Today, we’re excited to share the tech preview of our first feature enabled by generative artificial intelligence: generative script and sensor creation in Workspace ONE Unified Endpoint Management (UEM).
Generative AI has taken the tech world by storm over the last year, and these capabilities, first shown at VMware Explore, introduce generative AI into end-user computing (EUC) in a responsible, impactful way.
How generative AI scripting will work in Workspace ONE
Scripting is an essential task for desktop management, even in today’s world of unified endpoint management and modern mobile device management (MDM) APIs for Windows and macOS. IT admins often need code written in scripting languages like PowerShell, Python, or Bash.
With this tech preview, Workspace ONE UEM now includes the ability to generate scripts automatically based on a prompt provided by the admin. These scripts use best practices, but the admin has the opportunity to review and modify the output.
The Generative AI engine supports multiple scripting languages such as PowerShell, Bash, and Python, providing users with flexibility and convenience when switching between different languages within Workspace ONE for both Windows and macOS platforms.
Broadly speaking, there are a range of speed, scale, and cost benefits. There’s less of a reliance on having large amounts of specialized training and experience in writing scripts, which is helpful at a time when there are IT talent shortages. Even for IT admins who know how to write scripts, this feature will save time and increase accuracy. For IT admins who are building their skills, these scripts can provide guidelines.
We are making this new AI capability available in tech preview (pre-beta) in SaaS UAT environment (CN135) for U.S. customers who sign up for the tech preview here.
The ability to prompt the AI will be available in the natural flow of how an admin would manage and create a sensor today. Along with the existing options to either write the script in an input box or upload a script, customers who have signed up for the tech preview access will see an additional input option to prompt the AI in natural language to help generate a script in the desired language.
The script generated will include detailed comments about working on the script, error handling, sample output, and details of security and privacy nuances of the script being generated. Admins can choose to accept the output or make further edits as necessary, and then publish the script to devices.
At first this capability will be limited to “Sensors” scripts that are meant only to pull information from a device without making any system level changes.
The inclusion of AI assistance is only limited to the discovery of a script for the intent; there is no data passed to the AI about the environment or any protected data. As soon as the AI generates a script based on the prompt, the AI’s work is complete, and it is disengaged. Then sensor scripts can be edited, managed, and deployed as usual.
Our broader work with AI in Anywhere Workspaces
Of course, this is not our first foray into AI. Our machine learning enabled anomaly detection and guided root cause analysis in Workspace ONE Intelligence are just two recent examples of the data science work that we have been pursuing for years. As we defined in our autonomous workspace vision, data science — combined with powerful automation — is foundational for the future of end-user computing.
In addition to the generative AI–powered scripting capabilities now in tech preview, at VMware Explore we showed our future vision for a much broader range of generative AI enabled capabilities. You can watch our session, “What’s New in Anywhere Workspace,” to learn more about our vision. In the session, we discussed our guiding principles that AI should be aligned, relevant, and responsible; scenarios where humans can be in the loop, on the loop, or outside the loop; and use cases for admins, helpdesks, and end users.
For more on our approach to AI, also see our “Data Science Deep Dive in Anywhere Workspace, and What AI Means for EUC” and “Improve Digital Experience and Lower Costs with AI, Analytics and Automation” on-demand sessions.
We are excited for customers to begin trying this feature, so please sign up for the tech preview here.
