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ADR-002: Zero-Cost Architecture

Status: Accepted Date: December 17, 2025 Deciders: CODITECT Architecture Team

Context​

The integration must operate without incurring external API costs, using only free-tier services and open-source components.

Decision​

We will architect the integration with the following constraints:

Free APIs Only​

  1. Google Calendar API - Free (within quota limits)
  2. Google Meet REST API - Free (within quota limits)
  3. Workspace Events API - Free (Pub/Sub costs minimal)

No Paid Services​

  • NO Recall.ai ($0.10-0.20/min)
  • NO Zoom RTMS (requires Developer Pack)
  • NO Third-party transcription services
  • NO Real-time meeting bot services

Post-Meeting Focus​

  • Focus on post-meeting artifact retrieval (free)
  • Defer real-time processing to future paid tier
  • Use Google's built-in transcription (requires Workspace Business Standard)

Consequences​

Positive​

  • Zero marginal cost per meeting
  • No external vendor dependencies
  • Simple deployment (no bot infrastructure)

Negative​

  • No real-time transcription during meetings
  • Limited to post-meeting analysis only
  • Requires Business Standard+ for transcript access
  • No support for personal Gmail accounts

Neutral​

  • Customers needing real-time must upgrade to future paid tier
  • Architecture allows easy extension to paid services later

Implementation Notes​

# Feature availability by cost tier
free_tier:
  - Meeting scheduling (Calendar API)
  - Meeting space creation (Meet API)
  - Participant list retrieval
  - Post-meeting transcript retrieval*
  - Post-meeting recording retrieval*

paid_tier_future:
  - Real-time transcription
  - Live meeting bots
  - Real-time AI insights

# * Requires Google Workspace Business Standard+

References​

  • Business requirements document
  • Cost analysis spreadsheet