# IYALI — Generational Family Tree & Oral History Archive

> IYALI is an AI-powered collaborative genealogy platform designed to preserve multi-generational family trees, oral histories, and ancestral stories through natural language conversation.

- URL: https://iyali.vercel.app/
- Title: IYALI — Know your family. Preserve its story.
- Tagline: Build your family history through conversation.
- Domain: Genealogy, Family History, Oral Archives, Kinship Graph, African & Generational Lineage.

## Overview
IYALI bridges the divide between complex, intimidating genealogy software and oral family tradition. Instead of requiring users to fill out complex forms, IYALI allows users to describe their family relationships, memories, and ancestral stories naturally. The intelligent reasoning engine parses relationships, maps kinship networks, clusters relatives into generational tiers, and preserves oral history audio and written chronicles.

## Core Capabilities
- **Conversational Family Tree Builder**: Dictate or type natural language memories (e.g., "My grandfather had three children...") to automatically generate nodes, parent-child edges, and partner connections.
- **Interactive 2D Generational Canvas**: Pan, zoom, and organize ancestor and descendant cards with automated generational clustering and kinship connection vectors.
- **Oral History Studio**: Record spoken stories, ancestral poetry, and elder reminiscences directly in-browser with real-time waveform visualization, time-stamping, and playback.
- **Living Family Storybook**: An archival digital publication compiling family tales, folk history, and biographical milestones, with email sharing powered by Resend.
- **Kinship Calculator**: Instant query resolution for complex multi-branch kinships (e.g., "Lucas is John's first cousin once removed").
- **Multi-Tenant Lineage Workspaces**: Distinct family trees with isolated data, invite codes, role-based access (Owner, Collaborator, Chronicler, Viewer), and email invites.
- **Heritage Crests & Heraldry**: Customizable African and ancestral family crest presets reflecting heritage identity.
- **Zero-Lock-in Data Export**: Export entire lineage graphs in open JSON, printable PDF, and vector SVG.

## Architecture & Data Privacy
- **Platform**: React 18, TypeScript, Tailwind CSS, Express backend, Google Gemini API, Firebase Firestore & Authentication.
- **Privacy Model**: Local-first browser storage with private multi-tenant Firestore cloud synchronization. Data is encrypted in transit and at rest, never sold, and never used for public AI training.

## Pricing Plans
- **Free Tier**: Free forever for up to 3 complete generations, conversational AI tree builder, interactive canvas, and JSON export.
- **Pro Monthly ($12/month)**: Up to 50 generations, full conversational AI queries, multi-device real-time synchronization, PDF/SVG export, and continuous AI biographer.
- **Pro Annual ($99/year)**: Unlimited generations, automated backups, priority AI generation, and dedicated family historian support ($8.25/mo equivalent).

## Frequently Asked Questions
- **Q: How does IYALI handle blended or modern families?**
  A: IYALI natively honors biological parents, adoptions, stepchildren, foster relationships, remarriages, blended households, and extended branches without template restrictions.
- **Q: How can relatives collaborate?**
  A: Each family workspace generates a secure 6-character invite code and Resend email invitations for relatives to join as collaborators or chroniclers.
- **Q: Can data be exported?**
  A: Yes, full family trees and chronicles can be exported to standard JSON at any time without vendor lock-in. Pro plans support PDF and SVG.

## Links
- App: https://iyali.vercel.app/
- Lineage Studio: https://iyali.vercel.app/#lineage-studio
- Pricing: https://iyali.vercel.app/#pricing
- FAQ: https://iyali.vercel.app/#faq