OpenAI focuses on Anthropic with Codex extension that gives more power to your computer

There is currently a low-level battle between OpenAI and Anthropic over who can release the simplest and most powerful AI coding tools and, so far, Anthropic seems to be winning. Claude Code has been named the tool of choice for many businesses, as TechCrunch reported last week, but OpenAI hasn’t given up yet.

This week, OpenAI announced a revamp of the Codexits standard tool, with a variety of new updates designed to give it even more power.

On Thursday, the company announced new features and improvements, perhaps the most notable of which is that Codex can now work in the background on your computer – open any program on your computer and work with a cursor that clicks and changes.

In practice, this allows Codex to install multiple agents, which work on the user’s Mac “in parallel, without interfering with your work in other programs,” the company said. in a blog post. In other words, because of how Codex runs in the background, the user can still use the machine while the agent is doing its own work. The assistant will work, according to the company, as a writing partner who does the work to help you when you are working on advanced tasks. OpenAI lists “in addition to front-end updates, test programs, or work in programs that don’t expose an API” as possible ways to use this type of support.

Overall, the business updates and other innovations reflect OpenAI’s desire to make Codex a competitive enabler and a feature-rich tool that can be integrated into a variety of business processes.

Viewers of the AI ​​coding space will also notice that some of the OpenAI capabilities now add to Codex look like what was previously released by Anthropic for Claude Code. Last month, Anthropic he announced that Claude and Cowork can remotely control your Mac and computer on behalf of users while they are away from their keyboard.

In addition to the tools, OpenAI’s Codex now has an in-app browser, which allows the user to give commands to the tool, which will run on the Internet. OpenAI says the service will be useful for game development and expansion, and that it plans to expand the capability so that Codex “will be able to command the browser beyond localhost web usage.”

There are other changes as well. A new feature called “memory” allows Codex to remember parts of previous operations and create important stories about the user’s performance. The assistant has also been given new graphics capabilities, which OpenAI says can be used to create product concepts, visual effects, mockups, placeholder images, and other business tools. Finally, to expand Codex’s capabilities, the company has announced 111 plug-in integrations from programs like CodeRabbit and GitLab Issues, which allow Codex to work with those tools.

As OpenAI designed it, these plugins give Codex the ability to perform small clerical tasks to improve your work life. For example, if you want Codex to look at your Slack channels and Google calendar and give you a to-do list for a given day, OpenAI says it can now do that for you.

A new Codex pricing model for ChatGPT’s business and enterprise customers has also been announced in an attempt to give users more flexibility when it comes to accessing the services of the writing tool.

Once considered the undisputed leader of its industry, OpenAI has become increasingly competitive with Anthropic in recent months, focusing more on enterprise technology and abandoning consumer tools such as its social media software. Truth 2. The company has also faced various controversies in recent months, including cases on ChatGPT which is said to affect the mental health of some users.