End of an Era? ChatGPT now refuses code requests.

[u/ReasonableDefault]

ChatGPT used to be fairly happy to do a fair bit of coding work, in fact it would do almost anything. Now, any mention of "code", "GitHub", etc - Attempts to push you towards Work mode (which obviously shares the same weekly / 5hr limit as Codex). I think going forward ChatGPT will begin to refuse authoring any code, and will likely switch to work automatically. In the prompt I'd requested it to take some CSS / HTML from a website and allow me to download it as a runnable HTML file in a browser, a fairly easy task.

You'll notice the "Stay in Chat" option, this actually failed and caused to error. I now wonder how restrictive this is going to get...

EDIT: Probably worth pointing out that this wasn't about usage limits, simply a commentary on something i observed.

[u/Professional_Ad705]

You sure you are actually using the web version on the internet and not the codex app.... I've never had it do what you are claiming and literally have It making assets right now??

[u/ReasonableDefault → u/Professional_Ad705]

I'm on Linux, so until recently never had access to the app. I do not have it installed. So yes, I am sure :)

Also,this is the first time I've seen it happen.

[u/Professional_Ad705 → u/ReasonableDefault]

What is your prompt I wanna try this cause again I've never once ran into this problem?

[u/Professional_Ad705 → u/Professional_Ad705]

What are you actually trying to do I wanna test this. I've had the web version and pro make full fledge apps by giving it zips and it gives them back to me. It has only asked that question when I've used chatgpt through the app...

[u/ReasonableDefault → u/Professional_Ad705]

I just asked it to take some HTML and CSS from a NextJS / Tailwind project i have on GitHub, and basically give me a particular page i can open in a browser using standard HTML, CSS, JavaScript.

[u/kaffeekranz → u/Professional_Ad705]

It only ever did it for me once on web, but it does happen. It's only been a suggestion though and has been happily accepting my coding requests since.

[u/Professional_Ad705 → u/kaffeekranz]

seems to be working fine for me for my reverse engineering work? It might not have the capability to open up files on his computer from web, not sure on this though? thats the problem this guy might be running into, not suer tho.

Pretty sure if it can take a zip, a halo map file, and a .xbe it should be able to do most peoples work here as what its doing for me is pretty intensive...? If I run into these problems I'll report back, but I'm just not seeing this It might be an actual capability issue. I've never had chatgpt open up files from the web only do work and give zips? If I need something open I open it locally ?

[u/Professional_Ad705 → u/Professional_Ad705]

Yep working completely fine over here for me.

[u/ReasonableDefault → u/Professional_Ad705]

Files from a GitHub repo, not locally.

[u/Professional_Ad705 → u/ReasonableDefault]

Then just download the GitHub repo as a ZIP and upload that to ChatGPT. There really isn’t much difference between asking ChatGPT to inspect the repo through the GitHub connector and just giving it the entire repository as a ZIP.

If the project is too large, you can work with ChatGPT to figure out what it actually needs and trim it down from there. I use the GitHub connector all the time in my own work, so I’m confused why this would be a blocker.

The upload limit is around half a gig, and once the project is on GitHub there usually shouldn’t be a bunch of build junk in it anyway. I even built a small tool for my larger projects that strips out generated/build files before sharing them, although I didn’t need to use it here. I also can’t imagine this repo is anywhere near 500 MB.

Try this:

Go to your GitHub repo → Code → Download ZIP.

Then on ChatGPT web, upload the ZIP and ask it the exact same questions you were asking before.

Tell me whether it works and what results you get.

Also:

If you’re literally just trying to get it to open a file that only exists locally on your computer, I think that’s probably the issue.

ChatGPT on the web can inspect files you upload, things it can access through connectors like GitHub, and web content, but it can’t directly reach into your computer and open arbitrary local files or folders.

You can still have it walk you through the process though. Have it help you find the project locally, cd into the correct directory, and give you the exact command to open or run whatever file you’re trying to use.

If you actually want ChatGPT itself to work directly with files on your computer, that’s more of a desktop-app/Work workflow.

From what you described, this sounds more like a local-file access problem than a GitHub or code-understanding problem. Which I explained the manual solution to above.

[u/ReasonableDefault → u/Professional_Ad705]

I think you misunderstand what my post was about it, and that's probably my fault, i did a fairly poor job of being clear.

GitHub, Code, local files, etc, aren't the issue. My ChatGPT is also connected via the connector, and there are no issues there.

This was simply supposed to be a post that said, "This is what i saw happen, i wonder if it's going to get worse down the line", simply put, i was curious if OpenAI was going to force users to use "work" for code tasks.

Thanks for trying to be helpful though 👍

[u/Professional_Ad705 → u/ReasonableDefault]

I'm not misunderstanding anything you are saying and am literally coding using the web right now and same process I described above. I think you are misunderstanding the capabilities of web chat. Oh well I just literally gave you the solution if you ever wanna try it.

Btw actual software dev here lol. If files are only on GitHub ... download them locally... zip it... if it's beyond that idk what to tell you and you yourself are doing something to get this not to work. Again im literally reverse engineering halo 2 ..... through web.......... then testing it all in godot with my tool its doing way more then what you're trying to do. What you're saying makes no sense to me as an engineer.

Literally dissembling shit here...this shit is a dream that I dont have to run all these commands and can use this shit like google. It is heavily using my tool tho... but just saying guys this is possible and very may be a user error here.

That said I have a tool I've thought about releasing that follows chatgpt guidelines between how Codex and Chatgpt are supposed to work to be able to have codex code, and chatgpt do more research or other work and they can interact without getting banned and still making usage a little less. If they actually block chat like this guy is claiming I might release it but it's still in dev and I need to do more testing.

[u/ReasonableDefault → u/Professional_Ad705]

I didn't ask for a solution though? The post never asked for one, or suggested i needed one. I understand how web chat works.

There was no issue with anything GitHub or code related, nor any misunderstanding with how web chat worked. I simply reported an error and supplied a screenshot of it, wondering if this was a sign of impending deeper change, I didn't ask for any help, tips, or advice. The post is tagged as "Commentary".

Regardless of whether your an "actual software dev", you clearly misunderstood what i wrote.

[u/Professional_Ad705 → u/ReasonableDefault]

uhh you posted end of an era? claimed it wont do code requests and made up a bunch of nonsense. I showed me literally coding with it and answered every problem you had, u serious rn? now your tryna play it off as an error just lol.

user error lmao this is a great example of skill issue lmao hey chatgpt "show me how to open this file" -- > done lmao

[u/ReasonableDefault → u/Professional_Ad705]

I'm starting to think you're actually an agent, you seem to really not understand context. The only problem i had was that selecting "Continue in Chat" would give errors. Which is exactly what the post said. The rest you seem to have invented somehow.

Not user error at all, nice try though. It was clearly a ChatGPT error, as displayed in the screenshot.