One of the easiest ways to edit text in ChatGPT — once you have a draft that works for you — is to use the AI’s new onboard editor, Canvas.
A godsend to writers and editors, Canvas comes equipped with a number of handy tools that enable you to make quick, surgical and artful changes to any text.
But easily the most powerful tool of the lot is Canvas’ ‘highlight-and-change’ feature.
Essentially, this tool enables you to make onscreen changes to any text you highlight, without forcing you to regenerate your entire text every time you want to make a little tweak.
Instead, your requested changes appear onscreen for you in the precise location you made them — saving you considerable effort each-and-every time you make an edit.
For example, you can use Canvas to quickly edit the opening paragraph of a text to sound wittier by:
*Logging into ChatGPT
*Clicking on the AI engine you’re using on the top left of ChatGPT’s home page once you’re logged in
*Choosing ‘GPT-4o with canvas’ as your engine
*A new screen appears, with a message box in the center
of the screen that asks, “What can I help you with?”
*Typing “Please open a blank canvas” in the message box
*A split-screen appears, that features:
~A new blank canvas on the right, where you enter your draft text
~A ChatGPT message box appears on the bottom left, where you can input ‘traditional’ ChatGPT prompts any time you’d like
*Cutting-and-pasting your draft text onto the blank canvas
*Highlighting the opening paragraph of your text
*Waiting for an “Ask ChatGPT” tool to appear
*Clicking on the ‘Ask ChatGPT’ tool
*Typing into the ‘Ask ChatGPT’ message box, “Please make this sound wittier”
*Waiting a few seconds as Canvas rewrites your highlighted paragraph for you
*Waiting for a message to appear on the left side of your screen that confirms the rewrite has been made
*Reading the rewritten paragraph, which appears in the exact location of your previous paragraph
If you like the change Canvas has made, you can simply run with it and get on with other edits you may have in mind.
But if you don’t like what Canvas has wrought, you still have solid options.
Specifically: You can repeatedly message ‘Ask ChatGPT’ to make run-after-run at amping-up-the-wit in your text’s opening paragraph until Canvas comes up with an absolutely dazzling version for you.
Or, you can simply click the Canvas’ ‘rollback’ arrow — located at the top right-hand side of the screen — and stick with the paragraph you started with before Canvas made any changes.
One more example of the powerful new highlighting tool: You may want Canvas to rewrite some text that you’ve highlighted so that it targets a highly specific audience — such as your compatriots in your fantasy football club.
In practice, making that change to your text is also a snap for Canvas.
Simply:
*Highlight the text you’d like altered (In this case, you’ll be highlighting the entire text, since you want the entire text altered)
*Input a prompt describing the change you want in the ‘Ask ChatGPT’ message box (In this case, you’ll ask Canvas to “Please rewrite this text so that it appeals to a fantasy football club).
*Click ‘Enter’
And you’re done: Seconds later, ChatGPT will deliver new text for you that’s adjusted to your new specifications.
Essentially, the number of changes you’re able to make to your text with Canvas is limited only by your imagination.
Looking to re-color a text with a different emotion? Wish your text could be rewritten so that it presents a pro-and-con argument? Have a hankering to sprinkle your text with a dash of industry jargon?
Looking to make yet another kind of change to your text?
Each of those — and countless more — is a cakewalk for ChatGPT.
Again, simply:
*Highlight the text you’d like altered
*Input a prompt describing the precise change you want into the ‘Ask
ChatGPT’ message box
*Click Enter
And you’re done.
Seconds later, Canvas will serve-up the change you requested.
Accessing Canvas’ Beginner Editing Tools
Besides free-form editing, Canvas also comes equipped with a number of easy-to-use, pre-programmed buttons that beginners can use to edit all or part of a text.
For example: Simply highlight another passage in your text, or a number of paragraphs in your text — or even your entire text, for that matter — and you can access a toolbar on the bottom right screen of Canvas to make special kinds of edits.
Specifically, once you’ve cut-and-pasted your text into Canvas and highlighted text you’d like changed, simply hover over a pencil icon that you’ll find in the right, bottom corner of Canvas and you’ll see these tool buttons appear:
*Suggest Edits: The most versatile tool on the toolbar, clicking this button prompts ChatGPT to examine your highlighted text and auto-suggest ways to improve it.
*Adjust Reading Level: With a simple click of this button, you’ll be able to adjust your highlighted text to nine different reading levels — from kindergarten through graduate school.
*Adjust Length: A click here enables you to play around with the length of your highlighted text, easily enabling you to arrive at an optimum setting that’s right for you.
*Add Emojis: By clicking this button, you’ll be able to instantly add emojis to your highlighted text. Plus, if you feel that the result looks like ’emoji overkill,’ you can simply prompt Canvas — using the ‘Ask ChatGPT’ message box — to remove say 60% or 70% of the new text’s emojis — or whatever other percent reduction you’re after.
*Add Final Polish: Once you’re happy with your changes, clicking this button triggers Canvas to take one more look at your highlighted text and suggest any final edits, if needed.
As if that’s not enough, ChatGPT also features an extremely powerful ‘Help me write’ option that you can use if you find yourself staring at a blank screen and gulping with anxiety.
During such trying moments, you can activate ‘Help me write’ by opening ‘ChatGPT 4o with canvas’ and looking for the giant ‘What can I help with?’ message at the center of the screen.
Beneath that message, you should find a ‘Help me write’ tab that you can click on.
If the tab is not there, try clicking on the ‘More’ tab and a ‘Help me write’ tab should appear.
Either way, after you click the ‘Help me write’ tab, a prompt will instantly appear in the ‘What can I help with?’ message box with the words ‘Help me write.’
Simply finish the sentence inside the message box detailing the format of text you’d like to create (such as free-form text, blog post, essay, social media post, etc.).
Instantly, Help me write will launch into an interview with you to help you pinpoint what you’d like included in your text.
Based on your inputs, Help me write will continue to walk you through the writing process, finish a draft of text for you — and then make sure you’re satisfied with the overall voice, tone and structure of the text it’s auto-created.
Pretty cool.
There is one caveat regarding all this new magic from ChatGPT: If you’re a newbie to ChatGPT, go in with both eyes open, knowing that the following Canvas onboard editing tools (which we’ve already seen) only represent an infinitesimally small capability of the full powers of the Canvas editor:
*Suggest Edits
*Adjust Reading Level
*Adjust Length
*Add Final Polish
*Add Emojis
Essentially, these aforementioned tools — found, as we’ve seen, by hovering your mouse over the pencil icon that’s located in the bottom right corner — are simply beginner tools that are designed to help get you started editing when using Canvas.
Once you get the hang of editing in Canvas by starting with these beginner tools, you’ll find that the true power of editing in Canvas comes from highlighting text you’d like to change — and then using the “Ask ChatGPT” message box to input precise, highly personalized editing preferences that you’d like the AI to use to rework your text.
Finally: If you’re a ChatGPT Plus or ChatGPT Team user, you’re in luck: Canvas should already be available from the model picker on the top left of ChatGPT’s home page.
Meanwhile, Canvas is currently being rolled-out to ChatGPT Enterprise and ChatGPT Education users — and may be offered to free users at a later date.
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–Joe Dysart is editor of RobotWritersAI.com and a tech journalist with 20+ years experience. His work has appeared in 150+ publications, including The New York Times and the Financial Times of London.