Assistant
The Assistant is your main interface for working with Town AI. Ask it anything — it can search the web, read your email, check your calendar, create documents, run code, and more.
Overview
The Assistant is a conversational AI that has access to your connected accounts and Town’s full set of tools. Every conversation is a thread — you can have as many threads as you want, switch between them, and pick up where you left off.
Unlike a generic chatbot, the Assistant works with your real data. It can look up a specific email, check what’s on your calendar tomorrow, draft a reply, create a document, and export it to Google Docs — all in a single conversation.
Getting started
Starting a conversation
Open the Assistant from the sidebar or navigate to /assistant. You’ll see a centered input with a personalized greeting and suggested tasks.
Type your message and press Enter, or click one of the suggested task cards to get started. A new thread is created automatically when you send your first message.
The chat layout
- Left: the conversation — your messages, the assistant’s responses, and tool call activity
- Right: a detail panel that slides in when the assistant creates or references a document or workflow
On mobile, the detail panel appears as a bottom drawer.
What you can ask
The Assistant has access to a broad set of tools. Here are common things you can do:
- “Show me the latest emails from Sarah”
- “Draft a reply to the marketing team’s proposal”
- “Archive all newsletters from the last week”
- “Find the attachment from John’s email about the Q3 report”
The Assistant can search emails, read full threads, create drafts, add or remove labels, and archive or trash messages.
Calendar
- “What’s on my calendar tomorrow?”
- “Schedule a 30-minute meeting with Alex next Tuesday at 2pm”
- “Move my 1:1 with Sam to Wednesday”
- “Cancel the team standup on Friday”
The Assistant can list your calendars and events, create new events, edit existing ones, and delete events.
Calendar changes that create or modify events require your approval by default. You can switch to autonomous mode if you want changes applied automatically.
Web search and research
- “What’s the latest news on the OpenAI API pricing changes?”
- “Research the top 5 project management tools and compare them”
- “Look up the population of Tokyo”
The Assistant can search the web and fetch full page content.
Documents
- “Create a doc summarizing our Q4 goals”
- “Write a meeting prep brief for my call with the investors”
- “Draft a project proposal based on the emails from last week”
Documents created by the Assistant open in the detail panel alongside the conversation. You can continue chatting while the document is visible, and ask the assistant to make edits to it. See Town AI Document for the full document editing experience.
File search
- “Find the presentation I uploaded last week”
- “Search for anything related to the annual budget”
The Assistant can search across your Content Library, email attachments, Google Drive, Notion, Slack, and Dropbox (depending on which integrations you have connected).
Code execution
- “Run this Python script and show me the output”
- “Calculate the compound interest on $10,000 at 5% over 10 years”
The Assistant can execute code in a sandboxed environment with internet access.
Workflows
- “Show me my active workflows”
- “What did Auto-inbox do with my emails today?”
- “Create a workflow that drafts weekly standup updates from my sent emails”
The Assistant can list your workflows, query their session history, invoke them, and help you create or edit workflow configurations.
Input features
Text input
Type your message in the input box at the bottom of the conversation. The input supports:
- Multi-line text (Shift+Enter for new lines)
- Markdown formatting
- Draft persistence — if you navigate away and come back, your unsent draft is preserved
Voice input
Click the microphone button to record a voice message. Your audio is transcribed and sent as a text message. A “transcribing” indicator appears while the audio is being processed.
Image attachments
You can attach images to your messages in two ways:
- Paste from your clipboard (
Cmd/Ctrl + V) - Drag and drop an image file into the input
Attached images appear as thumbnails in the input before sending.
@-mentions
Type @ in the input to reference workflows, squares, or other context:
| Mention type | What it does |
|---|---|
@workflow | References an existing workflow by name |
@square | Mentions a square (in square threads) |
@assistant | Explicitly mentions the assistant |
@context | References another session or context |
Mentions appear as colored chips in the input. An autocomplete popover helps you find the right reference.
Create actions
You can also use @ to create new things directly from the chat input:
- Create a workflow —
@Create a workflow that... - Create a document —
@Create a doc... - Create a sheet —
@Create a sheet... - Create an email —
@Create an email...
Approval modes
The Assistant supports three approval modes that control how tool calls with side effects (like sending an email or creating a calendar event) are handled:
| Mode | Behavior |
|---|---|
| Respect tool setting | Each tool uses its default mode — some auto-execute, others require approval |
| Require approval (HITL) | All write actions require your explicit approval before executing |
| Autonomous | All tool calls execute automatically without approval |
You can change the approval mode from the input area before sending a message. The mode applies to the entire thread.
When the assistant proposes a write action in approval mode, you’ll see the tool call details and can approve or reject it. If you reject it, the assistant continues the conversation without executing that action.
Thread management
Thread list
All your threads appear in the sidebar. Each thread shows:
- The conversation title (auto-generated from the first message)
- Unread indicator for threads with new activity
- A pin icon for pinned threads
- A colored dot for threads in a Square
Thread actions
Right-click or use the menu on any thread in the sidebar to:
- Rename — change the thread title
- Pin / Unpin — keep important threads at the top
- Mark as unread — flag a thread for follow-up
- Delete — remove the thread permanently
Sharing a conversation
Click the Share button in the thread header to create a shareable link. Anyone with the link can view a read-only version of the conversation.
Before a shared view is published, Town applies a privacy transformation to reduce exposure of sensitive internal details. This keeps shared conversation links focused on useful context while minimizing raw internal data leakage.
The detail panel
When the assistant creates or references a document or workflow, a detail panel slides in on the right side of the conversation.
Documents in the detail panel
Documents open in a rich editor inside the panel. You can:
- Read and edit the document directly
- Select text and add it to the chat for context
- Use slash commands (
/) in the document — prompts are sent to the conversation thread - Resize the panel by dragging its left edge (320px to 800px)
Workflows in the detail panel
When viewing a workflow, the panel shows the workflow configuration in a read-only view.
Suggestions and the home screen
When you first open the Assistant (before starting a thread), you’ll see:
- A personalized greeting generated from your profile and recent activity
- Suggested tasks organized into categories:
- Time-sensitive — things that need attention now
- Audio briefings — summaries you can listen to
- Documents — content that could be drafted or updated
- Observations — patterns the assistant has noticed
- Schedule view — your upcoming calendar events
Click any suggestion card to start a conversation with that task pre-filled. You can also refresh suggestions or adjust what categories appear.
Squares
Squares are shared spaces where multiple people can chat with a shared AI assistant. Each Square has its own assistant context and conversation history.
How Squares work
- Navigate to a Square from the sidebar
- Messages you send are visible to all Square members
- Use
@squareto direct a message to the Square’s assistant (messages without the mention are regular chat) - Each Square member sees the same conversation
Delegated work
In a Square thread, you can @mention your Personal Assistant to delegate a task. This creates a separate session with your PA, and the result is brought back into the Square thread. You can:
- Accept the result (inserts it into the Square input)
- Dismiss it
- Reply to your PA for follow-ups
Keyboard shortcuts
| Shortcut | Action |
|---|---|
Enter | Send message |
Shift + Enter | New line in input |
@ | Open mention autocomplete |
Backspace | Delete selected mention chip |
Arrow keys | Navigate mention autocomplete |
Escape | Dismiss autocomplete / popovers |
How it connects to other features
- Town AI Document — documents created in the assistant open in the detail panel; the full document editor is available at
/content/document/[id] - Workflows — the assistant can create, edit, invoke, and inspect workflows
- Safety — write actions in approval mode generate approval requests you can review