In a world where this is useful, you aren't going to be spending your precious battery on running an LLM...
layer8 20 minutes ago [-]
No need for a battery, you just need someone to hit the pedals on that dynamo.
desireco42 1 hours ago [-]
Solar cells work no matter what, I agree that maybe less processing is more useful but LLM is uniqely useful as well
qingcharles 1 hours ago [-]
This is not true for me. I would want an LLM after the apocalypse. I'd become like the Wizard of Oz, the all-knowing oracle.
Yokohiii 2 hours ago [-]
I like the idea of an LLM that acts as a public knowledge base. But that doomsday framing on the site is pretty annoying.
waynerisner 1 hours ago [-]
I think there’s a difference between doomsday framing and preparedness.
Offline access and local models aren’t about assuming collapse—they’re about treating knowledge as infrastructure instead of something implicitly guaranteed.
That feels more like resilience than pessimism.
adsharma 2 hours ago [-]
This is not just a random idea.
AlexNet -> Tansformers -> ChatGPT -> Claude Code -> Small LMs serving KBs
Large LLMs could have a role in efficiently producing such KBs.
russellbeattie 42 minutes ago [-]
Doomsday may not be the end of the world, but simply living in a country where you're being unjustifiably bombed by a foreign government lead by a delusional sociopath, and so access to information sources becomes limited.
DoctorOetker 4 minutes ago [-]
What Gulf state do you live in? UAE?
cstaszak 29 minutes ago [-]
I'm a fan of "civilization in a box" kinds of projects. However the ZIM file format leaves a lot to be desired in 2026. I've been exploring a refreshed, alternative approach: https://github.com/stazelabs/oza
I do think having an LLM as an optional "sidecar" is a useful approach. If you can run a meaningful Ollama instance alongside your content, great!
iandanforth 2 hours ago [-]
I like this idea! I don't need the LLM bits, and want it to run on an old Android tablet I have lying around. Can anyone recommend similar software where I can get wikipedia / street maps / useful tutorial videos nicely packaged for offline use?
entropie 1 hours ago [-]
A friend made this years ago. I never used it but the idea is awesome.
Anyone thought about using a Steam Deck with this? Or explored the concept of a "Nomad Deck"?
wds 2 hours ago [-]
Not sure how good of an idea a Steam Deck would be for this. If you can't access Wikipedia, I imagine a replacement for its unprotected glass screen would be harder to come by if you drop it.
JanisIO 12 minutes ago [-]
True, but I always give my devices a protective glass and put them in rugged armor. Broken screens never been a problem for me..
c0balt 4 hours ago [-]
It might be an interesting idea given that the Steam Deck has reasonable amount of RAM/GPU. The main issue for a knowledge base might be the lack of a physical keyboard though.
mhitza 2 hours ago [-]
It has built in microphones though.
itintheory 39 minutes ago [-]
Why does it have to have AI? Ugh.
layer8 28 minutes ago [-]
You can use Kiwix, OpenStreetMap and Kolibri as an AI-free equivalent. Adding AI to those is exactly the differentiator of this project.
pstuart 23 minutes ago [-]
I get the hate on AI for many reasons (hype, resource greediness, threat to civilization, etc), but having a local LLM that could help guide and reason about the data within seems like a win, especially if it's optional.
WillAdams 4 hours ago [-]
Missing a chance to note (or configure for?) installation on a Raspberry Pi --- that'd make an affordable option to leave powered down, but ready to go in an EMI-shield/Faraday Cage.
pdpi 1 hours ago [-]
They specifically state that they’re aiming for a “fatter” model that expects higher-end hardware, and other projects like Internet in a box already target rpi-style devices.
ZeroCool2u 2 hours ago [-]
See I really want this in a simpler format. Like a single file embedded database on my filesystem that I can point a single/or few tools at for my model to use when it needs.
moffers 4 hours ago [-]
Really clever targeting of a niche. I’d be interested to hear if they find success!
I used it on a long train trip. There was no internet due to drone attacks, and with Kiwix I could browse pre-downloaded Wikis
cousinbryce 3 hours ago [-]
I’m convinced that the multitude of off-line Internet tools is a ploy to keep any one of them from gaining traction
lucasluitjes 2 hours ago [-]
The ones mentioned in this thread all use Kiwix for off-line wikipedia, OSM for maps, Khan for educational videos. It looks like internet-in-a-box is aimed at working well on low-powered devices, whereas nomad expects beefy hardware and includes local AI. Not sure how WROLPi differs from internet-in-a-box.
Maybe it's like linux distros: all based on the same software, but optimized for different use-cases or preferences.
rtibbles 1 hours ago [-]
I mean, technically they use Kolibri for educational videos and exercises. A lot of them do come from Khan Academy, but we do a lot of work to make an offline first education platform, and also bring in a huge swathe of other open educational resources.
bpavuk 2 hours ago [-]
turns out I have the same setup (sans local LLMs - they are pretty useless on 2018 cards) but in Obsidian :)
whatever I think might be useful later, I capture through the web clipper extension. [0]
In the meanwhile, wikipedia ships wikidata, which uses RDF dumps (and probably 8x less compressed than it should be).
https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Database_download
There is room for a third option leveraging commercial columnar database research.
https://adsharma.github.io/duckdb-wikidata-compression/
Offline access and local models aren’t about assuming collapse—they’re about treating knowledge as infrastructure instead of something implicitly guaranteed.
That feels more like resilience than pessimism.
AlexNet -> Tansformers -> ChatGPT -> Claude Code -> Small LMs serving KBs
Large LLMs could have a role in efficiently producing such KBs.
I do think having an LLM as an optional "sidecar" is a useful approach. If you can run a meaningful Ollama instance alongside your content, great!
https://github.com/ligi/SurvivalManual
https://internet-in-a-box.org/
https://wrolpi.org/
I used it on a long train trip. There was no internet due to drone attacks, and with Kiwix I could browse pre-downloaded Wikis
Maybe it's like linux distros: all based on the same software, but optimized for different use-cases or preferences.
whatever I think might be useful later, I capture through the web clipper extension. [0]
[0]: https://obsidian.md/clipper