Product features: workspace apps

In user language: lightweight business tools in this workspace — UI plus data. You can also ask a work agent in Messages to create or improve them.

What an app is

• Each app belongs to the current workspace; members share it (data is isolated to the workspace).
• An app usually has: a standard UI (drawn from your description), business data (stored separately), and operating notes (so the agent knows how to help).
• Fits department tools: simple receiving, notebooks, leave-registration prototypes, one-click reports. Complex compliance still belongs in a dedicated platform plugin (see product spec), or Compliance checks (workflow template).

How to open the apps desktop

1. Select a workspace in the top bar.
2. Tap Apps on the right (grid icon + label, next to the Feature menu).
3. Or click Go to apps desktop in a help answer.

With no workspace selected, Apps is unavailable; first go to Workspace collaboration to create or switch.

To open the apps desktop first after login: Account → Preferences → Default page after login → Apps.

What the apps desktop looks like

• The main view only shows desktop icons (app sets and app tiles are the same size):

- App set: “group” mark in the top-left; open to see apps in the pack. - App: ungrouped apps, or shortcuts pinned to the desktop.

• Top-right gear (Manage): new app, import app pack, manage app sets, manage templates (sidebar).
• On a tile you can pin/unpin (☆/★) and delete (×).
• Inside an app: fill forms and view lists; close with ← Back.

App sets

• New / delete an app set: Manage (top right) → App sets.
• Open an app set: tap its icon on the desktop.
• Delete an app set: Ungroup only (apps become ungrouped) or Delete with apps (cannot undo).
• Creator or workspace admin can delete.

Create an app manually

Manage (top right) → New app:

After create, the new app opens automatically.

Top bar after you open an app

Besides ← Back and the name:

App pack and Improve are exclusive: opening one closes the other; tap the same button again to close the sidebar.

Iterate with Improve

1. Open the app → top bar Improve.
2. Describe the change, e.g. “add a department filter to the list”, “fetch via predefined query xxx”.
3. Type / to cite a workspace skill, or paste a screenshot or attachment.
4. Generation shows in the conversation (expand reasoning and output); when there is an applicable change, preview the diff then confirm write.
5. Several assistant tabs can improve in parallel; conversations save automatically.

Best after a skeleton exists: polish UI, fetch logic, and report flow without rewriting from zero.

Import and export an app pack

Copies UI and logic to another workspace (or backup then import). Does not include business data already registered in the source workspace.

If this workspace already has an app with the same id, Overwrite (replace UI/logic and clear business data) or Copy (new app). Workflow apps cannot be exported or overwritten.

If the app depends on predefined queries, the export pack tries to include those query definitions (not database accounts). On import, if the target workspace lacks a same-named query, an admin can write them onto a data connection, or import the app first and fill in Data integration later. See Data connections and predefined queries.

App templates

Manage (top right) → Templates (or from an open app → More ▾ → Save as template):

Ask an agent in Messages to create an app

After a workspace is selected, describe the need to the help agent or a work agent, e.g.:

• “Help me create a receiving app”
• “Make a small inventory-registration app”
• “I want an OA leave-registration app” (tries to generate a data model and UI description; needs a language model configured)

On success the reply includes an Open app link. Then keep polishing with Improve.

Vague phrasing: extra round or not

Everyone uses the same order: if you name “create an app / agent / skill”, it does it. Revising a document, writing a file, querying a connection stay with the current assistant. Invite, remove member, delete agent, open a page, and similar: the model reads the full sentence so “remove wording / summarize the topic” is not treated as removing a member. Only something like “make a literary-creation one” with no named object may ask another round: agent or app?

Each work agent can choose what to do when vague (not two intent engines):

How to change:

1. Chat (recommended): tell the current work agent “ask the model when vague” or “only act on clear requests”.
2. UI: Agent marketplace → My agents → that assistant → Persona → left Intent and concurrency → Vague phrasing: extra round or not.

If never saved separately, Ask the model when vague applies.

#### If it misunderstood, what to say next

If the assistant got your intent wrong (you wanted to revise a document, it listed data connections):

1. If it is still generating, Stop first.
2. Correct in the next sentence, e.g. “I did not want to list data connections; keep revising the method”, “not that — I want to change the document”, “I did not want to create an app”.
3. The assistant should admit the misread, then immediately do what the previous round should have done; save a correction record if needed. Do not only say “noted” and stop.

You can also open Intent and concurrency on the Persona page and view or delete correction records.

Run a skill report first, then make an app

When the in-app “one click produces it” should match the same metric and template as the skill in chat:

1. In Messages type / to pick a skill (or natural-language trigger) and run the report through.
2. Then say “please generate an app that can produce this report when opened”.
3. If this conversation just read that skill, even without typing / this round, the system can inherit skills already used in this conversation.
4. If the skill already has an executable compute script, it is synced into the app pack when possible; otherwise the assistant freezes the stats logic from the conversation into app code.

The app then does not depend on the chat model improvising. Material requirements: What belongs in a skill.

Delete an app

• On the apps desktop or inside an app set: × on the tile, or open the app → More ▾ → Delete app; confirm.
• Creator or workspace admin can delete.
• Permanent; cannot undo.

vs Skills Center and platform plugins

| | Workspace app | Skills Center | Platform plugin | |--|-----------|----------|----------| | Typical use | Small tool + simple data; one-click UI after freezing a skill report | Teach the agent how to do a class of work | Full professional system | | UI | Standard lists/forms on the apps desktop | No separate UI | Separate site | | Data | The app’s own data | Usually not an app database | The plugin’s own system |

Related docs

• Skills and agents — import/export skills, use skills in chat
• Data connections and predefined queries — predefined queries travel with the pack
• Compliance checks (workflow template) — on-site inspection workflows
• Messages, conversations, and attachments — create an app in chat