ChatGPT Adds iCloud Mail and Calendar Plugin Support

OpenAI has added support for Apple's email and calendar services to ChatGPT through new plugins for iCloud Mail and iCloud Calendar. The company says the plugins work across desktop, the web, and iOS for free and paid accounts, and users can read and manage iCloud emails or calendar events with a prompt after logging in with an Apple account and creating an app-specific password.

How the plugins work

ChatGPT can now work with iCloud in the same way that it can with Gmail and Google Calendar. The iCloud Mail and iCloud Calendar plugins differ from letting ChatGPT interact with Apple's Mail and Calendar apps on macOS directly. Those apps can display inboxes and calendars from third-party services such as Outlook or Gmail, while the new plugins only access messages and calendar events associated with Apple's services. They are not useful for people who do not use iCloud.

Pro plan and Dot agent

If you pay for OpenAI's Pro plan, the company's AI agent, Dot, can also use either plugin. OpenAI promoted the plugins by saying users can ask ChatGPT to find an email, catch up on an inbox, check what is next, or update a calendar event.

Apple and OpenAI relationship

The plugins arrive amid a complicated relationship between OpenAI and Apple. ChatGPT was the first AI assistant to be directly integrated with Siri. Apple's decision to work with Google rather than OpenAI to revamp its AI models suggested the relationship had soured. Apple's July lawsuit alleging OpenAI employees stole its trade secrets furthered that impression. Yet, alongside the new M6 iMac and MacBook Pro, Apple announced Creator Studio updates that include a new chatbot experience partially powered by OpenAI models in Pages, Numbers, and Keynote. Neither company seems willing or able to fully walk away from the other.

Sources: Engadget