Improvement: Make .env loading path relative to project in ai-service

[pragnyanramtha]

Description

The ai-service loads .env from a hardcoded relative path which will break depending on where the service is started from.

Location

File: backend/ai-service/app/main.py
Line: 17

Current Code

load_dotenv("../../.env")  # Hardcoded relative path

Problem

• Only works if cwd is backend/ai-service/app/
• Fails when running with uvicorn from project root
• Fails in Docker containers
• Fragile and error-prone

Suggested Fix

import os
from pathlib import Path

# Get the project root (3 levels up from this file)
env_path = Path(__file__).parent.parent.parent.parent / ".env"
load_dotenv(env_path)

Or use environment variable directly without dotenv in production.

Labels

enhancement, ai-service, config

[karthikeya20012007]

Hi, I would like to work on this issue under NSoC 2026. Could you please assign it to me?