# Is it possible to execute these course notebooks locally using a free-tier Pinecone account? **URL:** \ **Category:** Building Applications with Vector Databases\ **Created:** [February 14, 2024, 1:57am UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177 "2024-02-14T01:57:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![glotrec](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/838e76/32.png) [@glotrec](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/glotrec)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2024, 1:57am UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/1 "2024-02-14T01:57:57Z")
Perhaps I have already made a fatal mistake: when I created my pinecone account, i opted for a “pod based” account because the offer of “$100 dollars of free serverless credits” seemed to indicate that going that (serverless) route would involve a credit card, which I am not willing to commit to at this time. In any case, I have an api key, but when i execute the following line, i get a TypeError error: ----\> 2 INDEX\_NAME = utils.create\_dlai\_index\_name(‘dl-ai’) can anyone clue me in? ---
**Author:** ![kwiseth](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/dlai/user_avatar/community.deeplearning.ai/kwiseth/32/80632_2.png) [@kwiseth](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/kwiseth)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2024, 4:00am UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/2 "2024-02-14T04:00:46Z")
Hi @glotrec, I believe it depends on the project. I’ve successfully run some of the projects locally using the free pinecone (pod) API key. But to work on the facial recognition project, we need to use pinecone serverless and that’s not provided with the free account. I’ve given my credit card info, trusting that the $100 isn’t going to be used up completely by minimal usage for experimentation purposes. When i’m done playing and when I get close to the $100 usage, I’ll disable my serverless pinecone key and stop using it. ---
**Author:** ![glotrec](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/838e76/32.png) [@glotrec](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/glotrec)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2024, 1:33pm UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/3 "2024-02-14T13:33:45Z")
thanks very much. very helpful! ---
**Author:** ![Saptarshi98](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Saptarshi98](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/Saptarshi98)\ **Post date:** [February 29, 2024, 12:57pm UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/4 "2024-02-29T12:57:25Z")
Hi @kwiseth, @glotrec I got the Pinecone API for free, but I think I am having issue with the INDEX\_NAME variable which is getting generated from the Openai API Key. Can you guys kindly help me how you got that Key? ---
**Author:** ![kwiseth](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/dlai/user_avatar/community.deeplearning.ai/kwiseth/32/80632_2.png) [@kwiseth](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/kwiseth)\ **Post date:** [February 29, 2024, 4:35pm UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/5 "2024-02-29T16:35:21Z")
@Saptarshi98 , which lesson are you working with? What specific issue are you seeing in your notebook? If you are working on the facial similarity notebook, the “free” API key won’t let you create the index. Lesson 5: Facial Similarity Search **requires** a Pinecone serverless API key, which requires us to provide credit-card information in order to obtain a $100 usage allowance. [Sidenote: I’ve used about $0.03 (3 US cents, aka, pennies) of that allowance ‘playing around,’ so in my opinion, Pinecone’s allowance is generous to learners. I just learned that this allowance will expire in June so I still have a few months to play, and since it expires, I won’t worry about an API key account floating around and possibly having charges against my credit card, FWIW.] Hope this helps, but please be specific about which lesson you are trying to work with and more about the specific issue. Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![glotrec](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/838e76/32.png) [@glotrec](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/glotrec)\ **Post date:** [February 29, 2024, 5:44pm UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/6 "2024-02-29T17:44:55Z")
Thanks! I’ve given up on Pinecone and moved on to Weaviate which seems to have a more open source approach to their usage tiers. So far, I am much happier with them. ---
**Author:** ![Saptarshi98](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Saptarshi98](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/Saptarshi98)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2024, 5:04am UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/7 "2024-03-01T05:04:00Z")
Hey @kwiseth, Thanks for clarifying. I was working to replicate the very first Semantic Search project on my local. However, I generated the podspec api from pinecone which is the free one but I am not able to figure out how can I get one free openai api key. I think both are needed to run the project seemlessly! ---
**Author:** ![kwiseth](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/dlai/user_avatar/community.deeplearning.ai/kwiseth/32/80632_2.png) [@kwiseth](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/kwiseth)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2024, 9:54pm UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/8 "2024-03-02T21:54:58Z")
@Saptarshi98 , The OpenAI APIs are handled in the [API section of OpenAI](https://platform.openai.com/docs/overview). You need to have a login account (but it’s free). See the [OpenAI Developer quickstart](https://platform.openai.com/docs/quickstart?context=python) for step-by-step guidance on getting an API key. The Developer quickstart includes links to create an OpenAI account. ---
**Author:** ![Saptarshi98](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Saptarshi98](https://community.deeplearning.ai/u/Saptarshi98)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2024, 7:33am UTC](https://community.deeplearning.ai/t/is-it-possible-to-execute-these-course-notebooks-locally-using-a-free-tier-pinecone-account/571177/9 "2024-03-03T07:33:54Z")
Thank you @kwiseth . Got it