philform
phil fills your job applications. Enter your details once; on any
application click phil this application, and philform reads the form,
works out what each box is asking, fills it, drafts the open-ended answers and
outlines everything for you to check. It never submits.
philform is open source (AGPL-3.0) and works on forms it has never seen:
there is no hand-written recipe per job site. A model reads each page's own
questions and options, so a new site, or a site that changes its markup,
still gets filled.
- Firefox: the latest signed build is on philformapp.com.
- Chrome: in closed beta; load
dist/chrome unpacked after ./build.sh.
What it costs
Your first 10 applications are free (every page of one application counts as
one). After that each fill takes three times its model cost from a wallet you
top up $5 at a time: a typical fill costs a fraction of a cent, about 400
applications per $5, and no fill can cost more than 30¢. The rules are in
src/common/wallet.js, shared by the extension and
the service.
Bring your own key for writing. Reading the form always runs through
philform's service on its TypeSafe account. Writing the open-ended answers
can use your own DeepSeek key instead: paste it under Settings > Written
answers. Those requests then go from your browser straight to DeepSeek,
billed to your DeepSeek account, and your philform wallet is charged only for
reading the form. Your key stays in your browser; philform's service never
sees it.
What it sends where
- Your profile, saved answers and CVs stay in your browser (optionally
encrypted under a password: Settings > Data).
- To fill a page, the form's questions and the parts of your profile they
need go to TypeSafe (through philform's service, which meters the cost), and
the questions that need writing go to DeepSeek.
- A thumbs-down sends the page's address, your note and the question labels,
never your answers. See PRIVACY.md.
What the user sees
- Profile. Name, contact, address, work history, education, references,
work authorization, and a CV, uploaded and read in the browser or pasted as
text (written answers are only as good as it). Someone with a CV for each
kind of job uploads each one and says what jobs it is for; each fill sends
the one TypeSafe picks for the job and writes from it.
- phil this application. A progress bar steps through Read, Match and
Fill, then a small celebration shows the time the fill saved and what that
time is worth at the user's rate ($16/hr to start, editable in the popup and
in settings), with an all-time total underneath. Blue outline: filled from
your details. Amber outline: a best guess or a draft, check it.
- Save my answers from this page. After typing in anything philform
missed, or correcting something it filled, this lists each answer on its
own row, with where it would be saved and its own Save (or Replace)
button. Next time philform fills it, on that site and on any other that
asks the same thing.
- How did phil do? A thumb up or down after each fill. A thumb down
sends the page's address for review, then offers a note.
How a fill works
| Step | What happens | Cost |
|---|
| Read | Every frame is reduced to field descriptors; custom dropdowns are opened to read their options | Free |
| Rules | Site skills and keyword rules propose an answer per field | Free |
| Decide | One TypeSafe request for the whole form: which saved value fits each box, which of its own options each dropdown should get, which saved response answers each essay; it also checks every rule's proposal | ~0.05¢ |
| Write | DeepSeek drafts what nothing saved answers, in parallel, while the rest is filled | ~0.1–0.5¢ |
| Fill | Written with real key and pointer events, read back, retried by typing if the page rejected it | Free |
| Again | The page is read again for questions that appeared, up to three passes | As above, for new fields only |
Fill what is most likely, flag what is unsure. TypeSafe's answers are
calibrated. At or above the confidence setting (default 0.6) an answer is
filled normally. Between 0.35 and that it is filled as a best guess and
outlined in amber, instead of leaving a required field for the user to find.
A required one-line question nothing saved answers ("How many hours a week can
you work?") gets a short draft, also amber. Never guessed: questions about who
someone is (gender, race, veteran or disability status, age), questions that
only apply after another answer ("If so, ..."), and anything the user switched
off.
Notice what was missed. After a fill, the page is checked for question text
inside the form that no field was read for: the sign of a widget philform
does not recognise yet. It costs nothing, needs no screenshot, and the popup
then asks the user to report the page. That, and the reports, are how new form
designs get supported. A vision check is deliberately not run per fill: it would
cost more than the fill. It is reserved for pages this check or a user flags.
Cost is metered and capped. Every call is priced from the tokens its
provider reports (src/background/cost.js). The popup shows the cost per
provider, and the price, which is three times the cost. A fill is capped at 10¢ of cost: the
writer's budget is cut to fit, and a fill that reaches the cap says so and
opens the report form. A typical fill costs 0.05–0.5¢ and takes 2–6 seconds.
Robust to the page. Design-system dropdowns (react-select, MUI, Radix,
Workday prompts, select2), ARIA radios and tick boxes, unnamed radio groups,
web components, suggestion boxes that must be picked from, masked inputs,
cross-origin frames, and questions revealed by earlier answers. A stalled
TypeSafe request is sent again after three seconds.
This is the beginning of the README. Read the rest at the original. Read the full README ↗
