Tom Caswell

Video Studio: turn a repo or a doc into a narrated demo video

Tom — Tue, 03 Nov 2026 02:32:04 +0000

I made Video Studio, a free, open source web app that turns a GitHub repo, web pages or a Google Doc into a narrated demo video. It writes the script from your sources and shows the lines each part is based on, so you can check every claim. You can edit any line by hand or just ask for a change, pick a voice and music, and it renders an MP4 with captions into your Google Drive. It started as a tool I built at work, and this is my own open source version.

The code is on GitHub under the MIT license: github.com/tom4cam/video-studio.

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My personal AI projects

Tom — Sun, 01 Nov 2026 18:59:16 +0000

I have been building small AI projects on my own time: a coin collection tracker, a family history helper, a dental practice app and more. Each one has a short demo video and a link.

See my personal AI projects

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CoinVault: a coin tracker for my Dad

Tom — Sun, 01 Nov 2026 18:56:30 +0000

My Dad collects US silver coins, mostly American Silver Eagles, so I built him CoinVault, a coin collection tracker that runs on his own computer and keeps everything there.

It shows what the collection is worth from the current silver and gold prices, charts the value over time, and shows which coins are missing from a set. He can add his own front and back photos, and it makes a daily backup. The text is big and the words are plain. A Sell button drafts an eBay listing to copy; nothing is posted for him.

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Rodoslov: a family-history helper for Bulgaria and Macedonia

Tom — Sat, 31 Oct 2026 22:30:00 +0000

Rodoslov (the Bulgarian word for genealogy) is a Claude artifact I build to help my Mom with researching family history in Bulgaria and Macedonia, where one name can be spelled many ways.

It suggests name variants to search, has a word finder for Bulgarian and Macedonian terms, a practice quiz, help reading old records, and a guide to where to look. For low vision it has large text, a high-contrast switch, read-aloud, and English and Bulgarian labels.

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Building an app for a small mobile dental clinic

Tom — Sat, 31 Oct 2026 03:12:00 +0000

I have been building an open-source dental practice management app for my friend who is starting a mobile dental clinic. It has a front desk, a recall list of patients due for a cleaning, safer staff sign-in, encrypted databases, etc. The code is private for now, but I’ll share it soon.

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Better Job Alerts: an AI assistant for job hunting

Tom — Wed, 14 Oct 2026 23:00:00 +0000

Better Job Alerts is a personal AI job hunting assistant that can learn your preferences and send you personalized job alerts. I named it BJ for short. Start by sending BJ an email (email address is in the video below) describing what kind of job you want and where, or upload your resume or LinkedIn profile. It replies within minutes with matching postings. You can also send BJ email in plain English with questions, feedback, or to modify or cancel your alerts.

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A better conference app for nurse practitioners

Tom — Thu, 20 Aug 2026 16:26:11 +0000

My wife attended the AANP conference in Las Vegas this year, and their conference app wasn’t very easy to use so I built her a better one with Claude Code while we were there. My version allowed her to plan sessions (including Watch Later), follow a live map to find session rooms, food, and shops, as well as track continuing education credits toward license renewal. Open the planner or see the code on GitHub.

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Open Content: The Gift That Keeps On Giving

Tom — Sun, 24 Jun 2012 01:31:26 +0000

The positive, often serendipitous news about the Open Course Library continues to appear. Shortly after our launch, the Saylor Foundation adapted 11 Open Course Library courses for use by self-learners. In the process they made the courses easier to access. You see, our first batch of courses were released as Common Cartridge .zip files which ended up being a barrier for those who don’t have access to a LMS. Saylor put our courses directly online and made them look pretty. They even caught a couple typos for us! (Note: We have since shifted to developing our course materials in Google Docs. All OCL course materials are available here: http://opencourselibrary.org).

Recently the Saylor Foundation began uploading some of their open courses to iTunes U, including several from the Open Course Library. Everyone benefits all over again, simply because a group of educators was willing to share their less-than-perfect course materials freely with the world. Open Course Library materials are now being used in 8 states through Project Kaleidoscope, an NGLC grant whose research is now informing our open sharing efforts in Washington State.

Last week I received a Google alert signaling that the North Carolina Community College System has added the Open Course Library courses to their NCLOR learning object repository. I look forward to reporting more good news as other educators decide to build on the OCL and Saylor materials and share back their improvements. While it’s impossible to control or even keep track all the outcomes of sharing one’s work openly on the web, I have only seen positive results for all involved. I’m sure there are a few exceptions, but in most cases nothing is lost by giving it away. As more talented instructors are recognized for their OER efforts I hope more educators will be willing to share their lessons openly.

I’ll end with a great 2-min spotlight on Pierce College Precalculus Open Textbook co-author Melonie Rasmussen:

Thank you to Melonie and to all the instructors who have been willing to take a chance by sharing their course materials openly through the Open Course Library. Truly this is a gift that keeps on giving.

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Herding Cats

Tom — Wed, 16 May 2012 22:04:08 +0000

At the WCET Digital Content Summit last week I was asked to describe how I work with faculty in Washington State to develop and curate materials for 81 of our system’s highest enrolling courses into the Open Course Library. I jokingly said two words: “herding cats,” and then I went on to describe the process and the great faculty, instructional designer, and librarian teams that have been involved. Of course, I only got quoted on the herding cats part. That’s the power of a sound byte.

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From Cable to Me to You

Tom — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 00:42:05 +0000

Flagrant reuse warning: I copied the following post from Cable’s blog because he said what I wanted to say

If you use Creative Commons licenses for your OER (or any other openly licensed creative work), you might want to check out: http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/32157
Please contribute to the new OER Policy Registry: http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/32072
New video hot off the press from CC Qatar:

Now to copy someone else. This past weekend the first 42 Open Course Library courses made their way to Haiti on a DVD — a little over 1GB of course content. Here’s the presentation given by Brandon Muramatsu. It’s worth watching. So maybe you don’t get to travel as much as I want to these days, but at least your openly shared content can.

From OpenCourseWare to Open Education

View more PowerPoint from Brandon Muramatsu

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