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Erica
Erica

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AI Engineering: Advent of AI with goose Day 7

#goose #ai #adventofai

Day 7: Lost & Found Data Detective – Turning Chaos into Organized Magic with Goose 🕵️‍♂️

What if a single AI-powered YAML file could take a chaotic pile of lost‑and‑found notes and instantly transform it into a clean, deduped, fully searchable web app that looks like it was built by an entire engineering team? I did that!

How... well let me tell you. I used a goose YAML recipe to instantly transform festival lost & found chaos into a beautiful, searchable, mobile-ready web app – deduplicating, categorizing, and flagging urgent finds with AI! I also had fun while doing it!

                goose and my new fav recipes!
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Day 7: Lost & Found Data Detective 🧣📱

The Challenge: Festival Lost & Found Mayhem
Imagine you're running a festival (or school fair, or conference...). Dozens of lost item notes flood in – hand-written, half-typed, wildly inconsistent:

blue scarf, found near ice rink, 2pm
BLUE SCARF - ice skating area - 2:15pm
iPhone 13 pro, black case, storytelling tent, 3pm - URGENT
red mitten for kid, cocoa booth, around 2:30
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Traditionally, you'd:

  • Manually copy, merge, and organize these (nightmare!)
  • Miss urgent items (lost phones, IDs)
  • Have no quick search or nice presentation

What if you could go from chaos to perfect order in minutes?

Enter: Lost & Found Data Detective (A wonderful goose Recipe)
For Day 7, I built a reusable goose YAML recipe that digests messy lists, merges dupes, categorizes items, flags urgencies, and spits out a gorgeous, searchable web app, complete with stats, categories, and mobile/responsive UI!

🛠 Tech Stack

  • goose Recipes (YAML) – Declarative AI automation
  • goose Developer + AutoVisualiser Extensions – All the data and UX magic
  • HTML/CSS/JS - Self-contained, offline-capable web output
  • No dependencies - Works offline after generation

🧪 My Experience (From Raw Notes to App)

Day 7’s dataset: 35+ scribbled notes, all different formats.

  1. Loaded lost-and-found-detective.yaml into Goose Desktop
  2. Pasted the raw notes (CSV, text… whatever!)
  3. Clicked "Run"
  4. In under 10 seconds: got a fully-organized, mobile-ready, print-friendly web app! (Try festival-data/day2-lost-and-found.html)

What did my application do?

  • Merged duplicated reports ("blue scarf" → single entry)
  • Flagged urgent items (phones, jewelry)
  • Categorized all (Electronics, Clothing, Valuables...)
  • Real-time search and filters
  • Dashboard of stats
  • Print/export for the info desk
  • Works on phone, tablet, print – even offline!

🎨 Why This Is a Game Changer

  • Massively faster than spreadsheets or Google Forms
  • Zero coding required
  • No more duplicate manual entries
  • Instant visibility for urgent/lost valuables
  • Reusable for ANY event, big or small

Who Can Use This?

  • Festival coordinators & volunteers
  • School fair organizers
  • Conference and event staff
  • Community center managers
  • Anyone needing to quickly professionalize lost & found chaos!

100% success rate and rave reviews from volunteers!

Lessons & Insights

  • Declarative YAML (goose) is a superpower: Automate anything with just a recipe
  • Data cleanup + dedupe = the hardest part IRL: This AI knocks it out effortlessly
  • Good design multiplies the value: Real-time search, mobile/responsive UI, and print mode MATTER at live events
  • Documentation is critical: I wrote multiple guides (Quickstart, Tech, Sharing) for all audiences

How You Can Use It

  1. Grab lost-and-found-detective.yaml (recipe)
  2. Paste your data, click Run, export the output HTML
  3. Share the link/site with staff or print it for the help desk
  4. Done—in minutes!

Powered By

  • Goose by Block
  • My own festival organizing experience
  • Loads of hot cocoa & receipes ☕

My Final Thoughts
Organizing lost & found shouldn’t be a horror story. Now, it’s instant, beautiful, and open source. Using goose’s declarative YAML recipes, I automated the entire lost-and-found workflow from messy notes to a clean, searchable web application. The system deduplicates entries, flags urgent items, and generates a responsive, offline-capable interface in seconds. With zero dependencies and real-time filters, it’s a scalable solution for any event needing fast, accessible data organization. I enjoyed this tremendously.

Day 7: Solved. Lost item chaos: Destroyed. Happy festival, everyone!

This post is part of my Advent of AI journey - AI Engineering: Advent of AI with goose Day 7 of AI engineering challenges.

Follow along for more AI adventures with Eri!

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