AI in Apps

Let your apps think, classify, summarize, and run full Operator agents on demand

Apps you build with the App Builder can use AI as a built-in capability — no extra setup, no API keys to manage. When you describe your app, simply tell the App Builder where AI should be involved, and it will wire it up for you.

There are two flavors of AI you can use, and the App Builder picks the right one based on what you ask for.

Pure AI — for one-off thinking tasks

Use this when your app needs a single, focused answer from AI: classify something, extract a value, summarize text, or look at one image or document.

Examples of what to ask for in your app description:

• "When a customer message arrives, use AI to classify it as Complaint, Question, or Compliment."
• "Add a button that summarizes the selected sales order notes into one paragraph."
• "When the user uploads an invoice photo, extract the total amount and invoice number."
• "Translate the product description into French."

Pure AI is fast and cheap. It does not use any tools, does not see your ERP data on its own, and does not remember previous answers — each call stands alone.

Choosing how hard the AI thinks

You can tell the App Builder how much effort the AI should put in:

• Fastest — trivial sorting and tagging.
• Fast (default) — most everyday tasks.
• Smart — careful analysis, multi-step reasoning.
• Expert — the hardest problems where accuracy matters most.

Just say it in plain language: "Use the Smart level when generating the recommendation summary."

Full agent conversations — when AI needs to do real work

When a single answer is not enough — for example, you need the AI to look up data, run tools, follow rules, or hold a conversation — your app can run a full Operator agent in the background, exactly like the assistant you talk to in the main Operator chat.

Examples of what to ask for:

• "Add a chat panel where the user can talk to the Business Specialist about the currently selected customer."
• "When the user clicks 'Analyze', let the System Architect agent investigate the issue and write a report."
• "Use my custom Onboarding Coach agent to guide the user through the steps."
• "Open a conversation with the Advisor so the user can ask product questions without leaving this app."

The agent has access to all of its normal tools and capabilities — querying ERP data, searching documentation, sending email, calling automations, and so on — within the limits of what the running user is allowed to do.

Picking the agent

You can use any of the built-in agents:

Or you can point your app at one of your own agents — both the ones you created and the ones other people have shared with you. Just refer to the agent by name when describing the app (e.g. "use my AI Asset Assistant agent to process the file") and the App Builder will look it up and wire it in for you. End users of the finished app never see or type an agent ID — the agent is baked into the app at build time. See Creating Agents for how to build your own.

You can also tell the App Builder to limit which capabilities the agent uses inside the app — for example, "only let the agent use Knowledge and Data Records, nothing else."

When you reference one of your own agents, the conversation runs with its base persona, its reasoning level, and its capability list — exactly the way the agent is configured under User Agents. The app can only narrow that list (drop capabilities); it cannot add anything the agent itself isn't allowed to use.

Read-only by default — opt in to write

Conversations launched from an app run read-only by default — the agent can read ERP data, search documentation, look things up, but it cannot create, update, or delete records. This is a safety net for apps that only need to look at data.

If your app legitimately needs the agent to write back — for example, "create a Vehicle record from the uploaded photo", "update the customer address", "log a To-Do task" — just say so when you describe the app: "the agent should be allowed to update records" (or "…create assets", "…log tasks", etc.). The App Builder will switch the conversation into write mode for you.

The deployment-level read-only lock (set by your instance admin) always wins. If the instance is hard-locked read-only, no app can override that.

Attaching files

When the user uploads or selects a file in your app, you can pass it to the agent as part of the message. The agent sees the same file content as it would in a normal Operator chat — full image understanding, PDF parsing, spreadsheet contents, etc. — within the usual file-size limits.

What the user sees

Conversations started by an app are real Operator conversations. They show up in the user's normal chat history, and the user can revisit them later from the main Operator interface.

Referencing other apps while building

While you are building an app in the App Builder, you can point the agent at another app to reuse its code or layout.

• Type @ in the chat input — a popover lists every app you can reference (any app shared with you at Clone level or higher, excluding the one you are currently editing). Pick one and the editor inserts an @app:<slug> mention.
• The agent can then list and read the referenced app's files and copy or adapt them into the current app. Writes always go to the current app — the referenced app is treated as read-only, regardless of your permission level on it.
• Just describe what you want in plain language, for example: "use the same dashboard layout as @app:sales-overview" or "copy the invoice parser from @app:ar-tools and adapt it to handle PDFs".

Where the AI runs

• AI calls are made by the Operator host on behalf of the running user. No API keys live in your app.
• AI usage counts toward the running user's normal AI credits, just like regular chat.
• A full agent conversation runs against the instance the user has selected in the toolbar at the moment the conversation is created. If you need a specific instance, make sure the user has it selected before triggering the AI work.

Best practices

• Reach for Pure AI first. It is faster, cheaper, and good enough for most tagging, extraction, and summarization tasks.
• Use a full agent only when the AI needs tools or a back-and-forth. Running a full agent for a one-line classification is overkill.
• Pick the smallest agent that fits. "Advisor" for product questions, "Business Specialist" for data work — using a heavier agent "just in case" wastes time and credits, and may not even be available to every user of your app.
• Match the agent to your audience. If your app will be used by people without an instance connection, lean on Advisor or Pure AI rather than agents that require one.
• Keep files small. When you ask AI to look at an image or PDF, the smaller the file, the faster the answer.
• Plan for failures. AI can be rate-limited, denied by permissions, or run out of credits — ask the App Builder to show a friendly message if a call fails, instead of leaving the user staring at a spinner.

Support policy

The AI features described here are part of the App Builder, so the same self-service support policy applies — see the Support Policy section of the App Builder overview. You are responsible for testing AI-driven flows in your app and making sure the agent and capabilities you choose match the permissions of the people who will use it.