An AI-powered question-answering platform where users can ask anything and get intelligent answers generated using free AI and knowledge APIs. The platform automatically stays current by pulling real-world events through free news feeds, so answers are always up to date.

• Vision
• Free API Paths
• Tech Stack
• Features
• Installation
• Usage
• API Endpoints
• Project Structure
• Roadmap
• Contributing
• License

Build an AI tool that can answer any question for free by chaining together multiple free APIs and open-source models. The platform:

1. Accepts any user question through a clean web UI
2. Routes the question to the best free AI/knowledge source
3. Enriches answers with real-time data from free news and event APIs
4. Auto-updates its knowledge base as real-world events happen
5. Lets the community vote on and improve AI-generated answers

The core idea is to use zero-cost APIs to power the AI answering engine. Here are the free paths integrated (or planned for integration):

These power the auto-update feature so the platform stays current:

The platform uses a scheduled job (cron) to:

1. Fetch latest news from free news APIs every few hours
2. Identify trending topics and events
3. Feed event summaries into the AI model for context
4. Update cached answers that reference outdated information
5. Tag questions/answers with "last verified" timestamps

• React 18 with hooks and functional components
• Redux Toolkit for state management
• Tailwind CSS for responsive UI
• Vite for fast dev server and builds
• Axios for API communication
• React Hook Form for form validation
• React Hot Toast for notifications

• Node.js + Express.js REST API
• MongoDB + Mongoose for data persistence
• JWT + bcrypt for authentication
• Helmet for security headers
• express-rate-limit for rate limiting
• express-validator for input validation

• Google Gemini API (free tier) for primary AI answering
• Hugging Face Transformers for open-source model fallback
• Node-cron for scheduled news fetching and answer updates

• User registration and login with JWT authentication
• Ask questions with title, content, category, and tags
• Browse and search questions with category filtering
• View question details with all answers
• Answer questions (backend API ready)
• Vote on answers (backend API ready)
• User profiles with activity tracking
• Protected routes for authenticated actions
• Responsive design across all devices
• Centralized error handling and input validation
• Rate limiting and security middleware

• AI-generated answer suggestions using free LLM APIs
• Real-time news feed integration for auto-updating answers
• Answer submission form on question detail page
• Upvote/downvote buttons on answer cards
• Edit and delete UI for questions and answers

• Multi-model AI routing (Gemini → Hugging Face → Groq fallback chain)
• Scheduled cron jobs to fetch news and update knowledge base
• "Last verified" timestamps on AI-generated answers
• Wikipedia/Wolfram Alpha enrichment for factual questions
• DuckDuckGo Instant Answer integration for quick lookups
• Markdown support for questions and answers
• User reputation system based on community voting

• Node.js (v16 or higher)
• MongoDB (v4.4 or higher)
• Git

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/Basant1Saini/Ask_Me_Anything.git
cd Ask_Me_Anything

# Install all dependencies (backend + frontend)
npm run install-all

# Set up environment variables
cp backend/.env.example backend/.env
# Edit backend/.env with your values:
#   MONGODB_URI=mongodb://localhost:27017/ask_me_anything
#   JWT_SECRET=your_secret_key
#   GEMINI_API_KEY=your_free_gemini_key  (get from https://aistudio.google.com/apikey)
#   NEWS_API_KEY=your_newsapi_key        (get from https://newsapi.org)

# Start both backend and frontend
npm run dev

Backend runs on http://localhost:5000, frontend on http://localhost:3000.

1. Open http://localhost:3000 in your browser
2. Register a new account or login
3. Ask any question — the AI engine will suggest answers using free APIs
4. Browse questions and contribute your own answers
5. Vote on answers to surface the best ones
6. The platform auto-updates answers as new real-world events occur

• POST /api/auth/register — Register new user
• POST /api/auth/login — Login and get JWT token
• GET /api/auth/profile — Get authenticated user profile

• GET /api/questions — List questions (supports ?search=, ?category=, ?sort=, ?page=, ?limit=)
• POST /api/questions — Create question (auth required)
• GET /api/questions/:id — Get question with answers
• PUT /api/questions/:id — Update own question (auth required)
• DELETE /api/questions/:id — Delete own question (auth required)

• POST /api/questions/:questionId/answers — Add answer to question (auth required)
• PUT /api/answers/:id — Update own answer (auth required)
• DELETE /api/answers/:id — Delete own answer (auth required)
• POST /api/answers/:id/vote — Upvote or downvote an answer (auth required)

• GET /api/users/:id — Get public user profile
• PUT /api/users/:id — Update own profile (auth required)

• POST /api/ai/ask — Get AI-generated answer for a question
• GET /api/ai/news-feed — Get latest news relevant to platform topics
• POST /api/ai/refresh — Trigger answer refresh based on new events

Ask_Me_Anything/
├── backend/
│   ├── config/
│   │   └── database.js          # MongoDB connection
│   ├── controllers/
│   │   ├── authController.js     # Register, login, profile
│   │   ├── questionController.js # CRUD for questions
│   │   ├── answerController.js   # CRUD + voting for answers
│   │   └── userController.js     # User profile management
│   ├── middleware/
│   │   ├── auth.js               # JWT verification
│   │   └── errorHandler.js       # Centralized error handling
│   ├── models/
│   │   ├── User.js               # User schema with password hashing
│   │   ├── Question.js           # Question schema with votes & tags
│   │   └── Answer.js             # Answer schema with voting
│   ├── routes/
│   │   ├── auth.js               # Auth routes with validation
│   │   ├── questions.js          # Question + nested answer routes
│   │   ├── answers.js            # Answer update/delete/vote routes
│   │   └── users.js              # User profile routes
│   ├── utils/
│   │   └── helpers.js
│   ├── .env.example
│   ├── package.json
│   └── server.js                 # Express app entry point
├── frontend/
│   ├── src/
│   │   ├── components/
│   │   │   ├── Navbar.jsx        # Auth-aware navigation
│   │   │   ├── Footer.jsx
│   │   │   └── ProtectedRoute.jsx
│   │   ├── pages/
│   │   │   ├── Home.jsx          # Landing page
│   │   │   ├── Questions.jsx     # Browse + search questions
│   │   │   ├── QuestionDetail.jsx# View question + answers
│   │   │   ├── AskQuestion.jsx   # Create question form
│   │   │   ├── Login.jsx
│   │   │   ├── Register.jsx
│   │   │   ├── Profile.jsx       # User dashboard
│   │   │   └── NotFound.jsx
│   │   ├── redux/
│   │   │   ├── store.js
│   │   │   └── slices/
│   │   │       ├── authSlice.js
│   │   │       ├── questionSlice.js
│   │   │       └── answerSlice.js
│   │   ├── services/
│   │   │   ├── authService.js
│   │   │   ├── questionService.js
│   │   │   └── answerService.js
│   │   ├── App.jsx
│   │   ├── main.jsx
│   │   └── index.css
│   ├── index.html
│   ├── tailwind.config.js
│   ├── vite.config.js
│   └── package.json
├── docs/
│   └── API.md
├── .gitignore
├── package.json
├── CONTRIBUTING.md
├── LICENSE
└── README.md

• Backend REST API with full CRUD
• JWT authentication system
• React frontend with Redux state management
• Question browsing, searching, and filtering
• Answer and voting system (backend)
• AI answer generation via Google Gemini free tier
• Fallback to Hugging Face / Groq when Gemini quota is exhausted
• News API integration for real-time event awareness
• Cron-based auto-update pipeline for stale answers
• Wikipedia + Wolfram Alpha enrichment layer
• Answer submission and voting UI on frontend
• Edit/delete UI for questions and answers
• Markdown rendering for rich content
• User reputation scoring
• Docker setup for easy deployment

1. Fork the repository
2. Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feature/your-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add your feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/your-feature)
5. Open a Pull Request

See CONTRIBUTING.md for detailed guidelines.

This project is licensed under the MIT License — see LICENSE for details.

• Author: Basant Saini
• GitHub: github.com/Basant1Saini
• Project: github.com/Basant1Saini/Ask_Me_Anything

Made with determination by Basant Saini