Understanding generative AI

Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the group name for the latest iterations of Machine Learning (ML). In the field of ML, you process large amounts of data to learn about the patterns in your data. This results in a trained model that can then be used to recognize these patterns or to predict certain values based on new parameters. The training data can be anything that is digitally available, from text to audio to images or video, and these models can be trained with all of it. Models trained on this type of textual data are called language models, as they can refer to concepts that can be expressed in natural (spoken) language.

GitHub Copilot uses these models to handle specific tasks. The two types of media that are supported by GitHub Copilot are text and images. The focus is on text, as that is how we write or document our code. However, images can also be used in the chat interface with models that support them. You might add an image...