Understanding ChatGPT Work

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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. OpenAI 于 7 月 9 日发布了 ChatGPT Work，并从那时起一直在对其进行疯狂的迭代。这是一个极其令人困惑但又非常强大的产品。以下是我目前对它的了解。

ChatGPT Work is actually two products

ChatGPT Work 实际上是两款产品

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. ChatGPT Work 中更有趣的版本是运行在云端的那个。可以通过 chatgpt.com 或 ChatGPT 移动应用程序访问它。我们称之为 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. (Update: Work Cloud is also available from the ChatGPT desktop app, via a “Where should this chat run?” dropdown.) For the rest of this article I’m going to talk exclusively about Work Cloud. 如果你安装了 ChatGPT 桌面应用（即以前被称为 Codex 的应用），你就可以访问一个名为 ChatGPT Work 的功能，它能够直接访问你电脑上的文件并运行程序。我们称之为 Work Local。这个版本感觉更像是普通 Codex 的换皮版，旨在降低非软件开发人员的使用门槛。（更新：Work Cloud 也可通过 ChatGPT 桌面应用访问，通过“此对话应在哪里运行？”下拉菜单选择。）在本文的其余部分，我将专门讨论 Work Cloud。

Work is for paid subscribers only

Work 仅面向付费订阅者

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 access. 目前，ChatGPT Work（两种版本）仅向每月 20 美元及以上的订阅者开放。免费用户和每月 8 美元的 Go 用户无法访问。

Work has features that aren’t available in Chat

Work 拥有 Chat 所不具备的功能

The interface for accessing Work is a tab selector, which presents it as an alternative to Chat. The obvious question is when should I use Chat, and when should I use Work? 访问 Work 的界面是一个标签选择器，它将 Work 作为 Chat 的替代方案呈现。显而易见的问题是：我应该在什么时候使用 Chat，又在什么时候使用 Work？

OpenAI’s official answer to that question is: Use Chat when you want an answer, explanation, brainstorm, or short draft. Use ChatGPT Work when you want ChatGPT to complete a task with a clear outcome, such as a brief, deck, analysis, recurring update, workflow, or file you can review and use. OpenAI 对此问题的官方回答是：当你需要答案、解释、头脑风暴或简短草稿时，请使用 Chat。当你希望 ChatGPT 完成具有明确结果的任务（例如简报、演示文稿、分析、定期更新、工作流或你可以审查和使用的文件）时，请使用 ChatGPT Work。

I find that almost entirely useless, because I’ve been using regular ChatGPT Chat for all of those task categories for years! The better question then is what features does Work have that are missing from Chat? After extensive experimentation I think I’ve mostly figured that out: 我觉得这个回答几乎毫无用处，因为多年来我一直都在用普通的 ChatGPT Chat 处理所有这些类别的任务！那么更好的问题是：Work 拥有哪些 Chat 所缺失的功能？经过大量的实验，我想我已经基本弄清楚了：

Options to use Luna and Terra in place of Sol
使用 Luna 和 Terra 代替 Sol 的选项
A code execution environment with Internet access
具备互联网访问权限的代码执行环境
A headless Chrome browser
无头 Chrome 浏览器
A persistent filesystem shared between sessions
跨会话共享的持久化文件系统
The ability to publish ChatGPT Sites
发布 ChatGPT Sites 的能力
The ability to run sub-agent sessions with Sol, Luna, and Terra
使用 Sol、Luna 和 Terra 运行子代理会话的能力
Scheduled prompt automations (may be in ChatGPT Chat too)
定时提示词自动化（可能在 ChatGPT Chat 中也有）

Model selection

模型选择

In Work, you get the option to pick GPT-5.6 Sol, Luna, or Terra, each with Light, Medium, High, Extra High, Max, or Ultra reasoning levels. You can also pick GPT-5.5 at Light, Medium, High, or Extra High. These look to be the same models that are available through the OpenAI API. 在 Work 中，你可以选择 GPT-5.6 Sol、Luna 或 Terra，每种模型都有 Light、Medium、High、Extra High、Max 或 Ultra 推理级别。你也可以选择 Light、Medium、High 或 Extra High 级别的 GPT-5.5。这些看起来与通过 OpenAI API 提供的模型相同。

Chat offers a different selection: 5.6 Instant, Medium, High, Extra High, and Pro (actually Extra High and Pro are only available for $100/month+ subscribers—$20/month subscribers cap out at High). It doesn’t explain if those are Luna or Terra or Sol (I’m assuming Sol?). 5.6 Pro appears to be exclusive to Chat, with no equivalent in Work. My current understanding from using Codex is that Ultra is a special mode that more eagerly delegates to sub-agents. I believe ChatGPT Work sessions are billed against your Codex allowance, while ChatGPT Chat Sessions get their own, separate allowance. This may help explain the model availability differences. Chat 提供了不同的选择：5.6 Instant、Medium、High、Extra High 和 Pro（实际上 Extra High 和 Pro 仅供每月 100 美元及以上的订阅者使用——每月 20 美元的订阅者上限为 High）。它没有解释这些是 Luna、Terra 还是 Sol（我假设是 Sol？）。5.6 Pro 似乎是 Chat 独有的，在 Work 中没有对应版本。根据我使用 Codex 的经验，目前的理解是 Ultra 是一种特殊的模式，它更积极地将任务委派给子代理。我相信 ChatGPT Work 会话是计入你的 Codex 配额的，而 ChatGPT Chat 会话则有其独立的配额。这或许有助于解释模型可用性的差异。

Code execution with Internet access!

具备互联网访问权限的代码执行环境！

As a long-time fan of the Code Interpreter pattern—pioneered by OpenAI in 2023—this is by far the most exciting feature of ChatGPT Work (Cloud) for me. The code execution environment can now talk to the rest of the internet! 作为 OpenAI 在 2023 年开创的“代码解释器”（Code Interpreter）模式的长期粉丝，这是目前为止 ChatGPT Work (Cloud) 最让我兴奋的功能。代码执行环境现在可以与互联网的其他部分进行通信了！

ChatGPT Chat can’t do this—if you ask it to install additional software packages or interact with websites or APIs that access will be blocked by the container proxy. (Weirdly, back in January it grew the ability to install packages, but that doesn’t seem to work any more. I wish they had better changelogs!) ChatGPT Chat 做不到这一点——如果你要求它安装额外的软件包或与网站或 API 交互，该访问将被容器代理拦截。（奇怪的是，早在 1 月份它曾具备安装软件包的能力，但现在似乎不行了。我希望他们能提供更好的更新日志！）

Claude’s equivalent container has allowed restricted internet access since it launched last September. Claude can install packages from PYPI and NPM and clone repositories from GitHub. But that is about it: the allowlist of domains is very short. ChatGPT Work allows a whole lot more than that. It can be configured with a specific list of allowed domains, but the default appears to be open to all. This makes Work an incredibly useful tool. You can have it clone GitHub repositories, install their dependencies, then use them to interact with the rest of the web! Claude 的同类容器自去年 9 月推出以来就允许受限的互联网访问。Claude 可以从 PYPI 和 NPM 安装软件包，并从 GitHub 克隆存储库。但仅此而已：允许访问的域名列表非常短。ChatGPT Work 允许的范围要大得多。它可以配置特定的允许域名列表，但默认情况下似乎对所有域名开放。这使得 Work 成为一个非常有用的工具。你可以让它克隆 GitHub 存储库，安装它们的依赖项，然后利用它们与互联网的其他部分进行交互！

A full, headless Chrome browser

一个完整的无头 Chrome 浏览器

Another killer feature of ChatGPT Work is the browser tool. ChatGPT Work can launch a full Chrome instance, load websites, fill out forms, and take screenshots. If a site requires sign in the browser can prompt you to take over and enter both passwords and 2FA codes, without round-tripping those credentials through the model itself. It can even run JavaScript against the DOM of loaded pages. ChatGPT Work 的另一个杀手级功能是浏览器工具。ChatGPT Work 可以启动一个完整的 Chrome 实例，加载网站，填写表单并截取屏幕截图。如果网站需要登录，浏览器可以提示你接管并输入密码和双重验证码（2FA），而无需将这些凭据通过模型本身进行中转。它甚至可以在已加载页面的 DOM 上运行 JavaScript。

I prompted: “Load simonwillison.net in your browser and extract the headings using JavaScript” 我输入了提示词：“在浏览器中加载 simonwillison.net 并使用 JavaScript 提取标题”

ChatGPT Work fired up a browser instance and ran the code: ChatGPT Work 启动了一个浏览器实例并运行了代码：

await tab.playwright.evaluate(() => {
  return Array.from(document.querySelectorAll("h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6"), heading => ({
    level: heading.tagName.toLowerCase(),
    text: heading.innerText.trim().replace(/\s+/g, " "),
    id: heading.id || null
  }));
});

This feels a lot like my shot-scraper javascript tool, only now I can access it on my phone! 这感觉很像我的 shot-scraper JavaScript 工具，只是现在我可以在手机上使用它了！

A persistent, shared filesystem

一个持久化的共享文件系统

ChatGPT Chat gets a fresh filesystem for each chat session. These cannot be accessed from any other session. In ChatGPT Work each session gets its own scratch folder—named something like /workspace/scratch/e00a0a017944—but each of those are persisted across sessions, so you can access files from previous chats. I have 171 folders in /workspace/scratch right now! As far as I can tell that /workspace volume is mounted to all Work sessions that are currently running—file edits from one can be instantly seen by the others. ChatGPT Chat 为每个对话会话提供一个全新的文件系统。这些文件无法从其他会话中访问。在 ChatGPT Work 中，每个会话都有自己的临时文件夹（命名类似于 /workspace/scratch/e00a0a017944），但这些文件夹在不同会话间是持久化的，因此你可以访问之前对话中的文件。我现在在 /workspace/scratch 中有 171 个文件夹！据我所知，该 /workspace 卷被挂载到所有当前运行的 Work 会话中——在一个会话中所做的文件修改可以被其他会话立即看到。