We are proud to announce a new 3.6.0 update of " Alloy - Launcher and Automator 3".      


This update includes:


Chat Functions

Chat "functions" represent activities should be done in response to some incoming messages. Such incoming messages can either:

  • contain clear instructions which "function" should be called together with its arguments or
  • the "function" and its arguments can be determined based on the message content


Example of such functions can be: getting weather forecast, sending emails, getting some statistics data, finding contacts etc.




To initiate a function call the "Send" or "Refresh" workflows should simply add a new "Chat Message" with the "Function" Type, function name as the Message, and function arguments as the "Custom Data". As result a Workflow having exact name of the function will be automatically called  with the conversation::ChatConversation and arguments::Map arguments.



A "function" Workflow after performing desired activities may:

  • Indicate that "function" was completed (e.g. by posting a local notification) and do not update the Chat Conversation
  • Add some "incoming" messages to the Chat Conversation with the results of the "function"
  • Return the results of the "function" to the sender for further processing by automatic sending results via the "Send" workflow. This can be done simply by adding a new "Chat Message" with the "Function Result"Type, function name as the Message, and function result as the "Custom Data".


A "function" Workflow  has the arguments:

  1. conversation::ChatConversation - a Chat Conversation to work with
  2. arguments::Map - arguments for a function call


A "function" Workflow  should return a conversation::ChatConversation. Usually it just returns the same conversation as passed to the Workflow.


ChatGPT Action

The ChatGPT action now fully supports "functions" so you can make your own private plugins to extend ChatGPT functionality. To specify the "function" definitions - choose the "Edit Functions" from the action's context menu.


Supported Functions

  1. "get current weather" - provides current weather so you may ask "What’s the weather like in Boston right now?"
  2. "get contact by name" - provides getting contact information by contact name so you may ask "Give me email of Kate Bell".
  3. "email" - provides ability to send email to a contact with generated subject and text so you may ask "Send email with birthday greetings to Kate Bell".
  4. "sms" - provides ability to send sms to a contact with generated text so you may ask "Sms birthday greetings to Kate Bell".
  5. "get file content as text" - allows getting a local file content as text (text and PDF files are supported). So you may ask anything about content of your local files like "Count spaces in the noname.txt file". To get your files accessible to the ChatGPT you should share your files to Alloy and save them to the Local Storage when prompted.
  6. "get current location" - allows getting current location. So you may ask location specific questions like "Tell me the biggest cities near my location?".
  7. "get web page text" - allows getting human readable text of a Web page. So you can ask anything about the content of specific Web pages like "What form of the grille has the car in https://www.autoblog.com/223123/ Web page?"

Other Improvements and Fixes

  • Improved rendering of context menu previews for Chat messages

  • Improved accuracy of the "Find Location" task