To my mind, this is simultaneously the most powerful and underrated feature of ChatGPT / OpenAI. This thing is like an uber-monster-data-chainsaw-nailgun with a whole galaxy of possible applications.

For myself, I've had fun using it to OCR documents to load into a vector store for deep research and semantic search. Or generating sprite sheets with the Gemini API (OpenAI is not good at this for some reason, even gpt-image-1.5) and then using the container tool to cut them up and turn them into animated gifs. Then making a little movie out of those gifs with ffmpeg, which also ships in the container.

There's goodies in there like xgboost that let you train a classical ML model, there's pandas, numpy, the list goes on.

I have even gotten the tool to generate simple synthesizer melodies (with a backing 808 kick!) and then applied effects to the audio. Image effects are possible in container as well with imagemagick.

I'm wondering why this feature doesn't have more uptake / publicity? Is this the secret sauce everyone discovers and keeps quiet about? Or am I missing something?

I understand the container tool is not intended for truly big jobs, but I imagine for a lot of small-to-medium teams, it could really hit a sweet spot of need (that many teams might not even know they have?).