M02

Due Date: October 17, 2026

Functional baseline: a working chat workflow, a materials-ingestion pipeline, a retrieval or memory mechanism, and at least one guided learning behavior.

Purpose

This review is about getting something real and running. A usable but limited prototype is the goal. It does not need to be impressive yet; it needs to work end to end, so that everything after this point is improvement rather than construction.

The single most important thing to demonstrate is that at least one learning behavior goes beyond plain question answering.

What to Deliver

  • A working chat workflow. You can hold a conversation with your Study Buddy.
  • A functioning document/material ingestion pipeline. Course materials go in, get processed, and become retrievable.
  • A retrieval or memory mechanism. The system can bring back relevant material or remember something across turns.
  • At least one guided learning behavior beyond plain question answering. A quiz, a concept check, a Socratic response that asks before it explains, anything that requires effort from you rather than delivering an answer.

What to Show at the Review

  • The basic chat workflow running live.
  • The materials pipeline processing a real course document.
  • Your retrieval or memory baseline.
  • First demonstrations of the system in use.
  • The current state of your prompts.

Expected Outcome

A usable but limited prototype.

How This Review Is Evaluated

Working baseline, document handling, retrieval/memory foundation, initial prompt quality, and your first demo. This review contributes 20% of your project grade.

Against the capability checklist, you should be at: architecture refined; chat workflow and materials ingestion working; retrieval or memory at a baseline; at least 2 workflows; at least one strong learning behavior; an evaluation baseline; an early demo; and initial revisions in response to M01 feedback.

Common Pitfalls at This Stage

  • Building a retrieval system that works in isolation but is not wired into the chat workflow.
  • A chat agent that answers everything immediately, with no behavior that asks you to do the thinking.
  • Ingesting documents without metadata, which makes targeted retrieval impossible later.

Submission Guidelines

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