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As someone who daily tries and fails to get ChatGPT to follow very simple and clear instructions on how to respond, it’s hard to believe that these system promp

As someone who daily tries and fails to get ChatGPT to follow very simple and clear instructions on how to respond, it’s hard to believe that these system prompts work as described.

willsmith72 3y ago
are you using gpt4? what kind of tasks are you trying to do?
sebzim4500 3y ago
In my experience you kind of just have to lower your standards. i.e. if your system prompt is followed 90% of the time that still a win vs not using one.
- chalsprhebaodu 3y ago
  I would be happy with 10%. I imagine my problem is using ChatGPT with GPT4 rather than the api. I have had a custom prompt with a mix of various requests listed below, worded many different ways, different combinations, etc. and ChatGPT will happily ignore most of them. - Don’t apologize. - Don’t make changes to the (code, draft, etc) that are not requested. - If I question something about your response to a prompt, don’t assume I am telling you you are wrong or asking you to re-answer. Explain. - Don’t conclude every response with a paragraph reiterating all that was said. - Don’t give a lengthy disclaimer that you’re an AI or a response may be incomplete or may not cover every edge case. If you have to include a disclaimer, just say “the usual disclaimer applies”. Many more little things I can’t recall at the moment. I gave up and removed the custom prompt. It made no difference.
  - fzzzy 3y ago
    You may get better results if you phrase all requests positively instead of using "don't". You even have a double negative in your second example.
    - chalsprhebaodu 3y ago
      Those weren’t the verbatim instructions, and as mentioned, I tried phrasing them many different ways. That said, I don’t recall necessarily trying to phrase every instruction positively, so I’ll try that. Thank you!
cypress66 3y ago
1) they don't seem very crazy, gpt4 should mostly handle this 2) they're probably finetuning the model a bit with these instructions

As someone who daily tries and fails to get ChatGPT to follow very simple and clear instructions on how to respond, it’s hard to believe that these system prompts work as described.

willsmith72 3y ago

are you using gpt4? what kind of tasks are you trying to do?

sebzim4500 3y ago

In my experience you kind of just have to lower your standards. i.e. if your system prompt is followed 90% of the time that still a win vs not using one.

chalsprhebaodu 3y ago
I would be happy with 10%. I imagine my problem is using ChatGPT with GPT4 rather than the api. I have had a custom prompt with a mix of various requests listed below, worded many different ways, different combinations, etc. and ChatGPT will happily ignore most of them. - Don’t apologize. - Don’t make changes to the (code, draft, etc) that are not requested. - If I question something about your response to a prompt, don’t assume I am telling you you are wrong or asking you to re-answer. Explain. - Don’t conclude every response with a paragraph reiterating all that was said. - Don’t give a lengthy disclaimer that you’re an AI or a response may be incomplete or may not cover every edge case. If you have to include a disclaimer, just say “the usual disclaimer applies”. Many more little things I can’t recall at the moment. I gave up and removed the custom prompt. It made no difference.
- fzzzy 3y ago
  You may get better results if you phrase all requests positively instead of using "don't". You even have a double negative in your second example.
  - chalsprhebaodu 3y ago
    Those weren’t the verbatim instructions, and as mentioned, I tried phrasing them many different ways. That said, I don’t recall necessarily trying to phrase every instruction positively, so I’ll try that. Thank you!

cypress66 3y ago

1) they don't seem very crazy, gpt4 should mostly handle this 2) they're probably finetuning the model a bit with these instructions