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...