I recently got access to DALL-E 3 through OpenAI’s ChatGPT+ interface. One of the key features and improvements in their image model is the ability to generate coherent text within the image.

Let’s give it a try, based on one of the most popular StackOverflow questions: How do I exit Vim?

Using the following prompt: Oil painting of a hacker furiously typing commands into an old computer and muttering to himself, “how does one exit vim?”

That… is pretty good!

Alrighty, I updated the logic this weekend and have Mr. RossBot operating on the hairy elephant website (Mastodon). (It’s also posting on Threads, if you’re into that sort of thing.)

I also updated the image model to use Stability.ai’s swanky new SDXL model. I’m pretty impressed with the results.

Alright, this is pretty awesome! 🎉

Last night at 11:27PM, my little generative AI side project, ArtBot, crossed 10,000,000 images created. People have created some pretty cool stuff.

Some random stats from Google Analytics since it launched on October 9th, 2022 to now:

• 71,000 unique users
• 8.3 million page views.

My Steam Deck has to be one of my favorite gadgets in the last few years. Gaming aside, the fact that it’s running Linux opens up all sorts of interesting possibilities.

For example, let’s use it to add a new feature to ArtBot… while I’m on an airplane. The screen is tiny, but oh man, it actually worked.

Using a customized prompt, you can (for now, at least), get ChatGPT to misbehave a bit.

For example, I turned it into an angry programmer.

Thanks to Reddit, I recently stumbled upon a cool project called Stable Horde. It essentially lets you generate images using a distributed cluster of GPUs donated by community members.

I had been creating my own web interface to remotely interact with a Stable Diffusion instance running on my own machine. I decided to quickly repurpose the web app and connect to the Stable Horde API. The result?

ArtBot, a Stable Diffusion demonstration that allows you to generate images using the power of the Stable Horde. It is awesome!

Oops. I guess I accidentally typed in “git status” (no, I didn’t — I do this all the time!)

Now, MacOS needs to redownload all the dev tools again. It looks like it’s going to be awhile.

Fun fact: The time between when Tyrannosaurus Rex existed and now is less than the time between now and when Git will finally be installed on this machine.

A problem that often happens to me: I get the inspiration to whip up something in Node.js  (for fun, for experimentation, for a side project, etc) but then I realize that I need to go through the process of actually setting things up before I can even start writing some code.

Usually, I have to dig through previous projects and copy over my eslint and prettier config files, read through some documentation and remember how to setup TypeScript again, install the correct dependencies for running tests. Before I know it, I’m bored and tired and no longer interested in doing whatever I was going to do.

I decided to experiment with some command line tools and created a Node.js script that can help me quickly bootstrap a new project with common configuration parameters that I use. It’s available on GitHub: Bootstrap Node Project.

The GIF above shows this tool in action. I’m able to get the scaffolding for a new project up and running within about 20 seconds! After running, the project structure looks like this (with associated npm start and test scripts, all ready to go). That is pretty awesome.

my-cool-project/
├─ .husky/
├─ node_modules/
├─ src/
│ ├─ index.js (.ts)
│ ├─ index.test.js (.ts)
├─ .eslintrc.json
├─ .gitignore
├─ .prettierrc
├─ package-lock.json
├─ package.json
├─ README.md
├─ tsconfig.json (optional)

Obviously, it’s highly opinionated and caters to configuration options that I personally like to use. But I figure it’s a great resource for anyone who wishes to roll their own utility to quickly bootstrap projects as well.

Earlier this evening, I was playing around with OpenAI’s GPT-3 language model for generating “human-like text.”

I gave it the following prompt:

Write a plot about a movie that involves rogue unicorns who want to
conquer Earth and the planet’s only hope is an Australian Cattle dog named Benson who sleeps a lot.

The response?

The unicorns, led by their king, Uni, have been planning their conquest of Earth for years. They have been observing the humans and have concluded that they are weak and vulnerable. The unicorns have developed a powerful magic that will allow them to take over the planet.

Benson, an Australian Cattle dog, is the only one who can stop them. Benson is a lazy dog who loves to sleep. He is content to spend his days lounging around and eating food. However, when the unicorns begin their attack, Benson is the only one who can stop them. He rallies the other dogs and leads them in a fight against the unicorns.

The unicorns are powerful, but they are no match for Benson and the other dogs. Benson is able to defeat Uni and the other unicorns, and the Earth is saved.

Summer blockbuster coming soon to a theater near you!