5 Building a ChatGPT clone with Aspire, Ollama, and Semantic Kernel
This chapter covers
- Fundamentals of large language models and how they can be hosted anywhere via Ollama
- Integrating Aspire with Ollama
- Hosting a ChatGPT clone in Aspire
- Building a custom user interface for an intelligent chat app
Large language models (LLMs), such as those used in ChatGPT, Claude, and Copilot, have taken the world by storm. Everyone is talking about them, including technical professionals and nontechnical people, because we can do so many interesting things with them.
Enterprises are increasingly integrating LLMs into their core products. Think of it as building your own domain-specific ChatGPT clone that answers questions about your product and acts as a virtual store assistant. The online shop we're building can benefit from AI integration.
Did you know that as a .NET developer, you can integrate any of these models into your application relatively easily regardless of the kind of application you're building and where you intend to run it? You can build any kind of AI functionality into your application as long as LLMs support it. You can use any advanced LLM features, such as retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) and Model Context Protocol (MCP). You can build chatbots, fully autonomous AI agents, you name it.
How do you do it? The answer is Semantic Kernel, a collection of .NET libraries that provide a simple interface for interactions between LLMs and custom code.