Observer AI: Your Local Monitoring Assistant

What Is Observer AI?

Observer AI is an open-source, local-first AI agent that watches your screen, camera, and audio and takes action when something happens. It runs on local models, so your data stays 100% private. The project is built by Roy Medina and is licensed under AGPLv3.

The agent works on a simple “When X then Y” principle. For example: when my training crashes, call me; when I’m out of the queue, SMS me; when I get distracted, WhatsApp me; when my Steam game downloads, Telegram me; when my overnight render fails, call me; when I haven’t made progress, WhatsApp me; when an appointment is available, send me a WhatsApp; when an item is back in stock, send me a Telegram.

Observer AI can be used through a web app (no install) at app.observer-ai.com, a desktop app for macOS, Windows, or Linux (recommended, ships with llama.cpp), or by bringing your own server with any OpenAI-compatible endpoint such as Ollama, llama.cpp, or vLLM.

How It Works for Small Businesses

For small-business owners, Observer AI replaces endless manual checks and missed notifications. Imagine a boutique clothing shop that gets an instant WhatsApp alert the moment a new shipment is logged in the inventory system, or a small print shop that receives a phone call the moment a large print job fails. Everything stays private and on-premise.

Each micro-agent runs in a loop: Sensors → Model → Code. Sensors include $SCREEN (screenshot for multimodal models), $CAMERA (camera frame), $MEMORY (stored text), $CLIPBOARD (clipboard contents), $MICROPHONE (microphone transcription), $SCREEN_AUDIO (transcription of a shared tab’s audio), and $ALL_AUDIO (mic and screen audio mixed, good for meetings). Audio is transcribed with Whisper via transformers.js.

The agent can send notifications through Discord, Telegram, WhatsApp, SMS, Email, Phone calls, or Pushover. It can also perform browser notifications, local sounds, video recording, and mobile app actions like locking the phone.

Key Features for Business Automation

Observer AI provides a variety of tools for memory and agents: getMemory, setMemory, appendMemory, getImageMemory, setImageMemory, appendImageMemory, startAgent, stopAgent, time, and sleep. These allow you to store and retrieve information across monitoring sessions.

For notifications, the agent supports sendDiscord, sendTelegram, sendEmail, sendPushover, call, sendWhatsapp, sendSms, and notify. Some channels (SMS, call, WhatsApp) require whitelisting. The agent also supports video recording with startClip, stopClip, markClip, and getVideo.

Decision models are available that don’t write text but answer typed questions with probabilities. You can ask yes/no questions or multiple questions at once using JSON prompts. This is useful for detecting specific conditions like “Is there a person in the room?” or “Which pet is visible?”

Privacy and Local-First Design

Observer AI is designed to be privacy-first. It runs entirely on your device, so your data never touches external servers. The desktop app ships with llama.cpp, so it runs any GGUF+mmproj model. You can also connect to local models via Ollama, llama.cpp, or vLLM.

The project is open-source under AGPLv3, meaning you can inspect, modify, and self-host the code. The GitHub repository has 1,800+ stars and 153 forks, indicating active community interest. The project also has a Discord community and a subreddit r/ObserverAI for sharing agents, asking questions, and reporting bugs.

Getting Started

To get started, you can use the web app with no installation at app.observer-ai.com and download a model to run it in your browser. For a more robust experience, download the desktop app for macOS, Windows, or Linux. It ships with llama.cpp, so it runs any GGUF+mmproj model.

If you have your own server, you can set a Custom Model Server URL to any OpenAI-compatible endpoint. Then describe what you want Observer to watch, or build an agent yourself from the Micro Agents tab. The CLI tool is also available: run ‘observe sleep 5’ and Observer calls you when the command exits.

Observer AI is built by Roy Medina and is available on GitHub at github.com/Roy3838/Observer. The project is licensed under AGPLv3 and is free to use, modify, and distribute.

Takeaways

• Observer AI is an open-source, local-first AI agent that monitors screen, camera, and audio and triggers actions when conditions are met.
• It runs entirely on your device, keeping your data 100% private and secure.
• Small businesses can automate monitoring tasks like inventory updates, job failures, and appointment availability without manual checks.