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Vector Stores in the OpenAI Responses API: An Interview with GPT5

I’d just finished a morning round of tinkering with the ham radio Extra Class tutor when the question hit me: how do I actually get the entire exam question pool into GPT without burning through tokens every time? With GPT Projects, I can just drop in a file and it remembers. But on the API side, things always felt a little more ephemeral — every call a blank slate. So I sat down with GPT-5 to dig into whether there’s a smarter, more cost-effective way. What followed was one of those back-and-forths where the clouds part: GPT Projects’ quiet little “remembered files” have a direct analogue in the API world — vector stores — and they might just be the key to making this whole tutor run leaner and meaner. Me: In GPT projects, I can upload files that the project remembers. Is there a way to do the same thing with the API? GPT-5: Great question. With the raw chat/completions endpoint, no — it’s stateless. You’d have to re-inject your files each time. But the newer OpenAI  Respo...
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The Project TouCans Audio Recording Rig

 Just a brief description of how I capture audio recordings during Project TouCans outings. First, where's the audio coming from? Project TouCans of course.  It's frequently in the air, embedded in its dipole antenna, so about a year and a half ago, we started piping audio to the round via Bluetooth. Specifically, the audio out from the RockMite feeds this Bluetooth transceiver, a 1Mii Bluetooth 5.3 Transmitter Receiver for TV to Wireless Headphones For the recording/receiving rig, I use a different Bluetooh reciver, an Alura . It's the only Bluetooth receiver I could find  that would receive the 1Mii. From there, I use a stereo connector splitter. One side goes to my Sony voice recorder microphone input. The recorder is fine with the fact that I don't have an attenuater in the line.  The other side of the splitter feeds my Bose Ultra QC noise cancelling headphones. Do be honest, I have those for work, not for palling radios. The whole system, over time, has ...

POTA Afternoon at US-4571 City College San Francisco

 Turns out that City College San Francisco on the US-4157 Juan Bautista de Anza Nationali Historic Trail is a pretty good QTH even in the middle of the day on 20- meters. I didn't make it to the East Coast, but the rig was heard as far away as Tenessee!  The audio was faint, but very quite on this POTA activation, and I managed to record it this time, so I'll have some QSL videos out soon so you can see and, arguably more importantly for radio, hear what was going on! Videos This playlist contains all the videos made during the outing. Hopefully, I'll get some QSO audio added to the list after a while. Maps More Data! Every one of the launch angles was above ground this time.  Here's an album of what the foF2 values and hmF2 values looked like along the path. If yo're interested in how these numeric charts were developed and continue to evolve, I have a  video  up on a part of the debug process where GPT-5 proved really helpful. I'm s...

How Many Files Can You Add to a GPT Project? An Interview with GPT-5 on Limits, Context Engineering Tips, and Chats

 Setting the scene: I’m tinkering with Project TouCans, knee-deep in radio logs, SQLite dumps, and Cesium code. Naturally, I’m wondering if shoving all this into one GPT Project is a recipe for brilliance… or for disaster. So I turn to Vril — you know, after Brainy from the Legion of Super-Heroes , because what else do you call your AI sidekick who always has the answers? Time to ask him straight up. [ As an aside, yes, GPT-5 has decided to sometimes call me Vail. I'm not sure why to be honest. Also, I asked Vril, er GPT-5, to write up our interview for me. Apparently, me asking it to 'Bro' up a few stories, just for fun, has convinced Vril that I use 'Like,' more than I actually might. ] Me (Vail): So Vril, how many files can I throw into a GPT Project before it just starts choking? Like, is there some magic number where the context window taps out and everything falls apart? GPT-5 (Vril): Great question. There’s no single hard file limit. What matters is ...

Using GPT-5 to Build Smarter Exam Help Systems: First Steps

 I’ve been working through how to add a reliable help system for the ham radio practice exams, and I wanted to capture what I’ve learned before it slipped away. The process involved a mix of free attempts, some not-so-free surprises, and ultimately some promising experiments using GPT-5 and canvases. This write-up is both a set of notes for myself and a guidepost for anyone trying to do something similar. Looks like I'll be heading towards the OpenAI soon. I was hoping the help system could be free like the  exams , but perhaps, not so much. What Can Be Done For Free? As it turns out, not much that's reliable, but some things that are a bit clunky, which, when they work, work really well. The Unbeknownst to Me Not Free Options GPT Code Interpreter Running the Practice Exam This one was a bit of a no-brainer. Asl GPT-5 to convert the JavaScript exam code to Python and then run it in the code interpreter, (because Python is allowed, but JavaScript isn't.) This worked well, b...

Project TouCans: First Teletype Over 2 Meters With KO6BTY’s CQ Decode

 We pushed the teletype prototype for Project TouCans further today! KO6BTY transmitted a CQ call on 2 meters, and I managed to decode it—at least semi-successfully—through audio from my K6 UVK5(8). It’s not perfect yet, but it’s another good sign that Project TouCans’ RTTY experiment is working. For those that don't remember, or weren't follwing along, I started workign on the possibility of teletype using Project TouCans back in May . I didn't have the time to add a frequency change relay and possibly a different internal keyer to TouCan's Rockmite, so I settled on converting the microPython code intended for TouCans into JavaScript that could be run on the blog using GPT. It worked. I knew this right away becasue DroidRTTY decoded the audio output of the blog page app. Meanwhile, CW on 2 meters has become kinda popular lately thanks to  KI7QCF . My mind put the two topics together today, and voila! Here's a video that explains it all. The semi-successful deco...

CopaseticFlow on Rapidity Appears in GPT-5 Research Window

 This blog was mentioned by GPT5 in its answer to my somewhat obsure question about special relativity! Here's the question. Yes, I did already know the answer, I was just taking GPT5 as a research tool out for a spin after reading Simon Willison's GPT-5 aka Research Goblin  post . The answers it came back with were spot on. They highlighted Kerapatoff's involvement which I find particiularly interesting. Then, when I scrolled, (very far down), it's cited sources, I saw... in the 'More' section... As it turns out, the 'More' panel was intended as a 'You might find this intereseting' sort of thing. So, it's cool to see the blog on GPT-5, but GPT-5 didn't actually use the blog. AI and its sourciness (to coin a term) have come up a recently on the SolderSmoke blog. OK, off to listen to some recorded QSOs!