AI assist (bring your own key)

AI assist is optional and bring-your-own-key. It is built so that a provider can never receive your confirmation codes or traveler names, and so that nothing is ever sent without you seeing it first.

Providers

Under AI providers you can choose between two paths, and there is no wrong one — Voyalier stays fully usable with neither:

• On-device via a local Ollama. Detection runs only on this device, and on-device runs never leave it. If no Ollama is found, a guided setup walks you through it — see On-device setup.
• Cloud, by adding your own OpenAI or Anthropic key. The key is stored in your operating system keychain — never in Voyalier’s files, database, logs, or any request body. It is read only to place it in that request’s authorization header, and the interface only ever shows whether a key is set, never its value. See Adding a cloud key.

On-device setup, step by step

When no Ollama runtime is detected, the On-device AI panel offers a short, three-step wizard rather than sending you to hunt for docs:

1. Install Ollama — a link to download it; it is free and runs locally.
2. Start Ollama — open the app (on macOS it lives in your menu bar and usually starts on its own after installing).
3. Get a model — pick one of the recommended models below.

For each recommended model you have two ways to get it. Copy command copies its ollama pull <tag> command to paste into your terminal, and once Ollama is running, Download pulls the model in-app with a progress indicator (keep the app open — it can take several minutes). The model tag is prefilled but editable, so you can adjust it or Add another model with a tag of your own.

Everything here runs on this device. Detection, downloading, and later use all stay local — always on this device, always your choice.

Adding a cloud key

In the AI providers panel, paste your OpenAI or Anthropic key and choose Validate & save. Voyalier checks the key with the provider before storing it, so a typo or an expired key is caught up front rather than at the moment you send a request. If it validates, the key is saved and verified; if the provider can’t be reached to confirm it, Voyalier tells you it saved the key but couldn’t verify it right now, so you’re never left guessing.

Don’t have a key yet? The How to get a key helper expands into the exact steps and links straight to each provider’s API-keys page. Either way, the key only ever lives in your OS keychain.

Preview before anything is sent

The Preview an AI request panel builds, on your device, the exact request Voyalier would send: the fixed system prompt and the grounded trip details, plus a clear “leaves your device / stays on your device” signal for the chosen provider. It reuses the same redaction as the shared brief, so confirmation codes and traveler names are excluded by construction and could never reach a provider; imported document text is withheld too. The preview also cites what it is grounded in and shows a rough token estimate.

Nothing is transmitted until you choose to send the previewed request.

Running a request, and the log

When you send it, the same redacted request goes to your chosen provider (on-device Ollama, or OpenAI/Anthropic using your keychain key). A fixed system prompt forbids inventing high-stakes facts — entry, visa, health, and safety details are quoted from cited sources, never generated — and every reply carries a non-authoritative disclaimer.

Each successful run is recorded in a per-trip activity log that stores metadata only (provider, model, time) — never the prompt or the reply.

Filling lodging-date gaps on-device

If a booking you imported has lodging dates that the deterministic parser didn’t pick up, Fill gaps with on-device AI can propose them from your own imported text. It is Ollama-only and runs entirely on this device — nothing leaves — and you can Preview what it reads before running it.

Every proposal is a draft, not a save. Suggestions are routed into the same review dialog you use for imported candidates, so nothing changes on the Blueprint until you confirm it. Voyalier drafts dates from your imported text; it never invents prices, visas, health, or safety details.

Customizing the AI instructions

For those who want it, Customize AI instructions lets you view and override the system instructions Voyalier uses, each with a Reset to default:

• Assist & preview instruction — used when you preview or run an AI request.
• Lodging-date draft instruction — used when the on-device AI drafts missing lodging dates.

Two guardrails hold regardless of what you write. The lodging-date draft stays schema-locked to dates — it only ever accepts dates, whatever the instruction says — and every AI reply is still marked not official. Instructions are stored on this device and change only future requests; they never change what leaves your device beyond the instruction text you already see in the preview.