Toby app tour

This page shows you around the Toby app: what each area is for, where to find things, and how to customize it. Each section links to a full guide.

The main window

• Sidebar (left). Switch between areas: Home, Chats, Projects, Library, Recordings, Flows, and Skills in one list.
• Bottom of the sidebar. The persona picker on the left chooses which persona new chats use. The colored dot on the right shows whether Toby's background service is healthy. Green means everything is working. Click the dot for details or to restart it.
• Toolbar (top right). Record (●) starts a meeting recording, Settings (gear) opens settings, and Search opens the command palette. A second group holds actions for the current screen, such as New, Edit, Run now, or Delete.
• Lists. Areas that hold many items (chats, projects, recordings, and so on) show a list in the middle column. Click an item to open it. Click empty space in the list to go back to the overview.

Home

Home is your daily dashboard. It shows cards for Upcoming events, Tasks, and Unread mail (once those apps are connected), each with a short AI summary. Continue working lists your five most recent chats and projects.

Cards and buttons you create with flows also appear here: cards in the grid, and one-click buttons in the Actions strip on the right. Rows that link somewhere, such as a news article or a task, open when you click them.

Customize Home

Click Edit Home (pencil icon) in the toolbar. While editing you can:

• Drag cards to reorder them.
• Hide a card. Hidden cards move to a Hidden cards area. Click Show to bring one back.
• Color a card with the palette button. Use default follows the flow's own color; Neutral removes color.

Click Done or press Escape when finished. Your layout is saved on this Mac.

More options are under Settings → Home:

• Home persona chooses the persona that writes the card summaries. A fast, non-reasoning model works best (models labeled · reasoning sometimes include their working notes).
• Show unread mail / tasks / upcoming events turns the built-in cards on or off. Events come from your default calendar (see Default providers).
• Hide onboarding checklist hides the setup checklist. You can also click Hide next to the checklist's progress count.
• Reset Home layout restores the default card order, colors, and visibility.

Chats

Where you talk to Toby. Press ⌘N for a new chat, or use the arrow next to + to start one with a specific persona. See Your first chat.

The Working… section starts collapsed. Click it to see work steps and selected tools, then click again to collapse it. Your choice stays in place when work finishes or fails; completed work shows Worked for with its duration.

Projects

A project keeps the chats, instructions, and files for one piece of work together. See Projects.

Library

Files you want Toby to remember and search, such as PDFs, notes, and images. See Library.

Recordings

Meeting and call recordings with transcripts and AI summaries. See Recordings.

Flows

Flows have manual, schedule, and event triggers. Their steps are step-by-step recipes that can power Home cards and one-click buttons. See Schedules and Flows.

Skills

Instructions that teach Toby how to do a specific task your way. See Skills.

Memories

Facts and preferences Toby remembers about you. Memories open in their own window: View → Memories (⌘6). See Memories.

Command palette

Press ⌘K (or click Search) to jump to any chat, project, recording, setting, or action by typing part of its name. If you type a sentence that doesn't match anything, such as "summarize my day", choose Start a chat with… and Toby opens a new chat with that request.

Keyboard shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
⌘N	New chat (or a new project chat when a project is selected)
⌘K	Command palette
⌘,	Settings
⌘1	Home
⌘2	Chats
⌘3	Settings → Integrations
⌘4	Projects
⌘5	Skills
⌘6	Memories
⌘8	Flows
⌘9	Recordings
⌘0	Library
⌘?	Open this help site

In Settings → General you can also set system-wide shortcuts that work even when Toby is in the background: open the command palette, start or stop a recording, start a new chat, or ask Toby's Head. Ask Toby’s Head defaults to ⌃⌥Space (Control–Option–Space). Use Record… to record another combination, or Clear to disable it.

Toby's Head

Choose View → Show Toby's Head, or Show / Hide Toby's Head in Toby’s menu bar menu, to show or hide the floating head. Toby appears as a portrait cutout without a window frame. Drag the portrait to move it; click it to open How can I help? with a multiline question field. You can also choose View → Ask Toby's Head or press ⌥⌘T to open the composer directly with the keyboard while Toby is active. The global ⌃⌥Space shortcut works from other apps, shows the head if hidden, opens its chat bubble, and focuses the question field. Press it again to refocus the current conversation. Configure it in Settings → General. The bubble starts compact, with a small inset around the header and question field, and expands when you send a question. Near the bottom of the screen, it automatically slides upward to keep the whole conversation on screen without moving Toby.

Use Send or ⌘Return to ask Toby. Return inserts a new line. Replies stream into the conversation, including Markdown and any choices Toby asks you to make. Toby's Head shows the conversation without skill, tool, or preparation details. Errors and interactive questions still appear; full activity details remain available in the saved chat in Chats. Toby's Head uses your configured default persona and AI provider. Your first question creates a chat in Chats; follow-up questions continue that chat. Start over begins a new chat and keeps the previous one in your history. Stop cancels an active reply.

Closing the bubble or hiding Toby preserves the conversation and lets an active reply finish. Reopen it to continue. If Toby cannot connect or create a chat, your question stays in the input box so you can retry. The head's current conversation lasts until you start over, switch Toby home directories, or quit the app; saved chats remain available in Chats. Toby’s eyes follow the cursor while idle and center when you open the conversation. Cursor positions stay on your Mac and are not sent with messages. Toby smiles subtly while the conversation is open. When you close the bubble, he briefly frowns for about two seconds, then returns to his normal expression. Reopening the conversation restores the smile. While a question is processing, Toby raises one eyebrow. As the reply streams in, his mouth moves subtly as though he is talking, pausing when text delivery pauses. These expressions settle when processing finishes or Toby waits for your choice. Enable macOS Reduce Motion to keep the eyes still and switch mouth expressions without animated transitions. The processing eyebrow stays static, and talking motion is disabled.

Escape or clicking elsewhere closes the conversation while preserving its draft. Right-click the portrait and choose Hide Toby's Head to hide both surfaces. Toby's Head starts visible in the lower-right corner and remembers both its position and whether you showed or hid it between app launches. The chat bubble opens when you ask Toby; it does not reopen automatically at launch.

Settings

Open Settings with the gear button or ⌘,. Pick a section on the left. Most sections have their own guide. See Settings overview.

General

These preferences apply to this Mac only.

Setting	What it does	Default
Home directory	The folder where Toby keeps your data. Changing it points Toby at a different folder. It doesn't copy anything.	~/.toby
Start at login	Open Toby automatically when you log in	Off
Show menu bar icon	Quick access to chat, recording, and windows from the menu bar	On
Global shortcuts	System-wide shortcuts for the command palette, recording, and new chat	Not set
Show tutorial button	Show a button in the main toolbar to start the current section’s tutorial	On
Theme	System, Light, or Dark	System
Accent color	Color for buttons and highlights	Orange

Section tutorials

Choose the tutorial button (question mark) in the permanent main toolbar to start or restart the tutorial for the section you are viewing. For example, in Flows it starts the Flows tutorial; in Home it starts the Home tutorial. Home, Chats, Projects, Library, Recordings, Flows, and Skills each have their own tutorial. Replaying one section does not reset progress in the others.

The Home tutorial introduces the dashboard and workspaces. The Flows tutorial invites you to inspect a built-in flow, explains How it works, and opens a new flow draft. It explains triggers, sources, AI, and output destinations, scrolling the editor to reveal the output area. The other sections currently provide a short introduction.

Tutorials start when you request them. Choose Next to continue, or Finish tutorial at the end. Stop tour, closing a tip, or switching sections ends the current session. Use the toolbar button to start that section again. Exploring the tutorial does not run a flow or save a draft; you can customize and save the draft afterward or choose Cancel.

Use Settings → General → Show tutorial button to show or hide the toolbar button. This setting controls the button’s visibility, and there is no separate restart button in Settings. Progress is saved on this Mac; setup help and update notices are separate from tutorials.

Menus

Menu item	What it does
File → New Chat / Schedule / Skill / Project / Memory	Create a new item
File → Permissions…	Review the macOS permissions Toby uses (microphone, calendar, location, and so on) and grant any that are missing
File → Backup Toby Data… / Restore Toby Data…	Save or restore an encrypted backup of everything. See Security.
View → Connection Status…	Check the background service and inbound chat
Help → Toby Help	Open this site
Help → Report an Issue…	Send a bug report

Troubleshooting

• The status dot isn't green, or Toby isn't responding. Click the dot and choose Restart server, or open the command palette (⌘K) and run Restart server. Quitting and reopening Toby also works.
• An integration stopped working. Open Settings → Integrations, pick it, and click Re-connect.
• macOS didn't ask for a permission, or you clicked Don't Allow. Open File → Permissions… and click Allow, or Open System Settings if it was previously denied.
• Something else. Use Help → Report an Issue….

For how the app and its background service fit together, see Architecture.