An agent is a worker with a name, a model, a folder and the switches you give it. You can have as many as you like, each set up for its own kind of job.
Deploy it
- Open Agents and press Deploy your first agent (later, Deploy agent).
- Name it, for example
news-scout. Under Tell it how to work you can add standing instructions, like “Write in short plain sentences. Always cite sources.” - Choose a model. Pick a suggested cloud model, a free model you downloaded (see Models and keys), or any model id from a provider. If the model needs a key you haven’t added, press Add key….
- Set the switches. All six are on for a new agent: Files, Web, Browser, Computer, Terminal and Schedules. Turn off what this agent doesn’t need. With all of them off it can only talk.
- Its folder is
~/localoy/<name>. Press Change… to point it at another one. - For a cloud model you can set a daily spending limit. It stops for the day when it reaches it.
- Press Deploy. You can change all of this later: open the chat’s ⋮ menu and choose Settings.
Plan the job, then let it work
The mode sits at the bottom left of the message box. A new chat starts in Plan.
- Plan: it asks its questions and proposes a plan. Nothing runs, and it only reads.
- Auto: it does the whole job itself, and asks you only before sensitive things or when it would otherwise have to guess.
- Manual: one step at a time, and every action asks you first.
Describe the job in Plan, answer what it asks, then switch to Auto and tell it to go ahead. A change of mode applies from your next message. At the bottom right, Loop strength sets how long it keeps going before it pauses for you: Low, Medium (the default) or High.
When it asks
Two kinds of question appear in the chat. A permission (“Permission — …”) comes with Allow and Don’t allow, sometimes with an option to always allow it in this chat. A question about the work comes with choices, Let it decide, or a box to type your own answer. It waits up to 30 minutes for you.
Press Stop, or Esc in the message box, to stop a run at any point. Every step it took stays in the chat, in plain sentences.