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like a cmd+k type deal or something different? we do have cmd+k navigation to everywhere currently + global search, but i worry that less sophisticated users mi

like a cmd+k type deal or something different? we do have cmd+k navigation to everywhere currently + global search, but i worry that less sophisticated users might not use it.

sixdimensional 1y ago
No, I mean, like a copilot style AI assistant, the user can chat with to ask what they want to do, and either the assistant can operate and navigate the UI to the right place, or perhaps even shortcut the steps for the user by asking for questions to satisfy inputs for the thing they are trying to accomplish. An example: - user intent is to update an attribute for a component part number A21445 - user can click a chat bubble icon in lower right and chat to the assistant - user describes their intent - "help me update the description for part number A21445 - system replies by informing the user it will open the right screen, opening a part/component editing UI, with the right part loaded, with the cursor positioned in the description field, and the assistant stays open for further assistance; or; - system replies that it found the part and can update the description, shows the current description for the user, asks "what description do you want?" - user enters updated description - system confirms the change is correct - user confirms the change is correct - part/component description is updated without even opening the UI FWIW, it's great that you have cmd-K and also I've seen those kind of search boxes get more smarts like being able to type "part:A21445" to go directly to a specific UI. I just suggested the above as we learned some interesting user experiences became possible when our AI assistant had the ability to control our UI directly on behalf of a specific user. An example in the app I worked in (a web based data pipeline tool): - "Hey assistant, can you help me add some SQL transformation logic to dataflow ABC, to process the customer data?" - system uses metadata and knowledge of the UI to open the right dataflow, select the right type of UI to open to enable the user to add a SQL query in the right place, maybe even autogenerate the initial SQL query - this all from the main home page of the app, from a side panel chat assistant. - net result feels like talking to the assistant to operate the app, almost no clicks required. I hope that makes sense.
- barbinbrad 1y ago
  really appreciate you taking the time to write this! we've started trying to work through adding agents like this: https://x.com/barbinbrad/status/1903047303180464586 https://x.com/barbinbrad/status/1903047303180464586 the trouble is that there are 1000s of possible mutations -- and the quality of an agent tends to diminsh with the amount of "tools" you give it. i need to figure out the right abstraction for this.
  - jazzyjackson 1y ago
    I pray you focus on your core product and don’t fall into an agentification rabbit hole. If you do want everything to be automatable take a page from Blender and give every action a key binding plus a Python method, so Python scripts can take the same actions a human would, but as function calls instead of clicks. Then maybe maybe maybe you can have a text field that allows natural language to transform to an action, but please god stay away from chat interfaces. Rhino CAD is another interesting interface to look at, there’s a million buttons and menus but there’s also a text field at the top of the viewport where you can just type a command if you already know the name instead of rummaging through submenus. Kind of a CLI within the GUI.
    - sixdimensional 1y ago
      I somewhat agree with you, especially that one could identify a common abstraction that later an LLM could piggyback on top of. Genuine question though - have you implemented an AI assistant/chat interface recently using LLMs on top of a UI? I agree it can be a rabbit hole, but I just got through doing it on an app and there were definitely some things it really made way simpler and some complex scenarios that I'm not sure could have been done any more simply.
      - jazzyjackson 1y ago
        I built a chat interface in 2017 (this was with chatscript dialog trees with hole-filling and semantic search) that was ostensibly to prevent our data scientists from redundant work, ie, before they spent all day writing a SQL script, describe the job of the script and see if one already exists. The chatbot would then ask for the parameters required for a script, run the job, and then present a CSV of the returned data. As we collected user feedback and refined the UX, we got closer and closer to an option tree that could be better represented by a drop down menu. It was kind of depressing, but I learned that the actual job of that R & D wasn't to come up with a superintelligent chatbot that replaced data scientists, it was to come up with the infrastructure that would allow data scientists to put their python scripts in a common repository to allow re-use without re-installing locally and screwing around with pyenvs. Anyway, I'm also traumatized by my involvement with a YC startup that actually had a very good (if ENRONish) product around peer to peer energy futures trading that completely fell apart when investors demanded they make it "AI"
aitchnyu 1y ago
Please share the feedback for keyboard shortcuts from real users. Now shops in India tend to use touchscreens or have staff fiddle with laptops with tiny touchpads, but lots of shops use ERPs (Tally) with 90s UI that dont need mouse.

like a cmd+k type deal or something different? we do have cmd+k navigation to everywhere currently + global search, but i worry that less sophisticated users might not use it.

sixdimensional 1y ago

No, I mean, like a copilot style AI assistant, the user can chat with to ask what they want to do, and either the assistant can operate and navigate the UI to the right place, or perhaps even shortcut the steps for the user by asking for questions to satisfy inputs for the thing they are trying to accomplish. An example: - user intent is to update an attribute for a component part number A21445 - user can click a chat bubble icon in lower right and chat to the assistant - user describes their intent - "help me update the description for part number A21445 - system replies by informing the user it will open the right screen, opening a part/component editing UI, with the right part loaded, with the cursor positioned in the description field, and the assistant stays open for further assistance; or; - system replies that it found the part and can update the description, shows the current description for the user, asks "what description do you want?" - user enters updated description - system confirms the change is correct - user confirms the change is correct - part/component description is updated without even opening the UI FWIW, it's great that you have cmd-K and also I've seen those kind of search boxes get more smarts like being able to type "part:A21445" to go directly to a specific UI. I just suggested the above as we learned some interesting user experiences became possible when our AI assistant had the ability to control our UI directly on behalf of a specific user. An example in the app I worked in (a web based data pipeline tool): - "Hey assistant, can you help me add some SQL transformation logic to dataflow ABC, to process the customer data?" - system uses metadata and knowledge of the UI to open the right dataflow, select the right type of UI to open to enable the user to add a SQL query in the right place, maybe even autogenerate the initial SQL query - this all from the main home page of the app, from a side panel chat assistant. - net result feels like talking to the assistant to operate the app, almost no clicks required. I hope that makes sense.

barbinbrad 1y ago
really appreciate you taking the time to write this! we've started trying to work through adding agents like this: https://x.com/barbinbrad/status/1903047303180464586 https://x.com/barbinbrad/status/1903047303180464586 the trouble is that there are 1000s of possible mutations -- and the quality of an agent tends to diminsh with the amount of "tools" you give it. i need to figure out the right abstraction for this.
- jazzyjackson 1y ago
  I pray you focus on your core product and don’t fall into an agentification rabbit hole. If you do want everything to be automatable take a page from Blender and give every action a key binding plus a Python method, so Python scripts can take the same actions a human would, but as function calls instead of clicks. Then maybe maybe maybe you can have a text field that allows natural language to transform to an action, but please god stay away from chat interfaces. Rhino CAD is another interesting interface to look at, there’s a million buttons and menus but there’s also a text field at the top of the viewport where you can just type a command if you already know the name instead of rummaging through submenus. Kind of a CLI within the GUI.
  - sixdimensional 1y ago
    I somewhat agree with you, especially that one could identify a common abstraction that later an LLM could piggyback on top of. Genuine question though - have you implemented an AI assistant/chat interface recently using LLMs on top of a UI? I agree it can be a rabbit hole, but I just got through doing it on an app and there were definitely some things it really made way simpler and some complex scenarios that I'm not sure could have been done any more simply.
    - jazzyjackson 1y ago
      I built a chat interface in 2017 (this was with chatscript dialog trees with hole-filling and semantic search) that was ostensibly to prevent our data scientists from redundant work, ie, before they spent all day writing a SQL script, describe the job of the script and see if one already exists. The chatbot would then ask for the parameters required for a script, run the job, and then present a CSV of the returned data. As we collected user feedback and refined the UX, we got closer and closer to an option tree that could be better represented by a drop down menu. It was kind of depressing, but I learned that the actual job of that R & D wasn't to come up with a superintelligent chatbot that replaced data scientists, it was to come up with the infrastructure that would allow data scientists to put their python scripts in a common repository to allow re-use without re-installing locally and screwing around with pyenvs. Anyway, I'm also traumatized by my involvement with a YC startup that actually had a very good (if ENRONish) product around peer to peer energy futures trading that completely fell apart when investors demanded they make it "AI"

aitchnyu 1y ago

Please share the feedback for keyboard shortcuts from real users. Now shops in India tend to use touchscreens or have staff fiddle with laptops with tiny touchpads, but lots of shops use ERPs (Tally) with 90s UI that dont need mouse.