Timothy T. Yu and team built a chatbot that can run complex operations software for you:

Our system provides operations planners with an intuitive, natural language chat interface, allowing them to make queries, perform counterfactual reasoning, receive recommendations, and execute scenario analysis (what-if and why-not analyses) on operational plans.

Enterprise operations software is incredibly powerful but completely inaccessible. It drives logistics and supply chains for huge companies, but you need deep expertise and expensive consultants to use it.

The value is locked behind complex interfaces and expert-only language. Most organizations that could benefit can't afford to get in.

This paper makes the case for a fundamental shift in how we interact with these systems. Instead of forcing the human to learn the language of the machine through an intricate graphical user interface, it proposes an AI that acts as a translator, understanding the natural language of the user. It’s a move away from designing the perfect dashboard and towards designing the perfect conversation. The agent, SMARTAPS, doesn’t attempt to be an operations research expert itself; it intelligently selects and uses a catalogue of specialised tools that have been built by human experts.

This changes product design completely. No more arranging controls on screens - you're architecting dialogue instead.

How do you navigate the ambiguity of human language and map it to precise technical functions? That's the design challenge we're moving toward.