What I Built...

Ayush Anand — Thu, 29 Oct 2026 19:09:13 +0000

What I Built

During the hackathon, I worked on a voice agent — a project that explored making interactions with technology feel more natural through voice.

The idea was to move beyond the usual text-based interactions and explore a more conversational way for people to communicate with software. Building it meant figuring things out as I went, experimenting with the available tools, and trying to turn an idea into something that actually worked.

The experience was hectic, with a lot happening in a short amount of time. Looking back, what stands out isn't every technical detail but the process itself: making decisions under pressure, troubleshooting unexpected issues, and learning by building.

That experience is one of the reasons I keep coming back to hackathons. They push you to try things you might otherwise postpone and give you an excuse to turn an idea into a real project.

Demo

Voice-agent-workshop : https://github.com/coder-irwin/voice-agent-workshop(we were told to do this in the offline meetup)
ChibiDesk: Microsoft Store listing
ChibiDesk source and releases: https://github.com/gen-ayu/ChibiDesk-Releases
ChibiBot repository: https://github.com/gen-ayu/ChibiBot

Partner Technologies

The project explored voice-based interaction and the possibilities of building a more conversational software experience.

Working on a voice agent involves thinking about how users express their requests, how software processes those requests, and how responses can make an interaction feel natural rather than mechanical.

I'd like to revisit the project with a clearer picture of its architecture and continue exploring how AI can make voice interfaces more useful and intuitive.

Hackathon Experience

That week was a blur of building, experimenting, and trying to get everything working within the time available.

Hackathons have a particular kind of energy: you start with an idea, discover problems you didn't anticipate, and suddenly find yourself making decisions you would normally spend much longer thinking about.

It wasn't a perfectly organized development process, and that was part of the experience. Sometimes you have to prioritize getting something working over making everything perfect.

I might not remember every detail of that week, but I remember the feeling of trying to build something meaningful under a deadline. More importantly, it reminded me that the best way to learn a new technology is often to stop waiting until you know everything and start building.

That's a mindset I've carried into my other projects ever since.

ChibiDesk: A Little Life on Your Desktop 👻

Ayush Anand — Thu, 29 Oct 2026 19:00:31 +0000

This is a submission for the Hacktoberfest Open-Source AI Challenge Week 4: Ghost in the Machine.

What I Built

ChibiDesk is a Windows desktop-customization application designed to make desktops more personal and expressive. It supports animated desktop overlays, GIFs, videos, wallpaper customization, and an asset library.

Alongside it, I built ChibiBot, a Discord bot that supports the ChibiDesk community by managing asset submissions and helping members access shared wallpapers and other assets.

The idea behind ChibiDesk is simple: why should our desktops be limited to static wallpapers and icons when they could have a personality of their own?

Looking ahead, I plan to explore AI-powered wallpaper discovery, allowing users to describe their preferred aesthetic in natural language and receive relevant recommendations. This is a planned feature, not something currently implemented.

Demo

ChibiDesk: Get it from the Microsoft Store
ChibiBot: Explore the GitHub repository

Code

ChibiDesk: GitHub Releases
ChibiBot: GitHub Repository

How I Built It

ChibiDesk is built using Tauri, Rust, TypeScript, and WebView2, alongside native Windows APIs for desktop integration and window management.

ChibiBot uses Discord bot tooling and Supabase to support community interactions, asset submissions, and library management.

AI-assisted development has helped me work through architecture decisions, debugging, and implementation challenges. My next goal is to explore integrating an open-weight AI model into wallpaper discovery to make finding the right desktop aesthetic easier and more intuitive.

Why Does Open Innovation Matter?

Open innovation allows developers to experiment, learn from existing implementations, and build on the work of others instead of starting from scratch.

For ChibiDesk, open-source technologies make it possible to explore native Windows integration and desktop rendering while keeping the project accessible to future contributors.

They also create opportunities to experiment with open-weight AI models for future features without making the entire experience dependent on proprietary AI services.

I want ChibiDesk to grow into an ecosystem that people can use, contribute to, and help shape.

The Spirit of It

We spend hours every day looking at our desktops, yet they are often treated as purely functional spaces.

ChibiDesk started with the idea of making that space feel more personal through animated characters, wallpapers, and customization.

ChibiBot extends that idea into a community where people can share assets and discover new ways to personalize their computers.

For me, Ghost in the Machine is about making technology feel a little more alive. Behind the animations and visual elements are native Windows APIs, rendering systems, and plenty of debugging, all working together to create something expressive.

Maybe a desktop does not need to be just a place where applications live. Maybe it can have a little personality of its own. 👻

DEV Community: Ayush Anand

What I Built...

What I Built

Demo

Partner Technologies

Hackathon Experience

ChibiDesk: A Little Life on Your Desktop 👻

What I Built

Demo

Code

How I Built It

Why Does Open Innovation Matter?

The Spirit of It