Chat & sessions

Everything you do in Harriet Desktop happens in a chat session inside a workspace. This page covers starting sessions, reading streaming responses and the execution plan, and how workspaces and templates keep different jobs separate.

Workspaces come first

A workspace is a folder you choose and share with the app: an existing project or notes folder works fine. The AI reads and writes inside that folder, which is what lets it do real work — summarize a quarter's invoices for finance, draft vendor emails from a notes file for operations, assemble a renewal brief for sales — instead of only answering questions.

Keep unrelated jobs in separate workspaces so files, sessions, and context stay tidy.

Sessions

A session is one conversation with its own history. Use Create new session to start a fresh task in the current workspace rather than piling unrelated requests into one thread. Old sessions stay in the workspace, so you can come back to yesterday's analysis without re-explaining it.

1. Pick or create a workspace. Choose the folder that holds the files this job needs.
2. Create a new session. Each distinct task gets its own session.
3. Describe the job. Be concrete: name the file, the output you want, and any constraints. Your assigned skills apply automatically when they match.

Finding your way around the sidebar

The sidebar lists your workspaces in a fixed order, with only the one you are working in opened. Selecting another workspace opens it and closes the last one, so the list stays the height of a single workspace however many you have. To keep a workspace open alongside the current one, click its chevron — pinned workspaces stay open until you close them again.

A closed workspace still tells you what changed inside it. It shows a count of unread tasks, or a red count when something in it is waiting on you, and a moon when a cloud workspace is asleep. Sleeping is normal: cloud workspaces pause when idle and wake when you open one.

Two sections sit above the list:

• Needs attention appears only when something is blocked, and gathers it from every workspace at once: a task waiting for your approval, a question the AI asked you, a run that failed, or an event that needs review. Cloud tasks appear here even while their workspace is asleep, and opening one wakes it.
• Recent lists the last few tasks you worked on, in any workspace, so you can pick up where you left off without opening anything.

Both sections can be folded away with their headers, and stay that way until you open them again.

Searching across workspaces

The search box at the top of the sidebar finds a task by its title, by a filename it produced, or by a phrase said inside it — useful when you remember what a task was about but not which workspace it was in. Results are grouped by workspace, with the one you are in first, and each transcript match shows the sentence it matched.

Use the All workspaces and workspace buttons to switch between searching everywhere and searching only where you are. Arrow keys move through results, Enter opens one, and Escape clears the search and brings the workspace list back. The same search runs from the keyboard with ⌘K (Ctrl+K on Windows).

Task names are searchable everywhere, including cloud workspaces that are asleep and ones you have never opened on this computer. Harriet keeps a list of your task names so the sidebar can find them without having to wake a sleeping workspace.

Searching by a phrase from inside a conversation works for workspaces you have opened on this computer. The conversations themselves stay in the workspace rather than being copied to Harriet, so a workspace you have not opened here is findable by name but not yet by its contents. Open it once and it catches up.

Streaming responses and the execution plan

Responses stream in live, so you see the AI's answer as it is produced rather than waiting for a finished block. On longer tasks the app also shows an execution plan: the AI's todo list, rendered as a timeline you can watch. While the AI is working out its approach the session shows a Planning status; as it works through the list, the app reports progress in the form "2 out of 5 tasks completed".

The plan is your early-warning system. If an IT admin asks for a device report and the plan shows the AI heading toward the wrong data, stop it and redirect before it finishes, not after.

When your connection drops

Long tasks keep going through short interruptions. If Harriet loses its connection while it works, because your Wi-Fi drops, you move to another network or Harriet's servers restart, it waits until it can reach them again and then carries on from where it stopped. A note in the conversation says so while it waits; select Don't continue if you would rather it stopped. If the connection stays down, the note offers Continue so you can pick the task up yourself when you're back online.

A task running on your computer pauses while the computer sleeps. To stop it going to sleep on its own during long tasks, turn on Keep your computer awake while Harriet is working in Harriet Desktop's Settings. Your screen can still turn off, and closing the lid still puts the computer to sleep. Tasks in cloud workspaces keep running while your computer sleeps.

Reviewing changes to files

When your workspace folder is tracked with Git, the Working files list on the right shows how many lines each file gained and lost since the last commit, and marks new files. Click a changed text file and the preview opens on its changes, with long unchanged stretches folded away. Use Changes and Preview at the top of the preview to switch between the changes and the file as it is now.

Once a chat has used five or more files, the list splits them into Changed, the files Harriet created or edited, and Referenced, the files it read, was given or mentioned. In a Git workspace Referenced starts closed, because the edits are usually what you want to review; in other folders both groups stay open. A group of more than five files shows as folders you can open and close, and each chat keeps what you opened or closed until you quit Harriet.

In a Markdown or plain-text document, the preview marks edits in place. It strikes through removed words in red and highlights added words in green, so re-wrapping a paragraph doesn't hide what changed, and it tells you when only spacing or line breaks changed. For other files, such as a Python script, it compares whole lines: added lines are green and removed lines are red.

Harriet compares each file with the last commit, so the highlighting clears after a commit. CSV files show their changes line by line. Word documents, Excel workbooks, presentations, PDFs and images always open in the normal preview.

Keeping an eye on cost

When a chat, including any subagent tasks it started, has cost more than $10, a small $ appears beside its title at the top of the window. Hover over it to see the cost so far, or select it to see the chat's usage in detail. You can also open that usage view from the quick actions menu (⌘K, or Ctrl+K on Windows) with Show conversation usage.

To change the amount, open Settings, select Appearance and enter a new figure under Cost warning. Enter 0 to turn the warning off. The setting applies to this computer, or to this browser in the web app.

Voice conversations (preview)

The message box shows a waveform button beside the microphone, at the bottom right. Select it to start a voice conversation with that chat. On a new task, it opens a new chat and Harriet asks what you'd like to work on. In a chat that's already under way, Harriet says a quick hello and waits for you; ask where things are up to if you want a recap. To change how Harriet sounds, open Settings, select Appearance and choose a voice under Harriet's voice; it applies the next time voice starts. Voice stays attached to that chat when you browse elsewhere; other chats show a Voice on pill that takes you back or moves voice to the chat you are in. You can also ask Harriet to change chats. Say “open the Budget chat” and it appears on your screen; say “switch to the Budget chat and ask it to review the forecast” and the conversation moves there without stopping, and Harriet sends your request to that chat once. Harriet only changes what you are looking at when you ask her to, and moving the conversation never moves your screen. If more than one chat could be the one you mean, she asks which.

While voice is on, the waveform button becomes a voice pill showing whether Harriet is listening, speaking, asleep or connecting, and the microphone button mutes and unmutes voice. When the window has room, the conversation appears beside the chat as a chat of its own, which you can scroll back through, export or hide. Its foot shows what Harriet is doing, with buttons to mute, put her to sleep or wake her, and end voice. On a narrower window the latest words appear in a line above the message box. Select the pill for Go to sleep, Push to talk, Quiet updates, Voice history and End voice. When you switch to another app or minimise Harriet, a small floating card keeps the same status and controls on screen; it hides again when you return to Harriet.

Describe your task normally. Harriet writes up what you ask as a message in the chat, marked Asked by voice; select What you said beside it to see your own words. If the session is already working, Harriet queues your new request and sends it when the current work finishes. Queued requests appear above the message box, marked Voice, where you can edit or remove them. When the session finishes, replies or needs you, Harriet tells you what happened. Ask for the exact reply to hear it in sections; say “continue” to move through it. To examine a file, ask the session to inspect the file first, or open it in the visual chat.

You can also use voice in a workspace someone has shared with you, if you can send messages there. Your voice conversation is private to you. When you ask for work, Harriet checks the request against the workspace's sharing policy before it reaches the chat, just as she checks a typed message, and tells you if it couldn't be sent. Harriet finds chats in that workspace by their titles, and only the workspace owner can answer permission requests.

• Interrupt speech by talking over Harriet, by saying “Harriet”, or by selecting Stop talking while she speaks. This stops her speaking; the task carries on. To choose how easily talking stops her, open Settings, select Appearance and pick an option under Interrupting Harriet. Balanced ignores her own echo, a keystroke, a cough and steady background noise. Sensitive stops her as soon as you start talking, and suits headphones or a quiet room. In a noisy room, choose Only when I say “Harriet”. Push to talk always interrupts at once.
• Stopping or changing running work by voice always needs your confirmation: Harriet asks before interrupting, and offers to queue your request instead. The Stop button stops work straight away. Some external operations may already have completed, so wait for the reported outcome before asking for another action.
• Sleep closes the paid voice connection. The desktop listens locally for “Harriet” or “Hey Harriet”. A session reply or turn ending can wake it to offer an update. An unanswered reply window ends with a short sound and returns to sleep.
• Quiet updates suppresses automatic announcements. Push to talk turns the microphone button into a button you hold while speaking, instead of using continuous conversation or a wake word.
• Mute stops microphone capture and wake-word detection. End voice or signing out ends voice. Ending voice does not cancel the task. Locking the computer stops listening until you explicitly turn the microphone back on.

When the session asks a question or needs approval, Harriet reads the request word for word, and you can ask her to read it again. If you answer before hearing the exact wording, Harriet reads the request with the answer she heard and asks you to confirm it. An interrupted readout or a changed request must be read again. If a connection fails, Harriet does not silently repeat an instruction whose outcome is uncertain.

Voice history keeps the conversation's text and whether each reply was heard, plus an export button. Harriet does not save microphone recordings in that history. Active voice and transcription have their own usage costs alongside the session's normal model costs. Sleep has no paid voice processing; work already running in the session can still incur its normal costs.

This preview requires a supported desktop build with its offline voice resources installed and an eligible account. It is unavailable in the web app and for organisations requiring an EU voice route. Contact your admin if the entry is missing.

Templates for repeated work

If you run the same workflow often — a weekly pipeline summary, a monthly close checklist — save it as a template and re-run it instead of retyping the prompt. Templates are stored locally on your machine and are not shared with anyone. To give the whole team the same capability, ask your admin for a skill, which travels with your profile to every device.