Google is offering developers a toolkit for incorporating generative AI features into mobile and web applications. Firebase Genkit, an open-source framework, is available now in beta. Blending models, cloud services, agents, data sources and more in a “code-centric approach” developers are used to, the Genkit makes building and debugging for AI easier, according to Google. The first release is built for JavaScript and TypeScript developers, making building AI-powered apps available to professionals who specialize in building server-side applications using the Node.js JavaScript runtime. Continue reading Firebase Genkit: Developer Framework for AI-Powered Apps

Microsoft, which has been developing small language models (SLMs) for some time, has announced its most-capable SLM family, Phi-3. SLMs can accomplish some of the same functions as LLMs, but are smaller and trained on less data. That smaller footprint makes them well suited to run in a local environment, which means they’re ideal for smartphones, where in theory they would not even need an Internet connection to run. Microsoft claims the Phi-3 open models can outperform “models of the same size and next size up across a variety of benchmarks that evaluate language, coding and math capabilities.” Continue reading Microsoft Small Language Models Are Ideal for Smartphones

Opera has become the first browser to add support for large language models (LLMs). At this point the feature is experimental, and available only on the Opera One Developer browser as part of the AI Feature Drops program. The update offers about 150 LLMs from more than 50 different families, including Meta’s LLaMA, Google’s Gemma, Mixtral and Vicuna. Opera had previously only offered local support for its own Aria AI, a competitor to Microsoft Copilot and OpenAI’s ChatGPT. The local LLMs are being offered for testing as a complimentary addition to Opera’s online Aria service. Continue reading Opera Browser Is Experimenting with Local Support for LLMs