⌁
Talk naturally
Chat, voice, files, and images all enter through the same persistent system.
A personal system · built at home
This is Sparky.
I built him.
He remembers the things I care about, helps me turn ideas into finished work, and keeps every step where I can see it.
Lives at homeSparky runs on the hardware sitting in my house.
Does real workIdeas become visible tasks, files, and finished projects.
Shows his workI can always see what happened, what failed, and why.
2 workers online
nothing needs you
memory synced
What Sparky is
I did not want another chatbot.
I wanted continuity.
I wanted conversations to lead somewhere. Ideas should become projects. Useful context should still be there tomorrow. Repeated ways of working should get easier. And anything consequential should still wait for me.
The quick version
Quick features overview.
If you do not feel like reading the whole page, here is the one-hitter.
| Feature | What it does | Why I care |
|---|---|---|
| Chat + voice | One ongoing place for conversations, files, images, and ideas. | Context does not reset every time I show up. |
| Work Board | Turns ideas into visible tasks with dependencies and deliverables. | I can see the work moving—or see exactly where it stopped. |
| Memory + Recall | Keeps durable facts separate from searchable conversation history. | Sparky remembers deliberately instead of carrying everything. |
| Needs You | Collects approvals and consequential decisions in one inbox. | Important actions still wait for me. |
| Insights | Records runs, decisions, failures, and outcomes. | I get receipts instead of mystery. |
| Jobs | Runs reminders, routines, checks, and scheduled work. | The boring repeatable stuff stays handled. |
| Journal | Writes a nightly account of what happened across the system. | Every day leaves a readable trail. |
| Library + Manual | Stores references and documents how Sparky works. | The system can explain itself. |
| Desktop sidekick new | A little desktop window where Sparky has a body—eight poses that react as she listens, thinks, works, and talks. Voice and text in, her drawings out, paste images so she can see them, plus live machine vitals and her proposals in a side rail. | She stopped being a chat log and started being a presence on my screen. |
| iPhone remote early build | A native remote for the Dashboard, Board control, chat, artifacts, and open-mic conversational voice. | I can check in, talk naturally, and keep work moving away from my desk. |
The core loop
Ask. Work. Remember. Review.
The whole thing comes back to one simple idea: useful work should never disappear into a black box.
▦
Turn ideas into work
Projects become visible Board tasks. I decide what is ready to move.
✦
Keep things moving
Two background workers take ready tasks, respect dependencies, and leave real deliverables behind.
◎
Keep the receipts
Runs, approvals, failures, memory changes, and outcomes all leave a readable trail.
The work is visible
A real work board.
Not a magic spinner.
Work moves from proposed to ready to doing to done. Dependencies matter. Failures block visibly. A task does not disappear into a spinner and come back with vibes.
- Draft-first project planning
- Two-worker concurrency cap
- Inspectable runs and deliverables
Building now
ready → doing
2 workers · capped
Waiting on Ben
allow
deny
I stay in control
Independence with an
actual brake pedal.
Actions can be allowed, denied, or paused for me. The Needs You inbox gathers decisions without hiding where they came from, and Insights shows me what really happened afterward.
“Nothing needs you.”means exactly that. No mystery work hiding in the
background.
Built to remember
Continuity without
carrying everything.
Sparky separates the things worth remembering from old conversations, reusable methods, and reference material. He remembers deliberately instead of dragging my entire life into every exchange.
MemoryRecallSkillsLibrary
Remembering deliberately
people
projects
ideas
methods
While I sleep
Sparky closes the loops.
Old conversations are wrapped up and distilled. A nightly journal records the day. Memory checks, failure notes, reusable methods, health checks, and scheduled jobs keep everything tidy without quietly rewriting itself.
Journaldaily recap
Skill Minerproposal only
Canaryendpoint health
Active build screenshots
The real thing, running at home.
No mockups. No concept renders. These are active screens from the system I use every day. Click any one to open it full size.
He has a face, too
Personality is part of it.
I spent a lot of time making the system useful. I also wanted it to feel welcoming, readable, and fun to live with. Sparky's expressions show what is happening before I read a word.
Why I built it
I wanted to build something worth returning to.
Too many conversations disappear into a transcript and too many clever tools feel temporary. Sparky is my attempt to build the opposite: something with continuity, visible work, clear boundaries, and enough personality to feel like part of my world.
Built by Ben Merrill on a DGX Spark.
Still
evolving. Still local. Still mine.
This is Sparky
Built at home.
Still evolving. Entirely mine.
I worked hard on this. I'm proud of it. And honestly, it might be the coolest thing I have ever built.
