Pulse: AI-Curated Engineering Insights

Pulse is Android application designed to curate and synthesize complex engineering articles into digestible insights. By bridging a robust Kotlin/Compose frontend with a modern Express/Prisma backend, it delivers a seamless, native reading experience enhanced by on-demand AI summarization.

🏗 Technical Architecture

Android (Kotlin/Compose/Room) 
          │
          ▼  (REST API)
    Express API (TypeScript) 
          │
    ┌─────┴─────┐
    ▼           ▼
PostgreSQL   Gemini AI
 (Neon)    (LLM Summaries)

🚀 Key Technical Challenges Solved

• AI Quota Optimization: Implemented a Lazy-Loading & Caching strategy for LLM summaries to reduce API costs by 90% and gracefully handle throttling or quota exhaustion.
• Offline-First Sync: Engineered a local SQLite (Room) persistence layer to allow seamless reading during network outages, complete with a reactive offline-fallback UI.
• Modern UI/UX: Developed a custom 'IDE-Chic' design system with Skeleton/Shimmer loading, advanced WebView CSS injection, and animated Compose states for high perceived performance.

🛠 Tech Stack

• Mobile: Kotlin, Jetpack Compose, Retrofit, Room, Coil, Coroutines/Flow
• Backend: Node.js, Express, TypeScript, Prisma ORM
• Database: PostgreSQL (Neon Serverless)
• AI Integration: Google Gemini (Generative Language API)

⚙️ Installation & Setup

Backend (API Server)

1. Navigate to the server/ directory: cd server
2. Install dependencies: npm install
3. Configure your .env file with DATABASE_URL and GEMINI_API_KEY.
4. Run migrations: npx prisma db push
5. Start the dev server: npm run dev

Android Application

1. Open the client/ folder in Android Studio.
2. Ensure your emulator or physical device is connected.
3. Sync the Gradle project and hit Run. (Note: To test offline capabilities, turn on Airplane Mode after loading the initial feed).