Bots, folders, and threads

Bots are persistent teammates

A bot keeps its identity, instructions, memory, approved skills, connected tools, and computer preference. Create separate bots when the role or access should differ. You do not need another bot just to start a different project or choose another model.

• A coding bot attached to one repository
• A research bot with browser and document tools
• An operations bot with Gmail, Calendar, and Slack
• A local-model bot for private or offline work

New bot opens an editable draft before anything is created. Review its profile, model, permissions, memory, skills, and routines, then select Create bot. Settings → General → Defaults for new bots → Edit sets the starting values for future creation dialogs without changing existing bots. See Create your first bot for the full flow.

Bot settings

In Simple mode, a bot's settings open on a short panel: the bot's picture, name and job at the top, then three tabs. The examples below use a bot named Nova.

The gear at the top opens Bot settings: Instructions, Before Nova acts, Moods, Backup AIs, Call mode, the Apps it can use, and its Job.

Look opens when you select the bot's picture at the top of the panel. It changes how the bot's mascot looks: its color, shape and Facial features (White, Black, or the body's default), or your own picture. There is no expression to pick: the mascot's face follows what the bot is doing, such as thinking, reading, writing or waiting for you.

Before Nova acts has two choices: Ask me first (checks before changes) and Just do it (acts without checking). A bot set another way in Advanced mode shows that setting, greyed out; a custom one says Change this in Advanced mode.

In Advanced mode, a bot's settings open on every section directly, in three tabs:

Under the bot's name, its mascot shows what the bot is doing, as it does in the sidebar; select it to open Identity on the Profile tab. The search below it looks through all three tabs, each match under its section's name. Use the arrow keys, Home and End to move between the tabs.

Reply style

Reply style, in the Soul section, sets how a bot writes back to you:

• Default: full answers, formatted however the bot sees fit.
• Conversational: short, plain replies, often with a quick follow-up question. In a one-to-one chat on the desktop, each paragraph shows as its own small message.

A conversational bot answers short, simple messages, such as a quick question or a thank-you, with the fastest model of the same engine, and your message shows Quick reply with that model's name. Messages with code, attachments or a request to do something, and messages that follow the bot's tool work, use the bot's own model. So do threads that have a model of their own, and routines.

Moods

With a reply, a bot can name a mood, such as shy when you compliment it or laughing at a joke. Its mascot plays that mood for a moment when the reply arrives, then goes back to what the bot is doing. The mood is never shown as words in the chat, on your phone or anywhere else.

Moods is on for every bot. To turn it off for one bot, open its settings: in Simple mode it is in Bot settings, right under Before Nova acts; in Advanced mode it is in the Soul section, under Reply style. With Moods off, the bot is no longer told it can name a mood, and its mascot never plays one.

Threads are independent conversations

The conversations previously called Tasks are now Threads. Expand a bot in the sidebar and choose New thread, or use All threads to find an older conversation. Existing history is preserved.

Each thread has its own progress, approvals, and Stop control. Start another thread while one is working; stopping one does not redirect its siblings. Up to three direct threads can run per bot, including threads waiting for your approval.

Pinned threads

Open a thread's … menu in the sidebar and choose Pin. Pinned threads from every bot and group appear together in Pinned threads, between search and your bots. Select one to open it, or unpin it there. The section shows only when something is pinned, and not while the sidebar shows icons only.

Archived threads

Open a thread's … menu in the sidebar and choose Archive to fold it out of the bot's thread list. An archived thread stays out of the list even when a new message arrives or it turns unread, until you choose Unarchive in the same menu; only the thread you have open, or one you pinned, still shows. A bot's unread dot ignores its archived threads.

Delete several threads

When a bot or group has more than one thread, choose Select threads under its thread list in the sidebar. A bot's thread list shows in Advanced mode, with Settings → Appearance → Threads on. Tick the threads to delete, or shift-click to select a range. Select all, Older than 30 days and Archived pick threads for you, and Clear unticks them. A thread that is running can't be selected. Choose Delete, which shows how many are selected, and confirm: the conversations and their messages are removed for good, while files they generated in a project folder are kept.

If you delete every thread of a bot, a new empty conversation starts. A group always keeps at least one thread.

Pinned bots as circles

With Settings → Appearance → Pinned bots as circles on, a pinned bot shows as a large picture in the sidebar. In Advanced mode with threads shown, a pinned bot that has several threads or folders has an arrow below its picture that opens its thread list, with New thread and New folder.

Threads use their bot's model

Every thread runs on its bot's model. Change the bot's model and its threads change with it, including old ones a routine, a delegation or a hand-off opens again. A thread keeps a model of its own only when you pick one in that thread; choose the bot's own model in that thread's model menu (for a bot named Nova, Use Nova's model) to put it back on the bot's. A thread that follows the bot shows (bot's model) beside that model.

When some threads use their own model, the bot's model setting says how many, with Switch them too. That moves them all back onto the bot's model once; it is not a setting. A thread that is working keeps its model until it finishes.

If a thread's own model can't run (its engine was removed, turned off, can't start, or isn't allowed), the turn runs on the bot's model instead, the thread uses the bot's model from then on, and one line in the thread says so. A thread whose engine is signed out does the same only when the bot's model is on another engine that can run; on the same engine you see the sign-in prompt.

Folders keep related threads together

Folders are optional organization under a bot. For example, Pepper can have an Email folder containing Triage Gmail and Triage iCloud, alongside a Website folder.

A thread can choose its own model in the chat header and its Ask/Auto setting inside the composer. Folders have no model or permission settings. Moving a thread does not change its model, account, or access, or interrupt it. Removing a folder leaves its conversations ungrouped; it does not delete their history.

All the bot's threads share its saved memory and skills; they do not automatically receive every sibling transcript. Folders are not separate accounts or privacy boundaries. Bot profiles can carry different access preferences, but app organization is not an operating-system sandbox.

Threads can converse independently, but a physical computer, browser session, or shared project folder cannot safely have two agents changing it at once. Brainwrite reports contention instead of allowing overlapping managed actions. New local-agent threads use separate working folders by default; existing pinned folders are retained.

Groups and teams

Groups are the conversations previously called channels or rooms. They let multiple bots share context. Use a group when several specialists need the same brief or should hand work to one another. Membership, instructions and thread history are retained. The existing multi-bot turn-taking behavior is unchanged.

To pause one bot without stopping the group, write stop @Bot (or halt / pause next to its name), or press Stop Bot under the bot that is working. A held bot's running turn ends, and it is skipped by @mentions, the lead, Everyone and Auto until you address it again (@Bot …), say resume, or press Resume. @everyone stop and @everyone resume act on the whole group. Messages addressed to a held bot are shown to it when it comes back. Holds are kept across restarts.

In a group, each bot's reply is its final message. The notes it writes while working fold into a Worked for… row above that reply, and teammates read only the reply. If a bot finishes without a final message, the group shows finished without a summary and asks it once for a short result.

Existing sections keep their Chief of Staff assignments and bot communication rules. They are not thread folders. A Chief remains a bot role: it receives requests, delegates focused tasks, and summarizes the results.

Ask an existing Chief to appoint a bot as Chief of an authorized team, including a new team it creates. The combined setup shows the leadership change. In Ask mode, choose Apply setup or Cancel; Full Access applies it immediately. To replace a Chief, the plan must explicitly remove the old assignment and appoint the new Chief together. Each team has at most one Chief.

When you ask a Chief to delete several bots at once, each bot gets its own Delete bot card. Answer them in any order: each one applies or cancels on its own, and the Chief continues once, after you have answered every card, with all the results.

The new Chief can coordinate and configure its own team. It does not inherit the creator's access to other teams or execution permissions. Removing a Chief assignment also removes that bot's additional managed-team access. Existing conversations and model selections remain intact.

Delegation

Delegation asks another bot to handle a bounded subtask. The delegated task keeps its own activity and returns a result to the originating conversation. Give each delegate a narrow outcome and avoid assigning two bots ownership of the same files.