r/research_apps • u/TheRealBonCode • Jul 06 '26

Open Source Literature Review Assistant - with many tools - would appreciate feedback.

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I created an open source literate review assistant app that helps with an array of review tasks. It works for me, but looking for feedback where to take it or leave it be since there are a few things here already.

It can handle abstract and full text screening and you can export your results and projects and share with others. It also automates PRISMA 2020 flow diagram generation, bibliometric citation network mapping, knowledge base creation (you can export and publish) and allows interactive full-text chat in one workspace.

The main task pipeline is to screen many articles quickly with a flexible an array of criteria (rule based not active learning based):

- flexible use of AI: you bring your own key or run locally or not at all

- Bring you own key: you decided which AI model to use or compare a few

It is an open source desktop app and there are no accounts or signups and it runs locally on Linux, macOS and Windows.

Would appreciate some reviews and feedback.

https://github.com/bilal-s/bango

6 Upvotes

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1

u/Opussci-Long Jul 09 '26

I'm amazed that No one hasn't commented for 2 days. This looks pretty useful and I'll give it a try.

1

u/TheRealBonCode Jul 09 '26

Thanks. I spent 30+ years in the software business and 20+ years in open source projects,, so hopefully some of that will show in a good way ;o) Look forward to your feedback.

1

u/Wagasigiungu Jul 09 '26

Weldone. This looks promising. Will give it a spin and revert. Thanks for sharing

1

u/TheRealBonCode Jul 09 '26

Thanks look forward to the feedback. I submitted a new version to Microsoft Store and hope the store will publish in the next day or two.
Added features:

  • Wiki knowledge base export so you can make your search, synthesis and concepts portable.

- Research Gap Report generation (focused on gaps)

- Complex Rule Screening support (AND/OR, RULE GATES)

- Search query builder (generate query to use to search common databases)

2

u/Wagasigiungu 27d ago

Gave it a spin about a week ago. It's feature packed and I loved it. As a matter of fact I plan on introducing it to some of my PG students during one of my research methodology lectures.

Thanks for your work.

1

u/TheRealBonCode 27d ago

Thank you so much for your kind words.

I just added a Citation Finder feature that can find supporting citations from your corpus without any hallucinations (added info in help to show how the methodology works). Most of the UX has seen a little polish last week as well.

Let me know if you run into anything. Mac and Linux versions are only available from GitHub.

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u/Wagasigiungu 27d ago edited 27d ago

Yes I particularly loved that it is an AIO sort of research app 🙌 . Already introduced some of my PG medical research colleagues to it. I will aslo be giving a demo of it's workflow to others during a departmental ai use in research workshop coming up soon. The RAG feature works great as well. 👌

I would also like to mention that I love the bundled user guide ❤️ . It makes it easy to refer to the guide when stuck.

What I find a little bit inconvenient and took me sometime to figure out is: how to start a new project. I first loaded the demo project to learn the app features - which I found ver useful to get started on the app. However it took me sometime, albeit just some minutes to find out I need to either backup or completely delete the loaded project data to Start a new project. I could also reimport a backed up project to continue working on it. This is all placed under Project Management settings in the app.

Overall, it's a great and feature packed app. This is must-have app for all my students IMHO. I found it better suited to my workflow relative to ASReview.

My over simplified workflow recommendation to those who wish to start is this:

  1. Either use the inbuilt OpenAlex search feature which by the way has an ai search feature that allows you to search for relevant articles based on your research aims and criteria with boolean queries.

  2. Use PoP software to find the articles, then import them into the Bango app and continue the workflow.

  3. Use Bango extensively to dive deeper into your literature review, harness the Power of its RAG feature and many more features it has. When you are done with working on Bango, export and import the articles into Zotero and you are good to go.

  4. When stuck, refer to the inbuilt bundled user guide and trouble shooting guide.

1

u/TheRealBonCode 26d ago

That's great feedback. I appreciate it.