Are AI chat bots not good with TouchDesigner?
I’ve tried several different models for general beginner/intermediate support and, more often than not, the answers are incorrect, suggesting use of non-existing parameters or even Operators.
Yeah…NO!
I tried doing the same last year and got nothing but hallucinations, even when I reduced the requests down to really simple stuff like “how do I display a circle?”
Sure, the LLMs can ingest the wiki and extrapolate what it thinks are potential solutions, but I suspect because TD isn’t text based (like most other coding frameworks), the models have nothing to “learn” from as there are literally no examples that they are able to “understand”
1 Like
Right, so it’s not just me then. Good to know 
I had the same issues you with several chat bots (Claude, Chat GPT, etc), but recently I’ve used the last version of Chat GPT and it surprised me
Good to know, thanks 
I’m curious if there would be interest in developing an Model Context Protocol server for Touchdesigner? I think this could be accelerated by the upcoming VS Code language support, feeding those stubs or LSP docs into a context to translate into MCP?
I don’t currently use Claude but that would be the forerunner for all computer control/AI tooling.
1 Like
I’ve experimented with using Perplexity for TD and it performed reasonably well for medium difficulty tasks by giving accurate suggestions. It works well when your question is found to be covered somewhere on the forums or YouTube.
Also, it’s only as good as your general experience and expertise in TD, because you need to be able to peace together if something is bullshit or not.
I’ve also added the whole “Introduction to TouchDesigner” pdf to the context, which I assume helps lay some groundwork for more accurate responses.
AI IDEs like Cursor also allow to add custom Documentation to be indexed and available as context with varying success. If indexed properly, it could definitively also help with Python coding in TD.
4 Likes
Cheers @aulerius
Signed up to Perplexity now, best experience so far…
I’m finding that the more I lean into Python / GLSL in my projects the more useful any of the AI tools become. ChatGPT has definitely gained some awareness of TD’s Python API as well as operators and their parameters / attributes / etc. Github Copilot autocompletes are reliable as well.
1 Like
I decided to actually give perplexity.ai a spin and WOW, the difference between this and what I tried with chatGPT about a year ago is wild.
The ability to upload the entire ‘intro to-’ PDF to be ingested & contextualised is a gamechanger…as well as the fact it shows a lot of it’s workings in the replies with linked sources, make this alone, a goldmine of research rabbit holes.
1 Like
TouchDesigner MCP Server has been released 
8beeeaaat/touchdesigner-mcp @GitHub