ASKING FOR HELP/BEGINNER NOOB to A.I. and ML (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity) I know what A.I can and is used for, but I don’t have a strong understanding of the benefits it can provide

[u/Djxgam1ng]

ASKING FOR HELP/BEGINNER NOOB to A.I. and ML (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity) I know what A.I can and is used for, but I don’t have a strong understanding of the benefits it can provide

I am not in the tech field and I don’t create content for a living. I enjoy posting on different social media platforms and love to stream video games. I want to understand A.I. I want to know how to create prompts. It would be great to know some practical uses of these programs to maybe make my life easier (I do have an iPhone and gaming PC, and Apple products, but live in condo so my home isn’t all wired up electronically) and also maybe some uses geared towards just for fun.

I don’t really know where to start. I have ChatGPT on my phone, I do have Siri (iPhone), and I have X Premium (which I think means I have access to Grok.

Is there a certain use case scenarios one would use a specific A.I program for some things and another if you are trying to achieve something else? Do they all more or less produce similar results (maybe minor differences) or are some better than others. I looked at some pricing tiers and shocked to see how much some people pay per month to have unlimited queries, etc

I’ll be honest, I know what a prompt is, but don’t know, if there are any, certain rules or guidelines to follow when starting off with one (wording, what’s allowed, language or terms more friendly to help me get what I am looking for or terminology that I should avoid)?? Is it good to always add a photo? Can you add audio to a prompt (say I wanted a program to alter a song or something audio)?

I know this post is vague and a little all over, but just trying to get some assistance. I also know this specific community is meant specifically for the Grok (X) application, but after reading through some posts in other communities, this community seems a little more welcoming to people who have no idea how to use A.I and others can be pretty hurtful and discouraging when asking questions

TLDR: Give me some tips/tricks and helpful advice to assist me in learning and using different A.I Applications. Mainly use my IPhone 17 Pro Max, but I do have a M4 MacBook Pro and a gaming pc (5080). I mention specs because I know sometimes that matters in what you are trying to accomplish.

Thanks again

[u/Duente_Zaibatsu]

It does look you have a hammer and are looking for nails in the dentist office...

A tool is a tool and should have an intended purpose.

First, you should consider if you have a deterministic or stochastic problem, and if you want a deterministic or stochastic solution (all combinations).

Most companies fail to use the tools because they skip that.

Then, consider the cost of the solution, applications are money fountains, because they solve the same problem, repeatedly, for pennies, regardless of tools.

Finally, you do not have the hardware for the simplest of the models(and the know how), so you are likely to rent the solution from outside, they can almost instantly copy and outsell you, and you would have to pay them for the privilege...

Same as Amazon did with their resale business...

Nothing new, new scam age.

And to your question, no one would be able to gude you on such a vage question.

A calculator would suffice, or billions of Mainframes...

[u/Djxgam1ng]

Just looking for help ya’ll. Not trying to be made fun of. My confidence and self esteem is already really bad. I appreciate all the help. Hope you guys have a great week.

[u/ElJefe1967 → u/Djxgam1ng]

This is what I tell my friends and family: Stop using Google to search for anything, use your favorite AI chat...if at any point in your day you have a question about anything, ask the AI.

When asking, talk naturally and don't worry about mistakes...they can be cleared up in the following conversation with the AI chat.

When asking, provide as much information as you can...answer the What, Where, When, Why and Who of the question....the more information you provide in your question the better the answer will generally be.

You can ask about any topic you can think of, if it can't answer a question because of safety or guidelines, the AI will let you know.

If possible, get a microphone and use the voice feature as it lets you describe things better than typing or at least to me it's more natural and faster...like having a conversation with a really smart person. Don't worry about saying anything wrong it can be cleared up just like in a conversation with a human.

The 2nd phase after you're thoroughly used to using AI chat is to move onto agents. Agents can be thought of as individual AIs that can do much more than answer questions.

If you install, for example Grok Bot on your PC, and IF you give it permissions to access certain parts of your local PC it can create documents, spreadsheets etc. and modify existing ones. If you don't know if it can do a particular task, ask it if it can do it.

You can also give it access to your email and it will organize and clear out spam and block spam and even reply to emails if you grant it permission.

To do these kinds of extended tasks the chat bot will need access to "apps" such as Gmail etc. which is done by clicking the "Connect apps" button in the Grok Bot UI. In that page you can select which apps you want the bot to have access to and through those apps it will be able to perform tasks related to that app such as Gmail.

Beyond that you can use it for your work if your employer allows it in much the same way.

Hope this helps.

[u/Ian-Cubeless]

Honestly the free ChatGPT you already have is plenty to start, I wouldn’t pay for anything until you hit a wall. There aren’t really magic words, just give it context: who you are, what you’re trying to do, and what you want back. And when it gets something wrong, tell it what’s off and let it try again instead of starting over. Easiest way to learn is throwing real stuff at it, like pasting your OBS settings and asking why your stream keeps dropping frames.

[u/Strong-Finish5346]

My uses for AI:

Email

I have connected claude to my gmail account so I can just ask him to tell me if there are any emails that need my attention. Whenever I get added to a long email chain, I get AI to give me a summary of the conversation instead of reading it myself.

Scheduling

I have claude connected to my google calendar and I can just ask him what I have on for the day/week

Health and fitness

I have set up Claude to directly pull health data from my various fitness apps. So I can say "hey Claude, look at my nutrition and weight info and tell me how my calorie deficit is going".

I use claude for nutrition tracking. So as I cook, I weigh out the ingredients and say them out loud to Claude and he keeps track of it and then reads them back to me as I enter the recipe into chronometer.

For less precise tracking, you can take a photo of your plate and get a rough calorie estimate. (estimate gets better if you can tell it what each item is and roughly how much there is and any sauces and oil you used)

Tech support

Any time I have a tech support issue, I take a screenshot and feed it to Claude and he can instantly and correctly diagnose the problem and provide steps to fix it.

I use claude to walk me through things I might want to do but don't know how. For example, I had no idea how to connect claude to my fitness apps, and I didn't even know if it was possible. So I just asked "is this possible, and if so how do i do it?" And claude just gives me step by step instructions and if i run into trouble, I just feed him screenshots.

Coding

This is well known but you can ask claude to write any program you can imagine and it will do it and it will work.

Research

Claude can do its own research on the web, you can feed it academic papers yourself and it will comb through them and give you the relevant info you're looking for.

Learning

This ties into research. If you want to understand a dense academic paper, claude can read it, comprehend it and break it down in a way anybody can understand.

Claude is excellent for learning how to use software. I'm currently using it to learn how to use qGIS.

Shopping

This is a subset of research but I find claude is excellent for comparison shopping and bargain hunting.

[u/CuteQuail448]

The best way to start is to pick one everyday task or hobby and experiment with AI until you find what actually saves you time or makes things more fun.

[u/usernamedregs]

If you have made it this far, don't do it! The hype (always) oversells what they can do at present.

This is not to say they are not useful, but they are only truly useful in niche situations, maybe don't go looking in vain for those situations and just wait for one to present itself - then you can get sucked down the rabbit hole constructively.

[u/Powerful_Schedule939]

For prompts, just write like you're talking to a person who knows a ton but needs context. Tell it what you want, add relevant details, and specify the format you'd like back. You don't need magic words, and adding photos or audio works if the app supports it, though not every model handles both. For streaming and posting, AI can help you brainstorm clip titles, write better bios, or even draft replies when you're stuck.

Each tool has its own flavor. ChatGPT is a good all-rounder for explanations and writing, Claude tends to be a bit more nuanced with long text, Gemini ties into Google stuff, and Grok is more conversational with a looser personality. You don't need to pay for most things starting out.