Inspiration
Christopher Bruce's preserved memory of his father Ivan, known as Pop, captures the humor and personality that ordinary biographical facts can miss. Everyone's Own Echo helps families preserve stories, wisdom, and lessons so future conversations draw on what was actually recorded.
What it does
EOE now combines memory capture and retrieval in one Alexa+ simulation. Alexa is the visible conversational interface, while Arthur guides the interview behind the scenes. A person tells a family memory, receives a contextual follow-up, reviews the read-back, corrects the wording, and explicitly approves a save. The approved account can then be recalled. Read-back permission is separate from save permission; saving does not authorize public sharing. Existing source-attributed Legacy retrieval, topic continuity, and missing-information responses remain available.
How we built it
Codex assisted development using Node.js, JavaScript, HTML, CSS, and browser APIs. A portable deterministic capture engine preserves supplied wording and source attribution, selects limited contextual follow-ups, and manages read-back, corrections, and approval. Private review saves accepted captures in browser-local storage. The public capture recording uses a separate temporary in-memory store and loads only the approved Pop source; it never reads private saved memories. No runtime generative model, native Alexa connection, MCP server, AWS runtime service, production authentication, or cloud EOE synchronization is claimed.
Existing work and hackathon additions
EOE, the Legacy Program, and Arthur existed before the hackathon. Hackathon work adds the simulated Alexa+ pathway, contextual retrieval, attribution, missing-information responses, audience filtering, and tests. The September 22 upgrade adds Memory Capture Mode, correction, explicit approval, local persistence, recall, and an isolated capture recording view. EOE itself was not invented for the hackathon.
Challenges
Interviewing requires separating supplied statements from missing details, corrections, and permission to save. Local rules provide limited contextual guidance but can miss meaning or decline unfamiliar wording. Read-back preserves the user's words instead of generating biography. Draft edits must be reviewed before approval, storage failures must not claim success, and public recording must not expose private captures.
Accomplishments
The updated public video demonstrates capture, a contextual follow-up, read-back, correction, explicit approval, and recall using Chris's approved Pop story. YouTube reports a duration of 2:46. All 22 original tests still pass, with 20 additional tests for capture, storage, routing, and HTTP boundaries. Browser checks verified the complete loop, private recall after reload, and the preserved Pop retrieval behavior. Four owner-supplied Legacy records remain available for private judging; only Pop is approved for the public demo.
What we learned
A useful memory experience needs both a way to preserve an account and a way to revisit it. The person should control the wording and final approval. Public permission must remain separate from private storage, and source attribution should remain visible.
What's next
Broader interview language understanding, retrieval across multiple captured accounts, authenticated family access, cloud backup, production EOE storage, and native Alexa integration. Optional browser voice features remain unverified; the demonstrated workflow uses typed input. Private saved captures belong to the same browser/origin and can be lost if browser data is cleared.
Track and judging setup
Alexa+ simulated-experience route, built with Codex assistance. No AWS or Open Source mini-challenge entry is claimed. The private repository README links the complete v0.3 source archive with setup instructions and all tests. Extract that archive to run the updated capture experience; the root source remains the original v0.2 baseline. The recording session is temporary: New conversation preserves its saved capture, while refreshing clears it.
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