Chats

Every bot has one direct chat with you. It is always that bot that answers there. For several bots in one conversation, see Group chats.

Sending messages

Type and press Return. While a bot works, its avatar shows a breathing green dot in the sidebar and the chat shows what it is doing in a shimmering line: "Thinking…", "Running command: Install dependencies…", "Searching the web…", "Using GitHub…". Replies arrive a paragraph at a time.

Send another message while the bot works to steer it. Its current model step and tools—including a running command—finish first; then the bot sees your new instruction before its next step. Until then your message waits, dimmed, with Send now under it: click it to have the bot read it right away. A command the bot is running moves to the background and keeps going, and the bot can check on it or stop it. To end the bot's work instead, press Stop in the desktop app.

You do not see tool calls in the transcript. You see what the bot says before and after its work.

If a provider is overloaded or rate limited, the bot retries up to three times and the working row says so.

Attachments

Click +, drop files on the composer, or paste an image. On the phone, tap + for photos, the camera, or files, or paste an image into the field. A message can be attachments alone. Images show as thumbnails, other files as cards; click to open.

The bot gets each file in its working directory, so it can open it with its tools. Models that see images also get the image itself.

Dictation

In the Mac app and on the phone, click the microphone to dictate. The composer shows the elapsed time and the input level. Click the stop square to drop the words into the field, or Send to send them right away. Escape discards the recording on the Mac.

Lorca listens in the language of your current keyboard. Choose another in Settings › General, or from the microphone's right-click menu (a long press on the phone).

Mentions

Type @ and a bot's name. In a direct chat a mention is a reference the bot acts on: "Ask @Scout whether the leak is fixed" makes this bot message Scout.

Replies

To answer a particular message, right-click its bubble and choose Reply, or swipe it to the left on your phone. The composer shows what you are replying to; press Escape or its × to drop it. Your message carries a quote of the original, and the bot reads it. In a group, the bot you reply to speaks first, after any bot you mention. Click a quote to jump back to the message it came from.

Stop

Stop in the desktop app's composer, or Chat › Stop Responding (⌘. on a Mac), ends the bot's work in this chat, on whichever computer it runs:

• The reply ends, keeping the words it had shown.
• Its tool calls end. One that hasn't ended 15 seconds later is cut off, and the bot is told it may have done part of its work. So a turn ends within about 15 seconds, whatever its tools do.
• Its commands stop, except those running in the background: the chat names the ones still running, and Running tasks stops them.
• Coding agents in the chat stop, and so does a run of a recorded browser workflow. An open browser stays open.
• Work the bot handed to other bots stops too, on any computer, and reports back "Stopped before finishing."
• An email or Slack message it was still writing isn't kept. Draft cards already in the chat stay for you.

Stop ends a routine's run the same way, and the run still counts. In a channel's conversation, Stop ends the work on that message and the channel goes on to the next one. A Runner that is offline stops as soon as it reconnects.

The phone has no Stop for a whole turn; its Running tasks stop one command at a time.

Outputs

When a bot makes a file you asked for, such as a report, an export, or test results, or a document at a link, it publishes it in the chat as an output: the file's tile, the link, and what the bot checked, such as "Test result · Passed". The check is the bot's own claim: Passed, Failed, or Not verified. Several outputs in a row from one bot, such as the proof files a coding agent saves, show as one list with a line each.

The inspector lists the chat's outputs, the latest three with View all (on the phone, in the chat's Details). Click one for a preview, the check, every version, Open, and Save As… (Share… on the phone). When the bot makes a new version, the old ones stay. Outputs reach every device encrypted, and a task can cite one as evidence.

Bots that message each other

A bot can hand work to any bot outside the current chat, with what it needs: the context, what to deliver, and how to tell it is done. When it does:

• The chat you are in shows a Messaged ◉ Scout marker.
• Scout's own direct chat with you shows Message from ◉ Chef with the request, and Scout works there.
• When Scout is done, the chat that asked gets Message from ◉ Scout with a line about the result (click it to read the whole report), and Chef goes on with it.

So every handoff is visible in a chat you can read. A handoff to a bot whose Runner is offline waits and runs when that computer is back. One that comes back blocked or failed shows in Attention; the bot that asked can send a follow-up. After eight bot-to-bot hops with no message from you, bots stop messaging, so two of them cannot loop.

Unread counts and notifications

The sidebar shows an unread pill for replies you have not seen. Reading a chat on one device clears it on the others.

When a bot finishes a reply in a chat you are not looking at, the desktop app posts a notification and your phone gets a push. Push contents are encrypted; Apple and Google only see "New reply". While you have a chat open in front of you on a computer, your phone gets no push for it.

Organize chats

Right-click a chat in the sidebar to pin, rename, mute, hide, move it to a section, or delete it. On the phone, long-press it. Deleting a chat removes its messages and attachments from the relay and from every device.

Sections

Group chats under headings of your own, such as Work and Home. Choose File › New Section…, or Move to Section › New Section… in a chat's menu (on the phone, New Section in the New menu). Drag chats onto a section in the desktop app, or use Move to Section. A section's header renames it, moves it up or down, or deletes it, which moves its chats back to Chats. Sections and their folding sync to every device.

The sidebar lists pinned chats first, then each section, then Chats for the chats in no section, then Hidden.

Hidden chats

Hide moves a chat to Hidden at the bottom of the sidebar, folded. Its bots keep working there, it keeps its unread count, and search still finds it. Show in Sidebar, pinning it, or moving it to a section brings it back.

Muted chats

Mute quiets a chat For 1 Hour, For 8 Hours, For 1 Week, or Always. A muted chat sends no notifications or phone pushes on any device, whatever it is about, and stays out of the app's badge. Its row shows a crossed-out bell and keeps its unread count, and Attention still lists what waits in it. Unmute turns it back on.