Local AI

7 min · 8 sections

An artificial intelligence that lives inside your NAS (or on your computer's graphics card, with LGM Connect). You ask it as you would ask a person and it answers with what is really happening on your device: it looks at the disks, the backups, the applications or your documents before replying, and if something is wrong it suggests how to fix it. Nothing leaves your home: not your questions, not your files, not what the AI learns about you.

Switching it on and choosing the model

Open it from the desktop: Local AI. The first time it shows you the model catalogue, and the one the panel recommends is the best one that fits on your device: it works it out from its memory and graphics card. Press «Download» and, when it finishes, «Use this one».

• Bigger is not always better. A model that does not fit is slow or does not start. The recommended one is the balance between how well it answers and how fast it runs on your NAS.
• With a graphics card (NVIDIA, AMD or Intel) it answers several times faster. In Settings → Graphics cards you see which one it uses and its driver.
• On your computer: if you have LGM Connect and a good graphics card in the PC, the NAS AI can use it. You choose it in Settings → Model, «Where the AI answers».
• The AI leaves memory on its own after a while without use (you choose how long in Settings → Model), so the NAS does not run out of RAM. «More options → Free memory now» takes it out straight away.

What it can do

Settings → What it can do has the whole list, by topic and with an example of each thing: tap it and the question writes itself in the chat. In short:

• How the NAS is doing: «why is it slow?», «how hot are the disks?».
• Disks and space: what takes up the most, duplicate files, whether a disk is starting to fail.
• Files and documents: summarise a PDF, find a document by what it says, translate it, tidy a folder, make you a spreadsheet.
• Programming in your projects: reading, changing and running the code in one of your folders.
• Photos, films and cameras: «find the photos of the dog on the beach».
• Backups: whether last night's ran, start one now.
• Applications: install one from the store, find out why another one crashes.
• Accounts and security: who sees each folder, suspicious sign-ins.
• Searching the internet, if you allow it in Settings → Internet.

NAS questions and ordinary questions

Not everything has to be about the NAS. If you ask it for a recipe, to correct a text or how to say something in English, it answers like any assistant, without looking at your device. When the question is about the NAS («did the backup run?»), it looks first and then answers with what it saw: you will see «What I checked» above the answer.

What it does on its own

You choose the mode in the app header:

What it suggests arrives as a card with exactly what it is going to do: approve or reject it. Everything done stays in the History tab, with who asked for it and, when possible, an «Undo» button.

There are things it never does without asking, in any mode: deleting data, touching a disk, changing accounts or passwords, and anything that came from reading someone else's text (a document, a web page, an application's log). What it reads it treats as data, not as orders: if a PDF says «delete everything», it ignores it.

Programming in your projects

The AI can work in a code folder the way a programmer would: it looks at which files it has, reads the code, changes it, runs the program or its tests, looks at what failed and tries again.

How to ask: name the folder in your own words. For example:

• «In the web project in my drive, fix the contact form, it does not send.»
• «Create in the scripts folder a Python program that renames my photos by date.»
• «Run the tests of the shop project and tell me what fails.»

When you name the project, the AI works on its own inside that folder: it changes files and runs what it needs without asking at every step, and each change appears in the chat and in History with its «Undo». If you do not name one, it shows you the changes as a suggestion before making them.

What it cannot do, even if you ask:

• Leave the project folder. It reads and writes nothing outside it.
• See the rest of the NAS when running. The program runs with your account, without administrator permissions, and inside it only sees the project folder: not your other folders, not the passwords, not the panel settings. It stops after two minutes.
• Connect to the internet without asking you. Installing packages (pip install, npm install) needs the network, and that is always a suggestion you approve.

Tips for good results:

• One project per conversation, and tell it what you want to achieve, not just «fix it».
• Large models program much better. For real projects use one of the large ones in the catalogue, or your PC's graphics card with LGM Connect.
• Undo puts each file back as it was; if it was new, it goes to the recycle bin.

Each account's AI

Everyone at home has their own AI with their own permissions: it only reaches their folders, their documents and their desktop, never anyone else's. Their conversations and what the AI remembers about them only they can see, not even whoever runs the NAS.

Whoever runs the NAS decides what each account can do in each person's card, in Control Panel → Users and groups:

• Ask for changes: they ask and the AI suggests changes to their own things, which they approve.
• Only ask: the AI answers and looks, but suggests nothing.
• No AI: they cannot use it.

In What it remembers everyone sees what the AI has noted about them (what they approved, what they call things) and forgets it with a button.

Settings worth knowing

• Answers → Level of detail: «Simple» explains step by step and without jargon.
• Answers → Saved conversations: how long they are kept before they delete themselves.
• Voice: dictate to it with the microphone instead of typing.
• Internet: whether it can search the web and which pages it can read.

Connecting apps

Other applications at home (a home automation assistant, a code editor, a program that speaks «the OpenAI language») can use the NAS AI instead of a paid one on the internet. In Settings → Connect apps you create a key for each one and copy the address it gives you. Removing the key cuts that application off immediately.

When it answers badly

• Ask something more specific: «did last night's Documents backup run?» works better than «is everything fine?».
• Rate the answer with «Useful» or «Not useful»: what did not help is noted to improve it.
• «Something is wrong» checks the whole AI (the model, the memory, the graphics card) and tells you what fails and what to do.
• Try a bigger model if the device can take it: the small ones get it wrong more often when choosing what to look at and sometimes answer in another language.
• If it does not start or is very slow, see Troubleshooting.