Gemini-Powered RAG Chatbot – Learning
& Implementation Checklist
Goal: Build a chatbot that answers questions from a document using Gemini + vector-based
retrieval (RAG)
Duration: 1 week
Format: Each section includes What to Search and What to Do.
1. LLM Access & Setup Basics
🔍 What to Search
● How to call Gemini API with Python
● google-generativeai Python SDK setup
● How to install and authenticate Gemini SDK
⚙️ What to Do
Install the Gemini SDK:
pip install google-generativeai
Set your API key:
python
import [Link] as genai
[Link](api_key="YOUR_API_KEY")
Make your first call:
model = [Link]("gemini-pro")
response = model.generate_content("Hello! What can you do?")
print([Link])
Try sending a few prompts and printing the output.
2. LLM & Prompting Basics
🔍 What to Search
● What is a large language model (LLM)
● Transformer architecture for beginners
● Zero-shot vs few-shot prompting
● System prompts in LLMs
⚙️ What to Do
● Write 3 sample prompts in a .txt file: one zero-shot, one few-shot, one with system
instructions.
● Send them to Gemini and compare results.
● Observe how prompt format changes affect output.
3. Embeddings (Text to Vectors)
🔍 What to Search
● What are embeddings NLP
● sentence-transformers all-MiniLM-L6-v2 example
● Cosine similarity explained
⚙️ What to Do
Install:
pip install sentence-transformers
Run:
from sentence_transformers import SentenceTransformer
model = SentenceTransformer("all-MiniLM-L6-v2")
texts = ["chunk one", "chunk two"]
vectors = [Link](texts)
print([Link])
Compare two embeddings using cosine similarity.
4. Chunking Documents
🔍 What to Search
● Why chunking is needed in LLM context
● Fixed size text chunking Python
● Text chunking with overlap Python
⚙️ What to Do
● Write a Python function to chunk text into 200-word segments with 20-word overlap.
● Test it on a .txt file.
● Store the resulting chunks in a list.
5. Vector Databases (FAISS or Chroma)
🔍 What to Search
● How vector similarity search works
● Use FAISS with sentence-transformers
● FAISS top-k vector search example
⚙️ What to Do
Install:
pip install faiss-cpu
Example:
import faiss
import numpy as np
dim = 384 # for MiniLM
index = faiss.IndexFlatL2(dim)
[Link]([Link](vectors))
query = [Link](["your question"])[0]
D, I = [Link]([Link]([query]), k=3)
print(I)
6. Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG)
🔍 What to Search
● Retrieval-Augmented Generation explained
● RAG prompt template
● RAG pipeline with Gemini
⚙️ What to Do
Build this pipeline:
1. User query → Embed query
2. Search top-3 similar chunks from vector DB
3. Format a RAG prompt:
python
prompt = f"""
Use the following context to answer the question.
{chunk1}
{chunk2}
{chunk3}
Question: {user_query}
"""
4. Send prompt to Gemini and return the result.
7. FastAPI Backend
🔍 What to Search
● How to build a POST API with FastAPI
● FastAPI CORS middleware setup
⚙️ What to Do
Install:
pip install fastapi uvicorn
Example:
python
from fastapi import FastAPI, Request
from [Link] import CORSMiddleware
app = FastAPI()
app.add_middleware(
CORSMiddleware,
allow_origins=["*"],
allow_methods=["*"],
allow_headers=["*"],
)
@[Link]("/chat")
async def chat(request: Request):
body = await [Link]()
query = body["query"]
# TODO: Embed + search + call Gemini
return {"answer": "Gemini's response"}
Run:
uvicorn main:app --reload
8. React Frontend (Simple Chat UI)
🔍 What to Search
● Build a simple React chatbot UI
● Call FastAPI from React using fetch or axios
⚙️ What to Do
● Build a form with an input field and submit button.
● On submit, call FastAPI /chat with the query.
● Display Gemini’s response in a chat box or message bubble.
9. PDF/Text Parsing
🔍 What to Search
● Extract text from PDF Python PyMuPDF
● Clean PDF text for LLMs
⚙️ What to Do
Install:
pip install pymupdf
Parse and clean:
python
import fitz # PyMuPDF
doc = [Link]("[Link]")
text = ""
for page in doc:
text += page.get_text()
● Clean text (remove headers/footers).
● Chunk and embed as usual.
10. Optional Extras (Bonus)
🔍 What to Search
● How to stream LLM responses to frontend
● React loading spinner example
● ReAct agent pattern
● Build simple AI agent with LLM
⚙️ What to Do
● Add loading spinner during response.
● Show matched context chunks in chat UI for transparency.
● Build a basic agent: Plan → retrieve → think → respond (loop).
● Example: ReAct-style reasoning with Gemini in Python.
✅ Final Deliverable
A working chatbot that:
● Loads and chunks a .pdf or .txt file
● Answers user questions using Gemini + relevant context via RAG
● Runs via FastAPI backend and React frontend