Mark Zuckerberg Unveils His ‘Jarvis’ AI Assistant, Here’s How He Made It

Short Bytes: Mark Zuckerberg has finally unveiled his personal AI ‘Jarvis.’ Created using many AI techniques and programming languages like PHP, Python, and Objective-C, Jarvis can control his home appliances, play music, and even entertain Max. He also plans to create an Android app for the same and add more commands.

Earlier this year in January, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told the world that he’s planning to build an AI system that’ll be running his home. It was one of the personal growth challenges he takes up every year.

Now, Zuckerberg has pulled back the veil from his project, which is named Jarvis–an obvious nod to Tony Stark’s AI system in Iron Man. In a recent post on Facebook, he has shared an in-depth insight into his project.

Zuckerberg’s Jarvis AI can talk to his phone and computer, and control his home’s lights, appliances, temperature, music, and security systems. Over the time, it learns new words and concepts, and can even entertain his daughter Max.

Image: Fast Company

Just in case you’re wondering how he made it, Zuckerberg has an answer for you. He employed several artificial intelligence techniques like natural language processing, face recognition, speech recognition, and reinforcement learning.

To build his Jarvis AI from scratch, he used Python, PHP, and Objective-C programming language.

Zuckerberg had to reverse engineer APIs for his home appliances to be able to issue a command that they can understand. He also had to make modifications to some appliances that weren’t internet connected.

After writing his code, he had to find a way to communicate it using text messages or speech. He started this by looking for simple keywords like “bedroom,” “on,” and “lights.” He also realized that to work efficiently, Jarvis needed to handle more open-ended requests and have more context.

To communicate with Jarvis from anywhere, using Facebook’s own bot framework, he also built a Messenger bot.

Zuckerberg has also connected it to a T-shirt cannon that fires a new gray t-shirt every time he tells it to do so. To enable voice controls for Jarvis, Zuckerberg has built a dedicated Jarvis app that listens to what he says.

You can read the detailed information about Zuckerberg’s AI Jarvis in this Facebook post.

Zuckerberg says that he’s committed to improve Jarvis by using it every day. He hopes to add more commands to it and create an Android app.

Did you find Zuckerberg’s AI Jarvis interesting? Do you have some exciting personal project that you wish to share with us? Tell us about the same in the comments section below.