Love NotebookLM but hate giving Google your data? I found a great open-source alternative

Open Pocket book is nearly a clone of NotebookLLM’s core performance, together with stand-out options like audio summaries, the flexibility to ask questions on your analysis sources, and a lot extra. After all, nothing is ideal, and it isn’t with out catches. Under, I’ll dive into what I love about Open Pocket book, what’s much less very best about it, and how you can give it a strive for your self.

The core options are just about the identical as NotebookLLM. You add sources from PDFs to YouTube movies and every thing in between, after which it synthesizes this data into audio, quizzes, or you may simply chat with it.

Let’s begin with what actually units Open Pocket book other than NotebookLLM: it’s an open-source undertaking you should configure your self. This comes with some downsides, which we’ll get into a bit later. It additionally implies that your information is really safe in a means that NotebookLLM isn’t. You even have larger flexibility and customization choices than what Google affords.

You’ll be able to run Open Pocket book domestically utilizing a mannequin like Ollama, or join it to your favourite cloud-based AI fashions, together with GPT, Gemini Professional, Opus, and extra. It’s additionally simple sufficient to change between fashions, so that you don’t essentially should lock down only one selection right here both.

Even higher, there aren’t any limits to what number of notebooks you create, in addition to what number of sources you make the most of. In the meantime, the free model of NotebookLM limits you to 100 notebooks with not more than 50 sources every. That stated, utilizing Open Pocket book will nonetheless fritter away token limits in the event you’re utilizing a cloud-based mannequin, and in order that’s value holding in thoughts.

As a lot as I like Open Pocket book, it’s vital to be upfront about its downsides.

First, this isn’t a plug-and-play expertise by any stretch of the creativeness. Whereas I’m a fairly skilled laptop geek with many years of expertise, putting in Open Pocket book manually on a Chromebook was a large ache, to say the least. It took me two tries and a number of other hours to set it up this fashion. It was a lot simpler on Home windows because of the Docker Desktop utility, establishing in a half hour or so, but it nonetheless required a little bit of DIY data and troubleshooting to get all of it proper.

Let’s additionally speak about its audio abstract podcasts. Whereas I recognize that you could even have as much as 4 talking voices as an alternative of simply the two-voice possibility with NotebookLLM, the audio breakdowns are a lot shorter by default. As a substitute of the 8-15 minute cap you’ll get with NotebookLM, audio breakdowns are often nearer to simply a jiffy.

You’ll be able to customise this and enhance the size to half-hour or extra, but even then, I found the podcast’s high quality simply wasn’t as sharp. I used a few totally different fashions, and even then, I felt NotebookLM had barely stronger breakdowns.

You’ll additionally must have the service operating by way of a core PC or your personal cloud setup earlier than you should use it on different units like Android. Even then, you’ll have to make use of a net browser as there isn’t any native app.

Like I stated earlier than, putting in Open Pocket book may be a bit difficult, but the simplest means is to put in Docker Desktop, which helps you to run containerized purposes instantly while not having to make use of the command-line interface as a lot.

As soon as this system is operating, you’ll wish to receive the API key from your chosen supplier. The precise course of for this can range.

Whereas there may be an official beginning information for this course of, it’s vital to notice that it’s really outdated in a number of areas. For these planning to put in a cloud mannequin, the steps beneath stroll you thru the essential preliminary setup.

Begin by creating a configuration file. You’ll wish to open up one thing like Notepad and paste the next:

companies:
surrealdb:
picture: surrealdb/surrealdb:v2
command: begin –consumer root –move password –bind 0.0.0.0:8000 rocksdb:/mydata/mydatabase.db
ports:
– “8000:8000”
volumes:
– ./surreal_data:/mydata
# Eliminated the healthcheck as a result of the v2 picture is just too minimal to run wget/curl
restart: at all times

open_notebook:
picture: lfnovo/open_notebook:v1-latest
pull_policy: at all times
ports:
– “8502:8502” # Net UI
– “5055:5055” # API
setting:
– OPEN_NOTEBOOK_ENCRYPTION_KEY=change-me-to-a-secret-string
– SURREAL_URL=ws://surrealdb:8000/rpc
– SURREAL_USER=root
– SURREAL_PASSWORD=password
– SURREAL_NAMESPACE=open_notebook
– SURREAL_DATABASE=open_notebook
volumes:
– ./notebook_data:/app/information
depends_on:
– surrealdb
restart: at all times

After creating the file, you’ll wish to edit change-me-to-a-secret-string and exchange it with a phrase of your selection. You’ll then save the file as docker-compose.yml beneath a new folder referred to as Open Pocket book.

Subsequent, you’ll wish to run Docker Desktop. After it’s up, open File Explorer and navigate to the Open Pocket book folder the place you set the configuration file. Proper-click anyplace within the window and decide Open in terminal.

The Terminal window will open, and also you’ll wish to enter: docker compose up -d

After about 15 seconds, the companies will begin, and also you’ll have the ability to entry Open Pocket book in your browser by typing in http://localhost:8502 into the handle bar. The Open Pocket book UI ought to open, but you’re not accomplished but.

You’ll wish to go to Handle > Fashions, discover your most well-liked AI firm within the checklist, and click on the Add Configuration button. A brand new field will pop up asking you to enter a identify for your configuration and the API Key. After you add each, click on the Add Configuration button.

You’ll discover a Check button subsequent to your new configuration presently. Click on this button to check the connection. You’ll additionally must specify what mannequin you want to use for chat, embedding, and transformations. The final of those choices refers back to the course of used to create reflections, desk of contents, audio summaries, and extra.

As soon as that is all accomplished, try to be in enterprise. You’ll be able to then go to the New tab and create a new Pocket book. From there, it’s simply a matter of including sources and testing out all of its Transformation capabilities. That stated, you’ll nonetheless must configure your Podcasts settings and a few different issues. For brevity, I gained’t go into all these particulars, but you will discover extra within the Open Pocket book begin information.

So, is Open Pocket book higher than NotebookLM? Actually, the reply relies on your wants and the way a lot you’re prepared to play with settings to customise it to your liking. Open Pocket book may actually be well worth the effort for individuals who love the thought of NotebookLM but don’t like their information sitting on a Google server. The identical goes for individuals who just like the instrument but desire a mannequin that isn’t based mostly round Gemini expertise.

For everybody else, NotebookLM stays a barely higher performer that’s simple to get began with and may be made even higher with a NotebookLM Professional or Plus improve. But in the event you don’t thoughts some tinkering, Open Pocket book is completely value a shot.