A New Era for AI and Google Workspace

But when [exactly]?

Like many of you, I was on the API waitlist for PaLM and other Google AI tools. I assumed it would support Google Apps Script as an advanced service, but so far, there’s nothing to write about. But when these new integrations emerge, there will be new and exciting development opportunities to build far beyond the essentials offered by Duet, which is great for helping you write an email message or compose a white paper.

There are two big reasons to be excited about AI in Google Apps Script:

1. Duet is capable of serving as a code development Copilot, much like GitHub Copilot.

2. Leveraging all of the possibilities of PaLM 2 LLMs from within Google Apps Script.

For #2, I’ve been successfully building AI systems with Apps Script for more than a year now. It’s been very productive, and through this experience, I’ve been able to create API calls to employ almost any LLM desired, including PaLM, OpenAI GPT models, etc. However, it requires more code than I care to create, knowing that eventually, Apps Script libraries and integrated SDKs will emerge to streamline AI development.

As to #1 - a copilot for the apps script editor; Duet provides this capability as shown in this Cloud editing example.

Google Cloud Editor using Duet Code Creation

I want this in the Google Apps Script editor. I’m certain it’s coming soon. Until then, I’m using Grammarly GO.

Yep, it’s not what you (nor I) were expecting. How could a writing tool known for its decade-long grammatical and spelling support, work with Javascript code? Especially the V8 super-variant of Google Apps Script.

When I first began to use Grammarly’s beta release named “Go”, I was inclined to disable it when using the Google Apps Script editor. That changed almost my accident. I was trying to help a friend in Slack and needed to quickly create some code to make a point. Grammarly was waiting there in plain sight ready to help. I use the desktop version of Grammarly so that it is available in all apps. So, I thought I’d try it for code generation. It worked.

Let’s examine the boundaries of Grammarly’s code awareness in the context of actual Google Apps Script code examples.