melune a spoken-performance coach for macOS
In development
in prelaunch
v0.5 · alpha

a performance coach for the language you want to speak.

melune turns spoken sessions into a coaching film. After each conversation, it replays the moments that mattered, identifies the patterns behind them, and builds a targeted practice plan around what needs work. Not a streak tracker — a real diagnosis of how your speaking is actually changing.

a note · May 2026
melune is in early development and not yet available for download. It's being built as a native macOS app, currently in internal alpha. This page is a quiet placeholder — a record of what works today, what's coming next, and the thinking behind it.
about

What melune is.

The product loop is Speak → Replay → Diagnose → Drill → Retest → Update Evidence. You sit down for fifteen minutes, speak with the tutor in your target language, and end the session. But the session is not the product — the diagnosis is.

Afterwards, a written replay opens. Not just a transcript: a coaching surface. Moments are ranked by what they reveal — a grammar pattern that keeps recurring, a vocabulary gap under time pressure, a near-miss you paraphrased your way past, a well-handled structure worth naming. Each moment has the original audio, an improved version, and a brief explanation of why it matters.

Over time, these moments accumulate into a pattern model. "You tend to avoid dative phrases in service contexts." "Sentence-final particles are inconsistent when speaking faster." Each pattern has a confidence level, an evidence count, a freshness timestamp, and a scheduled retest. The next session is built around what needs pressure.

The goal is an honest picture of how your speaking is changing — not a level badge that moves every week. The proficiency estimate updates slowly, with a visible confidence band. The system explains when it doesn't have enough evidence to say more.

approach

What shapes the design.

These three principles shape almost every design decision. They explain what gets left out as much as what's included.

i.
Diagnosis, not chat

The product loop is Speak → Replay → Diagnose → Drill → Retest. Conversations are where evidence is collected. Replay is where learning happens.

ii.
Transparent claims

Corrections explain themselves. Proficiency estimates show their confidence. The curriculum states what it's targeting and why. Low-confidence diagnoses are labeled as uncertain.

iii.
Calm, not loud

No streaks as guilt-trips, no XP, no leaderboards. Sessions cap at fifteen minutes by design — short, spaced practice has better evidence for lasting gains than long, infrequent study.

where it is

What's working today.

Honest snapshot of the build. Items marked working are wired end-to-end in internal alpha; in progress is the current active development wave; planned means designed but not yet started.

  • ● Working
    Live voice conversation Real-time spoken dialogue with the tutor in your target language. Per-turn audio captured for replay. Pause and resume the mic without ending the session. Free conversation, scenario, and adaptive curriculum modes.
  • ● Working
    Session replay and feedback After each session, a typeset transcript with ranked grammar corrections, IPA pronunciation pairs, praise notes for well-handled moments, and a session summary. Corrections explain why, not just what. "Drill this" queues a targeted follow-up.
  • ● Working
    Adaptive placement test A three-phase test — written items, EIT-style sentence repetition, free conversation — that adjusts difficulty as it goes. Produces a proficiency estimate with a confidence band and a per-category map of weak spots.
  • ● Working
    Adaptive curriculum Each session is planned from the current weakness profile. Information-gap scenarios with real communicative outcomes, task sequencing from simple to complex, and scaffold fading as patterns improve. The curriculum shows its reasoning: which categories it's targeting and why.
  • ● Working
    Drills and targeted practice Five to ten items per session, each targeting one grammar or vocabulary feature drawn from the weakness profile or queued from the replay. Voice-graded, with proficiency feedback. Categories pulled from the real error taxonomy.
  • ● Working
    Vocabulary deck Cards auto-populated from real tutor turns. FSRS-based spaced repetition. An unconfirmed queue with bulk "I knew this" — confirm on first use, or let the app confirm on first review.
  • ● Working
    Comprehensible input, shadowing, and read-aloud AI-generated listening passages at your level, sentence-by-sentence shadowing with pronunciation feedback, and a paste-any-text reader. Pronunciation analysis is reserved for scripted modes like these — where the target sentence is known and scoring is reliable.
  • ◐ In progress
    Replay as diagnosis "Moments that mattered" — a coaching surface above the full transcript. Each moment is ranked by what it reveals: a recurring pattern, a near-miss, a pragmatic mismatch, a strong move worth naming, a fluency bottleneck. Audio, improved version, and why it matters.
  • ◐ In progress
    Pattern model Durable learner pattern cards that accumulate across sessions — recurrence count, trend, confidence, evidence sources, and a scheduled retest. Patterns connect moments to a longitudinal diagnosis, not just a list of today's mistakes.
  • ○ Planned
    Evidence ledger and retest loop "How we know" behind every learner-facing claim. Spaced retest scheduling for important patterns — same structure, new context — to check whether a correction held under pressure. The loop closes when retest success updates the evidence.
  • ○ Planned
    More languages German and Korean are the initial tracks — chosen because they exercise different parts of the architecture. The depth comes from language-specific pattern families, scenarios, and placement materials. More languages come once those two feel right.
  • ○ Planned
    iOS companion Read-only to start — browse past replays, review the vocabulary deck, listen to comprehensible input on the go. Live conversation stays on the desktop until it can be done properly on a phone.
practicalities

A few things worth knowing.

macOS first. melune is built natively in SwiftUI for the desktop. Sessions happen at a real keyboard with real audio hardware, which is where careful practice tends to happen anyway. An iOS companion will follow.

Subscription or BYO API key. You'll have the option to bring your own Gemini API key or subscribe for us to manage it. BYO is always available; managed pricing is being finalized. Typical BYO usage runs around $10–14 per month at a daily practice cadence. Managed tiers will cap conversation minutes by design — short, spaced sessions have better evidence for lasting gains than unlimited marathons.

Two languages at the start. German and Korean are the initial tracks. The data model and analysis prompts are language-agnostic; the depth comes from language-specific pattern families, scenarios, and placement materials. More languages come after those two feel right — not broad, deep.

A small, careful release. The first public build will go out to a small group, not a wide launch. There will be a way to put your name down before that happens — it's not wired up yet.