backend && pytest  # (after you write them 👀)

---

Built with ❤️ and an unhealthy amount of screen time

Remember: Friends don't let friends push API keys to public repos.