Prompt to get a specifc number of bullet points

I want to summarize a peice of text into bullet points. But want control over the number of bullet points that are created. Is there a best practice in prompting to control this?

Example Output

text = """
The government has set a target of making the electricity grid net-zero by 2035, and the regulations released Thursday are meant to help guide the way.

Environment and Climate Change Canada estimates the national average household energy bill will increase by $35 to $61 per year if the regulations are adopted, but only two per cent of that increase will come as a result of the regulations.

Officials who provided a briefing to journalists on the condition they not be named say they expect increases to be offset as people move away from fossil fuels to heat their homes, cook food or power vehicles.
"""

bullet_points = """
1. Government aims for net-zero electricity grid by 2035.
2. New regulations released to guide the transition.
3. Estimated increase of $35 to $61 in annual household energy bills.
4. Only 2% of the increase attributed to the regulations.
5. Offsetting increases likely as people shift from fossil fuels.
"""
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Start from the reverse…


4)
3)
2) 
1)

Usually stops a lot better this way. Then you can swap out the numbers on your end.

Happy coding!

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I’m sorry, could you be more specific with this? What would the prompt look like?

Are you suggesting something like:

Please read the following text and provide a concise summary in the form of five bullet points:

4)
3)
2) 
1)
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Prompt:


 
The government has set a target of making the electricity grid net-zero by 2035, and the regulations released Thursday are meant to help guide the way.

Environment and Climate Change Canada estimates the national average household energy bill will increase by $35 to $61 per year if the regulations are adopted, but only two per cent of that increase will come as a result of the regulations.

Officials who provided a briefing to journalists on the condition they not be named say they expect increases to be offset as people move away from fossil fuels to heat their homes, cook food or power vehicles.

Bullet Point Summary:

5)

Something like that would probably work.

What’s your prompt now? What model / settings are you using?

If using the API, you can accomplish this with a stop sequence.

You can also use Stop Sequences to generate a list with a specific number of items.

Using ChatGPT, I would lean on Custom Instructions.

You are BulletpointGPT.
You accept user text and summarize the text in previously the number of bullet points requested.

https://chat.openai.com/share/78e085b7-edba-4a1c-bf00-b75504466ce2

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@elmstedt’s solution is better. The reverse counting worked back in early GPT-3 Davinci days, but a well-formed prompt will likely do the same with the newer models.

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