When my wife was preparing for her Danish citizenship exam, she quickly found herself overwhelmed by the abundance of historical events and dates packed into her study material. Frustrated, she exclaimed, “There are so many dates here. How am I supposed to remember all of them?” I empathized with her struggle and suggested creating a timeline to better organize the information. However, she pointed out that the book was lengthy and in PDF format, which posed its own set of challenges. This sparked an idea—could we leverage AI to streamline her studying process?

Determined to simplify her task, I took the PDF and converted it into a Markdown file using Pandoc. This made the text more manageable and easier to manipulate. After that, I wrote a simple Python script to split the large file into smaller sections, making the information bite-sized and digestible. With everything neatly divided, I turned to an AI language model to extract the relevant dates and events directly in Danish.

In just a few minutes, the AI processed each chunk and organized the data into a clear timeline, beautifully grouped by year. What initially seemed like a daunting manual endeavor transformed into a remarkably efficient automated solution. The sheer speed and organization that AI brought to the task were eye-opening.

When I presented her with the completed timeline, her relief was palpable. What once seemed like an insurmountable pile of information was now laid out in a clear, structured format. This not only saved her a significant amount of time but also transformed her study experience into something far more effective.

This experience drove home the point that embracing AI and automation tools can vastly simplify complex tasks. By utilizing the right technology and adopting a strategic approach, what appeared to be a substantial problem can be reframed as a straightforward project. In the ever-evolving landscape of products and tools, it’s these moments of innovation that remind us of the incredible potential of technology to enhance our lives and workflows.