Iterative AI editing & faster AI responses

Iterative AI editing

Asking Deepnote AI to edit the content of a Python or SQL block is a powerful feature that can significantly enhance your ability to modify and debug your code. Often, achieving the optimal outcome involves iterative changes: you request a modification, run the code, and then realize further adjustments are needed. This back-and-forth interaction with the AI is typical when working with LLMs. However, until now, it required a workaround in Deepnote. Previously, you could only request a single edit at a time, meaning multi-step changes necessitated duplicating the given block and starting anew with a fresh prompt.

We’re excited to introduce iterative AI editing to streamline this workflow. Now, when you request an AI edit in a code/SQL block and receive a suggestion, you can immediately type in a new prompt as a follow-up. The AI will process this new prompt and provide another edit suggestion. As always, you can instantly run the code for these suggestions to observe how they impact your outputs.

Each AI follow-up suggestion is added as a new item to your edits history list. If you wish to revert to a previous stage in your editing flow, you can simply click on the desired step from the list, returning the block to that specific state. This feature allows you to effortlessly compare results across different prompts and continue with the most promising options.

This iterative editing flow essentially functions as an isolated mini-chat with the AI, ensuring that all the context of your prompts and AI outputs is preserved during your editing. The significant advantage is that you don’t need to repeatedly rewrite your original prompts; you can simply use short instructions as you would in a chat. For instance, if something doesn’t quite work, you can just say "try another option," and the AI will understand how to proceed.

The new editing flow can also help you keep your notebook more organized! Working with generative AI is inherently experimental, and maintaining the in-between stages in your notebook can create a mess of duplicated blocks. With iterative editing, you gain a safe drafting space, allowing you the freedom to commit only the final results to the notebook, ensuring it remains clean and focused for others to see.

See the new AI editing features in action in the video below!

Faster AI responses

You might have noticed that the speed of AI code generation, editing and fixing has significantly increased! This improvement is due to our switch to the latest and most capable OpenAI model. We hope you enjoy the 2x speed boost, which pairs especially well with the new iterative editing flow!