Playbooks overview

What an agentic playbook is, how it moves from draft to active, and why every run starts with a person.
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A playbook gives an AI agent a job to do. You write down the goal, list the outcomes (tasks) you want, and choose which actions the agent may run. When someone starts a run inside a space, the agent works through the tasks toward that goal. It reads files, searches the knowledge graph, and dispatches actions. It pauses for your approval at the gates you set.

Playbooks are org-level and reusable. A playbook is not tied to one space. You make it available to a space type. Every space created from that type can run it.

Playbooks (the definitions) are admin-only. The library lives at Playbooks in the sidebar. If you are not an admin, you see “You need an admin role to manage playbooks.” Running a playbook happens inside a space. Anyone who can contribute there can run one. See Run a playbook.

Two run types — keep them straight

A space has both a Playbooks tab and an Actions tab. They are not the same thing.

SurfaceWhat it runs
Playbooks tabAn agentic run. The agent pursues a goal across multiple tasks and actions, and pauses for approvals.
Actions tabA single-action run. You run one action over some files, with no agent.

This page and the rest of this section cover playbook runs (the Playbooks tab). To run one action over some files, see Run an action.

The playbooks library

Open Playbooks to see every playbook in your organization. The list has these columns:

ColumnWhat it shows
NameThe playbook’s name. Click it to open the editor.
Statusdraft, active, or archived.
Space typesThe space types this playbook is bound to, or All space types if it is not bound to any.
ActionsHow many actions the agent may run.
UpdatedWhen the playbook last changed.

Use New playbook to start one. See Build a playbook for the editor walkthrough.

The lifecycle

Every playbook carries a status. It moves through three states.

1

Draft

Being built. You edit the goal, tasks, and actions freely. A draft cannot run in a space yet.

2

Active

Runnable. You publish a draft by clicking Activate in the editor. Activation validates the playbook first. Only a valid playbook can be activated: it needs a name plus a title on every task. Only active playbooks appear in a space’s run picker.

3

Archived

Retired. The playbook is kept for history but is no longer offered for new runs. Archive a playbook from the editor when a process is replaced or no longer needed.

Runs are always started by a person

There is no trigger or scheduling system. A playbook never runs on its own, on a timer, or in response to an event. A person starts every run from a space’s Playbooks tab.

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