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Working with an AI agent

Plicine can host an AI agent of your own, such as Claude Code, so you can ask for a change while looking at the document it's about: "tighten this introduction", "add a row for travel to the quote", "make me a block that shows our opening hours".

The agent isn't part of Plicine. It's a program on your computer, under your own account with whoever makes it, and your conversation goes to them, not to us.

What you need first

One of these agents, installed and signed in on your computer:

  • Claude Code
  • Kiro
  • Gemini CLI
  • Codex

Installing one is done in a terminal, following its maker's instructions. If that isn't your kind of thing, ask a technical colleague; it's a one-off. Plicine finds whichever ones you have.

Opening the palette

The palette is the bar at the bottom of the document. Click it, or press Cmd+K (Ctrl+K on Windows) from anywhere. It's also View > Agent Palette, and the row at the foot of the sidebar shows which agent is picked and what it's doing. Esc folds the palette away.

The first time, pick your agent from the list. If it isn't signed in, the palette says so and offers a button that puts it right.

Asking for something

Type what you want. Enter sends and Shift+Enter starts a new line.

The document you're reading goes along with your message, so "this paragraph" and "the table above" mean what you'd expect. Remove its label under the box if you'd rather it didn't. Plicine also gives the agent a briefing about your vault at the start of a conversation: how documents and blocks work, which blocks you have, and which files to leave alone.

While the agent works, the palette shows its plan, each file it reads or changes, and its reply as it arrives. The document updates as the agent saves. Anything you send in the meantime waits its turn. Fold the palette and a strip keeps the current step in view, with a Stop button.

Type / in the box for commands: Plicine's own (export a PDF, switch the layout, start a new conversation, stop the agent) and any the agent has.

When the agent asks permission

Agents ask before doing some things, depending on the mode they're in. When yours asks, the palette shows what it wants to do and where, with the before and after for a change to a file, and waits. Pick one of the answers it offers, such as allowing it once, allowing it for the rest of the session, or saying no. The menus at the top of the palette change the agent's mode and, for agents that offer a choice, which model it uses.

Worth knowing

  • An agent acts as you. It can do to your files what you can. In a folder other people write to, keep it in a mode that asks before changing anything, because a document could contain text written to steer it.
  • A block the agent makes still waits for your yes before it runs, like any other new block.
  • The conversation lives in the open app. It's gone when you close Plicine.
  • There's one agent and one conversation for each open vault.

For technical readers: Building with an AI agent covers running an agent from a terminal, the tools Plicine gives it and the AGENTS.md briefing file.