By Charles Miller
What is this thing called ChatGPT? Since it was unveiled to the public in November 2022 this has been a hot topic in Information Technology circles. ChatGPT is an Artificial Intelligence (AI) program developed by OpenAI and is considered by many to potentially be as revolutionary as was the development of the internet search engine.
It is possible that ChatGPT is going to be the next generation of how we interact with the internet because it is able to learn and assist users who might not know exactly what to ask for. As the name implies, ChatGPT is able to chat with the computer user to gain a better understanding of what the user wants. This promises to be a big improvement over existing internet search engines that require searching for just the right terms in order to find what you are looking for.
Recently I experienced a real-world example of where ChatGPT could have been extremely helpful had it been available. My client had forgotten a password he needed, and in order to reset that password online the web site was asking him to verify the answer to one of the “secret questions” he had provided many years ago. The question was “Where did you meet your spouse?” He knew exactly where they had met over a half century ago, but did not have any idea of exactly what answer had he given to the web site when he set up his account. The answer could be New York, Gotham City, The City, New York City, Midtown, New Amsterdam, Manhattan, The City That Never Sleeps, or The Big Apple. All ten of the answers in the preceding sentence are different yet synonymous because each answer refers to the same geographic location. Unfortunately the web site on which we were trying to reset that password was not smart enough to understand that.
What can be really infuriating is interacting with a computer system that fails to understand that you know the answer to its question, you just do not know letter-for-letter what the computer wants you to confirm. For example, I have seen examples of online forms that failed to recognize that “TX” is an abbreviation for “Texas.”
If your answer to the question of where did you meet your spouse is “The Rainbow Room” then ChatGPT might ask where that is. If you respond “65th floor” then “Manhattan” then “49 West 49th,” ChatGPT should most likely be able to determine that you indeed know the answer to the question of where you met your spouse even though you do not remember the exact answer you entered when you created your account.
In giving this example I do not wish to imply that ChatGPT is limited to only what I have just described. It presents information in a conversational and structured form akin to what we humans would do, and it can chat about any subject that can be found on the internet.
Still, getting back to the password example, I am looking forward to the day when if you forget a password, ChatGPT will be able to ask you a series of questions about your password, and then it might say “Okay, that’s close enough.”
Charles Miller is a freelance computer consultant, a frequent visitor to San Miguel since 1981 and now practically a full-time resident. He may be contacted at 415-101-8528 or email FAQ8@SMAguru.com.
