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timmy-talking-turd/PRODUCT.md
timmy b838beb548
Quality gates / quality (pull_request) Failing after 2m50s
feat: ground Timmy chat answers in cited ledger records (#37)
Chat now has to show its work. Every answer that states a count, a date, or a
visible form cites the confirmed records behind it, and following a citation
opens exactly that log. Questions the journal cannot answer (food safety,
medicine, what a symptom means) get boundary copy with no borrowed evidence,
and a sparse window refuses to describe a trend instead of naming one.

The Hermes path is held to the same rule: the server gives each ledger record a
positional ref, the prompt requires inline [entry:L<n>] citations, and the
browser resolves them against the ledger it sent. A ref that matches no record
is stripped and the answer is labelled unverified rather than rendered as a
source, so an invented citation cannot look like evidence.

The release recording now exercises the grounded local answer, its citation
sheet, the refusal, and a Hermes reply whose refs resolve, each asserted in the
browser with fictional logs.
2026-10-18 08:17:40 +00:00

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Timmy the Talking Turd — Product Brief

Promise

Your intelligent pooping pal. Timmy makes bowel tracking private, quick, funny, and useful without pretending a consumer photo is a medical diagnosis.

Product wedge

Most stool trackers are sterile diaries. Most AI-health demos overclaim. Timmy combines:

  1. a memorable character users actually return to;
  2. a ten-second Bristol-type log;
  3. an optional private photo attached to the entry;
  4. longitudinal, plain-language pattern summaries;
  5. a free-text Timmy conversation backed by an authenticated server-side Hermes Agent;
  6. fail-safe symptom escalation;
  7. user-owned export and one-tap deletion.

MVP we can make real now

  • Installable mobile-first PWA.
  • All records and optional photos remain in this browser's local storage.
  • Manual Bristol type 1–7 selection with clinically grounded groupings.
  • Color, urgency, discomfort, note, and urgent-symptom capture.
  • Calendar/history and deterministic pattern summary.
  • Photo-first capture that can send one compressed image, after explicit consent, to a configured multimodal AI provider.
  • AI prefills only the visible Bristol form and color, shows confidence, and requires confirmation.
  • A three-destination mobile shell with one dominant photo action and progressive disclosure.
  • Smart free-text chat with local fallback and an optional fully tool-capable Hermes backend behind exact-origin authentication. Answers that describe the journal cite the confirmed records they used, and every citation opens that record; a question the journal cannot answer gets boundary copy instead of reassurance.
  • Portable JSON export and delete-all control.
  • A Timmy voice that is playful about logging and serious about red flags.
  • A short user-reported follow-up after a hard/lumpy (Bristol 1–2) log: difficulty passing, soreness, visible blood, truly black/tarry versus dark brown, and hydration. Mild reports receive proportionate non-diagnostic self-care; a confirmed red flag routes into the existing deterministic escalation, and dark brown is never silently escalated as black stool.

Honest AI boundary

The assisted-analysis release uses a general-purpose multimodal model to suggest only visible form and color. It is not clinically validated, never fills urgency, discomfort, symptoms, causes, treatment, or disease, and fails closed when confidence is low. Every suggestion requires user confirmation.

A production-grade image model still needs a consented, clinically labeled dataset; validation across lighting, toilets, skin tones, medications and diets; abstention when uncertain; privacy/security review; and likely medical-regulatory counsel if disease claims are ever introduced. Timmy should never clear a food, rule out disease, or replace professional care.

Hermes chat does not expand the medical claim. Confirmed text-only ledger fields may be sent only after the user connects to the authenticated backend; photos are excluded. The browser cannot choose tools, models, providers, work directories, or internal sessions. Deterministic urgent-symptom guidance runs before chat and remains available when Hermes is offline.

Audience

  • People managing constipation, diarrhea, IBS-like patterns, diet changes, medications, or a clinician-requested bowel diary.
  • Parents/caregivers need a distinct consent and child-safety flow; not in this MVP.

Tone contract

  • Funny: names, microcopy, streaks, and encouragement.
  • Never funny: blood, black/dark-red stool, severe/constant abdominal pain, vomiting, fever, inability to pass gas, unexplained weight loss, or emergencies.
  • Never say a food is "safe" from stool history.

Evidence anchors

Success metrics

  • Median log completion under 20 seconds.
  • Seven-day retention and logs per active user.
  • Export completion and deletion reliability.
  • Zero diagnostic or food-clearance claims.
  • Red-flag flow always interrupts the playful UI with unambiguous action guidance.