Assistant

Tool Approval in Assistant Chat

Before August takes certain actions in Assistant, it pauses and shows an approval card in the chat. The conversation continues once you approve or cancel. You decide which kinds of actions pause, and which run without asking, under Chat Features in your user profile.

When You'll See an Approval Card

By default, August asks before actions that change your files, settings, or external systems:

  • Drafts and tabular reviews: creating a draft or a tabular review

  • Files and folders: creating folders, and moving or copying files and folders

  • Deleting: deleting drafts, playbooks, skills, tabular reviews, or agents. August can't delete files or folders from chat; delete those from the folder view.

  • Memory: saving, editing, or removing a memory note

  • Email and integrations: sending, forwarding, or managing Outlook email, and saving to iManage, NetDocuments, or Lawmatics if your firm uses them

  • Importing from connected services: if your firm has it enabled, saving a document from SharePoint, Google Drive, Dropbox, iManage, NetDocuments, Clio, or Lawmatics, or attachments from an Outlook email, into August

  • Settings: changes August proposes to your Chat Features, Personalization, or connections

Reading documents, searching, and web research run without an approval card by default.

How the Approval Card Works

The card says what August wants to do and offers buttons named for that action, for example Send email and Cancel.

  • Approve (the button named for the action) runs it, and August continues.

  • Always allow, when shown, runs it and changes that row in Chat Features so August stops asking for that kind of action. It isn't offered for drafts or for sending and managing Outlook email.

  • Cancel skips the action. August continues without it, and you can keep asking follow-up questions. On memory cards this button is named for the choice, such as Don't save or Keep note.

Some cards offer other choices:

  • When August proposes a draft, the card asks whether you want an August draft, a Word document, or an answer in chat. See Drafts.

  • When August wants to import a document from a connected service, Import to August keeps it as an August document you can cite, search, and reuse later. Just read it this turn reads it for this answer without saving anything into August.

  • When you've limited legal research to selected sources and August wants to look further, the card offers Search the web or Selected sources only.

Manage Your Tool Permissions

Change how each group of tools behaves when you want fewer prompts or tighter control.

  1. Open your user profile and choose Chat Features.

  2. Find the row under Create, Files & folders, or Integrations. Memory and Office documents are rows under Create.

  3. Choose Block, Ask, or Allow.

Block stops August from using those tools at all. Ask pauses for approval every time. Allow runs them without asking. Deleting, and sending or managing Outlook email, always ask for approval, whatever the row is set to. Click Reset to defaults to undo your changes.

These settings apply to Auto. In Manual, the actions you switch on in the composer decide which tools August uses on that turn.

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