When I joined MacScripter in 2006 everything was hand made respectively brain made. Even when the questioners copied snippets from somewhere there was a certain amount of personal effort and I was pleased to help with the issues.
Times have changed and now you enter a prompt and the AI gives you a turnkey solution. However especially with regard to AppleScript the AI is not as smart as in other subjects.
In my opinion this forum was always a place to go for people interested in writing AppleScript code and in the language itself.
The bottom line is that in the future I’m not willing anymore to improve and correct the – sometimes ridiculous – flaws of obviously AI generated code. Sorry guys.
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I could not agree more. When I joined MacScripter a few years back, I joined to learn a new skill and gain a knowledge of AppleScript. When I’m in need of a particular script, to do a particular function, the first place I search is here at MacScripter. I take bits and pieces of things I find here and try to assemble them into a working script. If it works, that’s great, if not, I’ll post here and there’s always very helpful responses that eventually lead me to a solution. Using AI to write one’s scripts seems, at least to me, to be missing the entire learning and creative experience.
Amen. Have seen this over in the Apple communities too, and mirror your sentiment.
I’m feeling pretty ludite-ish over here as well. While I, obviously, welcome our new AI overlords, I do appreciate the knowledge and the effort put into getting it that our members have acquired, soft, smushy, meat-based creatures though they be. They do ok sometimes.
But I know that there is an entire generation of people who learn differently. Those who may not have any actual interest in the language, but want to accomplish a task, and those that simply can’t script. All these folks may wander into some LLM’s lair in search of solutions. They won’t find em there, but they will get something that looks like it could possibly be close. They might bring them over here.
Come to me with an AI generated image for some PS touch-ups and I’ll throw a shoe at you. AI AppleScript? I’ll begrudgingly try to fix it. I’m fine helping folks who want to borrow a cup of AppleScript here and there, even if they don’t come back with a pie to share.
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Every day that I learn something new is a good day, thank you Paul.
“Ludite-ish” is not a standard English word. It likely refers to someone or something that is somewhat like a Luddite, or exhibits characteristics of Luddism. A Luddite is someone who is opposed to new technology, often due to concerns about its impact on jobs or society. Therefore, “ludite-ish” would describe someone who is resistant to new technology or has some reservations about its effects, but perhaps not to the same extreme degree as a full-fledged Luddite.
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How can you tell the difference between AI generated script and script generated by someone who is trying to use appleScript?
Personally, I often as ChatGPT to write scripts, so far none of worked out of the box, then I fix the script and send the fixed version back to ChatGPT hoping it will learn. (So far I’ve detected no difference).
I don’t think I’ve posted AI content and asked for help, but if I ever do I’ll clearly identify it as such so anyone so inclined will know to ignore it.
I think the issue Stefan raises is part of a larger issue that’s been around for as long as I’ve been a member of this forum. It used to be that a forum member would request that someone write them a somewhat complicated script without making any effort on their own to write the script. A current variant is that a forum member will request that someone write them a somewhat complicated script and will offer an AI-generated script as a starting point.
Depending on the amount of work involved, I actually don’t object to the above. If I don’t want to respond to a request I don’t. What irritates me is when I take the time to write the script, and the requesting forum member doesn’t provide any feedback or offer a simple thanks. I have a mental do-not-respond-to list composed of people in this category.
I’m not sure if this is happening, but I get the impression that AI sites might be posting requests to forums like this to bolster their AppleScript training. The reason I say this is because some forum requests for help appear to have been written by LLMs rather than human beings. Perhaps there’s another reason for this.
Anyways, the issue raised by Stefan is a valid one, and I’ve already liked it.
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I think this is another one of those situations where the answer is 42.
For those questioners who have no basic knowledge, ChatGPT offers the following advice: “I’ve prepared books summarizing the basics, so please read them.”
I’ve written about 34 ebooks.
https://piyomarusoft.booth.pm/item_lists/rBkTpqJm
Maybe the site should ban generative AI. Other sites like stackoverflow do. It sort of seems like a slap in the face for someone to ask for assistance getting a script to work that they didn’t put any effort into. There are, in fact, services out there (fiverr, etc) where they could pay someone to write a script for them if they didn’t want to bother. Instead they get AI to mock up something they never expect to work in order to get someone here to come up with a working solution for free.
I think the usage of generative AI itself isn’t so much a problem as the lack of understanding (or interest) about whatever it is it is being used for, as well as its limitations (such as not actually being “intelligent”). As an additional tool I suppose it is OK, but these days it seems to mostly be used to get a quick result without putting in much effort. It is relatively easy to get the general idea about how something works (usually), but if someone can’t be bothered to understand enough about whatever it is they are trying to do, it tends to not matter much about what any answer is, because they don’t know what the question actually means.
Searching the internet is rapidly becoming useless from the noise being generated by AI training on its own content (and creating even more advertising, but that is another subject), and is most likely what sites like Stack Overflow are trying to reduce by banning it, as it waters down the content and winds up being a big time sink that also tends to drive away contributors.
Interesting study done by MIT on the dangers of AI to developing brains, think Middle and High School students. ChatGPT's Impact On Our Brains According to an MIT Study | TIME