This paper describes an experiment to merge freeform document-style text and structured computations into a single interface.

We think a promising workflow is gradual enrichment from docs to apps: starting with regular text documents and incrementally evolving them into interactive software. In this essay, we present a research prototype called Potluck that supports this workflow. Users can create live searches that extract structured information from freeform text, write formulas that compute with that information, and then display the results as dynamic annotations in the original document.

The idea is to prioritize the open-endedness of documents with the benefits of some schema, to enable computations and structure. Documents are powerful for their flexibility to accommodate all kinds of information, but the trade-off is a static environment, whereas applications can be dynamic and responsive. Potluck gives a look at what happens when you get some of both worlds.

Try out some of the examples. It’s impressive and shows promise for the future of the low-code / build-your-own-software movement.