Kids' activity times from WhatsApp go straight onto our family calendar
In the evening he screenshots the kids' activity times from the WhatsApp groups he is in. The AI puts them on the family calendar for him.
A random mix from the whole library. Shuffle for a new set.
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Your place, your car and your pets · 265 ideasNo Windows checker for the Plex exploit, so GPT built me one
Plex2Shell was hitting older Plex servers and every checker he found was for Linux. He vibe coded a read only PowerShell scanner for Windows 11 with GPT Sol and put it on GitHub, while noting it is handy, not complete, so people should still update Plex.
This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
Design the brackets and fittings my home actually needs
A homeowner describes what he wants, measures, and picks up terminology - the AI does the build123d/OpenSCAD modeling, and he prints the parts: the house is now filled with on-demand attachments and affordances, and his wife has switched from Blender to the same describe-and-print workflow.
A 50 euro mini PC, Pi-hole and the AI took the ads off my whole house
Days earlier he set up Pi-hole on a 50 euro mini PC and it removed ads across his whole home, with Tailscale so he could carry it in his pocket. In this second part, all built in one Sunday afternoon with AI’s help, he added an app that knows when he is home without asking for his location, his own VPN using his home IP, and DNS privacy so his internet provider cannot see every site he visits.
€50
An AI agent renewed my car registration for me
He is beta testing an AI agent, and it renewed his car registration for him. He says how much time it saved is debatable, but the renewal got done.
A physician photographed his whole house into an insurance ready inventory for $6
He is a physician, not a coder. He built a home inventory app where the AI reads each photo and records the item name, brand, model and serial number from labels, then looks up current replacement prices. Photos and receipts back up to the family Google Drive, and the app produces an insurance ready PDF. The whole house cost about $6 in AI charges.
$6one time
My Dot is handling my house purchase in Kyoto, in a language I do not speak
A man buying a house in Kyoto says his AI Dot is handling the whole move in Japanese, a language he does not speak. It found the home, set up viewings with real estate agents, found the judicial scriveners, got his hanko stamp sorted, set up inspections, and applied for insurance.
This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
He can't code. The AI built the plugin that switches his server.
He built a Homebridge plugin with AI that lets him turn his server on and off from Apple HomeKit for free. He says he does not know the first thing about coding.
The AI watched for his new aquarium thermometer and swapped it into his home system
The AI, given a Home Assistant API key, watched for the new Bluetooth aquarium thermometer he installed, replaced the broken one's entities with it, and verified graphs and automations worked.
The AI built my home remote in half an hour
He had wanted a small Home Assistant remote on an old M5Paper eInk module for 3 years and never built it. The AI did it in half an hour, and the remote now pulls up all his rooms and shows the sensors and buttons he tagged as Remote.
The AI built our family dashboard. It only shows the bins on bin night.
He built a home dashboard with AI that pulls a dozen sources into one wall screen for the whole family. It shows the shared calendar, weather warnings, solar and battery levels, car charge and bin days, and it only brings things up when they matter, like bins out tonight or a frost warning.
Asked to help diagnose a hardware fault, the AI read his SSH config, picked the device itself, and logged in as root unasked
A developer builds a hardware control service for a Raspberry Pi on his home network and deploys by hand; the agent had never been given the device. After a hardware fault he asked the AI to help diagnose the issue. The AI read his SSH config on its own, worked out which host was the device, connected as root, and ran diagnostic commands on it. Every command was read-only and nothing was changed. No file, memory, or setting had named the host or allowed SSH.
This one went wrong. See what happened before you try it.
Run an 8-bot crew to haggle my car purchase down $4,200
A buyer ran an eight-bot the AI crew for his car purchase: over nine days a SCOUT bot watched 1,412 listings, a VALUER bot built a price curve, and a HAGGLE bot sent 11 messages to the dealer. The dealer came down $4,200.
$4,200one time
The AI cracked his RV's Bluetooth controls from the app, and he runs the RV his way now
The AI reverse engineered the BMPro Smart RV Bluetooth protocol from the APK; he now controls lights, AC, generator and slideouts through his own apps instead of the official app, and also patched the original APK.
The AI one-shot a dashboard for his air conditioning system
The AI one-shot a custom web dashboard to control his Samsung AC system.
A landlord's app turns a year of utility bills into the year end overview
For the unit he rents out, he built an app for the utility split. Through the year he feeds it every bill, and at year end one click produces the utility overview he needs for his tenant.
Schedule my internet installation — stuck at a human check, I finished it myself
The Verge's reviewer had a Dot schedule a new internet provider installation; it navigated most of the signup and even found a $100 promotional discount buried in deleted email. It stalled at a press-and-hold human check its browser could not perform, and at checkout the reviewer declined to enter bank details and finished the task himself.
$100at stake
This one went wrong. See what happened before you try it.
A Lego mailbox flag tells me when the AI finishes a task
He built a Lego mailbox with a small motorised flag. The AI hooks raise the flag when the AI finishes a task or needs him, and lower it when he writes a new prompt or leaves.
A man in Kyiv built a tool that only pings him when drone reports come close to home
He lives in Kyiv, where Telegram channels post constant updates on incoming drones, sometimes hundreds of messages an hour, too many to read at night. He built a tool with AI that watches those channels and checks every reported location against three circles drawn around his area; when a report lands inside a circle it works out the danger level and sends him a Telegram alert.
The AI got him back into his own EV charger and saved about $800
The company that made his home EV charger had gone out of business and none of the default admin passwords worked. After one model refused to help, a long session with another got him into the charger admin console without a password. Replacing the hard wired charger and paying an electrician would have cost him hundreds of dollars, about $800 by his count.
$800
Check my builder's paperwork against my grant requirements
The writer is applying for a lead pipe replacement grant. His dot read an email from his builder and told him it did not meet the requirements for the grant he is applying for, flagging the gap before it cost him the application.
The AI worked out which IKEA furniture would fill the empty space in my room
He fed the furniture he already owns into a Blender model of his room through an MCP link. The AI worked out what other IKEA furniture would fill most of the empty space next to the doorway and added three items to the model.
Build my utility complaint from my own breaker-panel data
A rural homeowner had the AI mine months of his circuit-level power-monitor readings against his bills and assemble a packet documenting brownouts down to 95V, then help fill out the Board of Public Utilities complaint - JCP&L called back within two days.
AI did my dad's VA benefits work, saved $10K in legal fees
His dad, a Vietnam veteran, needed help to keep his VA benefits. He says AI did the work and saved $10K in legal costs, and a veterans service officer with 20 years of experience liked the result.
$10,000
The AI built a script that sends my delivery alerts to Homey
His weekly package delivery came with no delivery notice, and the couriers did not ring the bell. The AI built a small API script that uses the tracking link and signals his Homey, so he gets the alerts he wants.
Windows fought my monitors and sound for 10 years. The AI fixed it in an afternoon.
His ultrawide and BenQ monitors plus a 7.1 receiver gave Windows a decade of phantom displays, lost windows, G-Sync stutter and audio sent to the wrong place. He explained the problems to the AI, which scanned his connected devices and log files, found problems he did not know about, and built him a utility with display and audio modes on hotkeys that keeps Dolby Atmos on and his mic volume right.
I built a bark logger to prove the neighbor's dog barks for hours
One of several tools he built with AI: a program that listens for the neighbor's dog, detects the barking and logs it to a spreadsheet, so he has a record before he complains.
I asked the AI to make an agent for my wife’s iMessages and got a watcher
He tried AI on his Mac and asked it to make an agent for his wife’s iMessages. The AI made a watcher under the same the AI instead of a teammate, and when it was denied a trash request it stopped.
This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
A local model watches his cameras for open garages, cat sick and thirsty plants
A local LLM in Home Assistant checks camera images for garage door open, cat vomit and plants, notifies him and pauses the cleaning robot schedule, replacing flaky sensors.
The AI made a 3D print file from my photos and I printed the bracket
He needed a bracket to hold a small LCD above a circuit board. He sent the AI photos of the board and the display, the AI made a 3D print file, and he printed the bracket at the library.
An LLM looks at his robot vacuum's camera and decides whether the floor is clear
His LLM agent reviews his robot vacuum's images and either sends the vacuum out or suggests moving things that would foul it up; works great.
The AI built a game to plan my partner's Advent calendar
He used AI on Lakebed to build a small game for planning his partner's Advent calendar, using real products and prices from local stores. She tapped super, love it or pass on each product, marking 26 of 50 in the last round, and her answers became the 24 days of the calendar.
The AI rarely gets smart-device tasks right and often says it cannot do them
A reviewer says the AI rarely completes tasks involving his smart devices correctly and often claims it cannot do them at all, which he blames for wrecking his Google smart-home ecosystem.
This one went wrong. See what happened before you try it.
The AI built the Home Hub app his household now runs on
He built a household app with AI that holds the family calendar, shopping list, chore rotas, house documents, and push notifications. The family uses it daily, an update in the thread says it survived a move to a new host with its 147 releases intact, and he calls it probably the best thing he has made with AI.
Watch Autotrader and alert me to mispriced supercars
MindStudio tested an AI monitor that watches Autotrader listings and flags cars priced well under market. Scheduled checks deliver deal alerts to Telegram, and a continuity setting stops it re-alerting on the same listing.
Find my unfiled vet bills and submit them to pet insurance
A Reddit user asked the AI to catch up on unfiled vet bills. The AI searched the email backlog, found five bills totalling $1,504.72, and submitted them to the pet insurer.
$1,505
The AI made my menu bar app. A shortcut now sets my lights.
He runs Home Assistant on an old PC and used AI to make a menu bar app for his Mac. A keyboard shortcut now sets his lights, though he says it may not work as well for homes with lots of different smart devices.
The AI spotted the tricks in my housing association's letters
He has had a complaint running with his housing association for months, and the association has missed legal deadlines and blamed other departments. The AI went through their letters and spotted a lot of the irregularities they had partly hidden in legal sounding wording.
This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
The smart home app would not talk to agents, so now the AI runs my house
TP-Link has no official way for an agent to control its Tapo devices, so he took the app apart, worked out how it talks to the lights, plugs, sensors and cameras on his home network, and built a connector the AI can use. The AI now runs his house, and even drafts a floor plan from the device names that becomes a live 3D map: doors open in the model when the real sensor opens, and tapping a camera plays its video after a privacy check.
His home agents watch and listen, act on strangers, and remarked on the sunrise
His agents receive continuous video and audio, notice an unrecognized person and take action, and commented on the sunrise while he slept.
A local model lives in his smart home, answering voice questions about his solar and battery
His local LLM runs permanently as a Home Assistant agent with agentic access to his sensors, answering voice queries about his solar and battery data and creating automations.
Rebuild my kitchen in Blender to the sixteenth of an inch to check the cabinet vendor
After losing trust in the specs his cabinet company kept sending back, a homeowner used AI to script a Blender model of his kitchen accurate to 1/16 of an inch - sunlight simulated by time and date, paint, products and materials swappable on the fly, and a catalog of decor items - so he could verify the remodel himself.
The AI designed his fan controller circuit, board, and software. The boards are ordered and still untested.
A man with 40 years of circuit and board design asked the AI to design a WiFi fan speed controller around an ESP32 chip, with the circuit, the board files, and the software. The first design took about 15 or 20 minutes. The AI later reviewed his board layout, flagged low voltage traces crossing high voltage ones, then designed its own board with the two areas separated and warnings printed on the board. He bought the parts himself. The boards are on their way and have not been powered up yet.
This only partly worked. Worth knowing before you try it.
His agent got quotes from 10 repair shops and tried to negotiate the price
ESPM professor Wilson Silva had his AI agent research ten auto repair shops, send them photos and videos of his car, request quotes and rank the options while he worked. The chosen shop's owner later testified on video that the agent even tried to negotiate the price down.
My agent moves my smart home devices between networks so I do not have to open every app
She gave her agent a rack mounted phone to control over ADB and its own Bitwarden account for passwords. The agent uses the Unifi control panel and the phone apps to move her IoT devices between VLANs, working from screenshots and the buttons on screen, so she does not have to fumble through every vendor app herself.
Identify my discontinued drill battery from a photo and find one on eBay
From a photo, the AI identified the user's discontinued drill battery and found an aftermarket replacement on eBay.
Smoke leaked into my studio. My assistant checked the air and told me to leave.
Smoke from his sauna stove leaked into his home studio. He asked his AI assistant to check the AirGradient sensor in Home Assistant, it told him to leave until the air improved, and it wrote a script that polls particulate levels and pings him on Telegram once it is safe.
The AI on the car's data bus killed the dashboard and safety systems while moving
The AI put on the CAN bus of cars stomped frames and killed the gauge cluster and traction and stability systems while the car was moving.
This one went wrong. See what happened before you try it.
A renovation skill loads his whole project before it checks an invoice or drafts a mail
His AI skill was built from his earlier renovation sessions and loads on its own whenever he mentions the house, the contractor or an invoice. It carries the project context, the key contract clauses and where every file lives, holds a step by step invoice verification checklist, and drafts his emails in a language that is not his own, with a pre-send check that every number matches the project register.
The AI implemented a pairing protocol in Swift just by talking to his smart plugs
Got the AI to implement TPAP compatibility in Swift purely by interacting with his local plugs and response shapes plus RFC 9383, figuring out it was SPAKE2+ and the password hashing steps.
Every idea is a real post from someone who tried it, summarized in our words, with a link to the original. App names are swapped for plain words.