And then there was GPT

- For thousands of years, humans have been using all manner of complex tools to assist in their daily activities. It's what separates us from most of the rest of the animal kingdom. Augmenting our work has largely been welcomed. Over time our tools have become vastly more elaborate and helpful. Without machines, for example, the Industrial Revolutions would've been impossible, and the world we know today would not exist. Directly and indirectly, advancements in these tools and machines have resulted in the elevation of billions of people out of extreme poverty. Today, with a combination of robotics and artificial intelligence, or AI, smart machines are designing, developing, and deploying solutions with much less input from humans. AI-enabled capabilities powered by game-changing software and vast amounts of data are demonstrating familiar and convincing human behaviors, such as making things, problem-solving, and pattern recognition. There are few places where AI is more apparent today than in our factories and offices. Enterprise applications are increasingly being powered by AI-enabled software. We see use of this software in areas such as cybersecurity, financial forecasting, engineering, coding, design, and in product lifecycle and supply chain management. New AI capabilities are being introduced all the time. However, sometimes there is a sudden leap in innovation. In 2018, one such event happened. GPT version one was released. GPT, or Generative Pre-trained Transformer, was created by OpenAI, a San Francisco based research laboratory. GPT, and specifically its solution called ChatGPT, released in November 2022, would introduce the existing concept of generative AI to the broader world. This is software that takes input provided by a person or machine and creates remarkable output in the form of text, audio, and visuals. Since its release in 2018, several new versions of GPT have been introduced, expanding and improving what it can deliver. Today, there is a scramble to embed GPT and related generative AI capabilities into all types of existing solutions and to create completely new solutions. This course covers GPT in general, but with version four as the basis for the capabilities explored and examples provided. Before I jump deep into GPT, let's first step back and briefly understand the AI journey that has taken us to where we are today.