OpenAI's ChatGPT Work: Cloud and Desktop Versions Explained
OpenAI announced ChatGPT Work on July 9th, offering two versions: a cloud-based service accessible via chatgpt.com and mobile apps, and a desktop app (formerly Codex) that can access files and run programs locally. The desktop app bundles a full Python, Node.js, LibreOffice, and other native binaries in its cache. Currently, ChatGPT Work is available only to subscribers paying $20/month or more.
Coverage timeline
Simon Willison
OpenAI announced ChatGPT Work on July 9th, and have been furiously iterating on it ever since. It is an extraordinarily confusing and very powerful product. Here's what I've figured out about it so far. ChatGPT Work is actually two products The more interesting version of ChatGPT Work is the one that runs in the cloud. This can be accessed via chatgpt.com or through the ChatGPT mobile apps. Let's call it Work Cloud . If you install the ChatGPT desktop app - the app that used to be called Codex - you gain access to a thing called ChatGPT Work that can access files and run programs directly on your computer. Let's call that one Work Local . This one feels more like regular Codex re-skinned to be less intimidating to non-software-developers. For the rest of this article I'm going to talk exclusively about Work Cloud. Work is for paid subscribers only Right now, ChatGPT Work (in both flavors) is available only to $20/month and up subscribers. Free users and $8/month Go users do not have ac
I was poking around in my ~/.cache/ folder using OmniDiskSweeper when I spotted something interesting. The OpenAI Codex desktop app (since rebranded to just ChatGPT) has 1.7GB of stuff in there in a folder called codex-primary-runtime , including a full Python installation, a full Node.js installation, and native binaries for Poppler , git, and the LibreOffice open source office suite (which forked from OpenOffice.org in 2010): The ~/.cache/codex-runtimes/codex-primary-runtime/plugins/openai-primary-runtime/plugins/documents folder includes skills which tell Codex how to find and use those binaries. Tags: codex , generative-ai , openai , ai , llms , openoffice , open-source
