https://ryanorban.com/categories/creative-prompting/Recent content in Creative-Prompting on Ryan OrbanHugoen-usme@ryanorban.com (Ryan Orban)me@ryanorban.com (Ryan Orban)Ryan OrbanSun, 04 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000https://ryanorban.com/notes/virtual-machine-inside-chatgpt/Sun, 04 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000me@ryanorban.com (Ryan Orban)https://ryanorban.com/notes/virtual-machine-inside-chatgpt/<h3 id="summary" class="scroll-mt-8 group"> Summary <a href="#summary" class="no-underline hidden opacity-50 hover:opacity-100 !text-inherit group-hover:inline-block" aria-hidden="true" title="Link to this heading" tabindex="-1"> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="16" height="16" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" stroke-width="2" class="lucide lucide-link w-4 h-4 block" viewBox="0 0 24 24" > <path d="M10 13a5 5 0 0 0 7.54.54l3-3a5 5 0 0 0-7.07-7.07l-1.72 1.71" /> <path d="M14 11a5 5 0 0 0-7.54-.54l-3 3a5 5 0 0 0 7.07 7.07l1.71-1.71" /> </svg> </a> </h3> <p>Jonas Degrave&rsquo;s viral December 2022 blog post demonstrates prompting ChatGPT to roleplay as a Linux virtual machine, executing shell commands and producing plausible output. The setup is a system prompt establishing ChatGPT as a terminal, then a conversation where commands like <code>ls</code>, <code>pwd</code>, <code>cat</code>, <code>python3</code>, and <code>gcc</code> are &ldquo;executed&rdquo; and ChatGPT responds with realistic-looking terminal output. The machine maintains state across the conversation — creating files, editing them, and retrieving them later.</p>