What are Chats in Task Manager?
Chats in Task Manager are team conversations in the same workspace as your tasks and files. A chat looks like a task, but it has no status or priority. It has a name, a list of participants and one thread for messages, attachments, checklists and drawings.
Messages in a chat work just like messages under a task. They use the same editor, reactions, mentions and quoting. Your team doesn't have to learn two different ways to have a conversation.
You choose participants when creating a chat. You can also add Workspace members during setup. The person who manages the chat archives an unneeded thread: its creator, a participant with chat administrator permissions, a Workspace administrator or a global administrator. By default, the list shows only active conversations.
What can you see in the conversation window?
Press Enter to send a message and Shift+Enter to insert a new line. If you send successive messages less than five minutes apart and no one else posts in between, the new content is added to the previous entry. This won’t happen with a quote, after an AI entry, a private or system entry, or if the combined content would exceed the size limit. It appears as a single message in the thread and is edited as a whole. Attachments and questions for the AI Assistant always remain separate entries.
Add files using the paperclip, by dragging them into the window or by pasting them from the clipboard. A screenshot pasted into the editor becomes part of the message. A file pasted outside the editor becomes an attachment. The Draw icon lets you add a freehand sketch, including on an uploaded background. The sketch is added to the message and the chat's Files. You can also mark up an image you've received: in the image preview, select “Draw on image”.
You can tick off items on a to-do list after sending a message. A progress bar appears below it, for example, “2 of 4 done”. Checkbox states are shared with participants and saved straight away. A mini avatar appears next to each ticked item, and hovering over it shows the person’s first name, surname and date. There are also four reactions (OK, Looking, In progress, Done), quoting that scrolls to the original, and an @ mention with a list of people that narrows as you type.
What do you gain?
You don’t have to recreate an unfinished message if you switch to another thread, close your browser or your session expires - as long as the text is no more than 200,000 characters and you return within 14 days. When you come back, the text is waiting where you left it. If sending fails, you can recover the text in the current conversation; if you manage to write something new or switch threads, it will be waiting when you return. No need to recreate a paragraph you spent ten minutes writing.
You don’t waste time looking for where you left off. It’s easier to pick up where you left off after a few days away. You don’t have to scroll through the whole thread to find the oldest unread message from someone else.
You don’t need a separate list of decisions alongside the conversation. The whole team can see progress in the same place. And when you need to show a change on a mock-up, you can mark it up instead of describing it in words as “that button on the left, a little lower”.
How it works in practice
On Tuesday, the team agrees on changes to a client project. The designer uploads a screenshot of the mock-up from their computer. The client manager selects “Draw on image” and marks three areas. “Insert” adds the finished drawing to the message composer. If the image is hosted on another server and the browser blocks it from being saved, Task Manager lets you know.
Below it, someone adds a to-do list with four items. Throughout the afternoon, the team ticks off completed items. The bar shows “3 of 4 done”, and each item shows who ticked it off and when. On Thursday, someone returning from leave opens the thread and sees the “New” line above the oldest unread message from someone else for a few seconds, then starts reading from there.
Frequently asked questions
Who can see chat conversations?
A regular user only sees chats they're part of. Global administrators and workspace administrators see all chats within their scope in the list. Only the person who asked a private question to AI and received a reply can see it, even if other people are administrators. The person managing a chat can add and remove participants in its settings.
Can other people see a question to the AI Assistant in a chat?
No. Only the person who asked a question in the Assistant's private mode can see it and its reply. Other participants aren't notified and won't see them in the message list.
What happens to my unfinished message if I close the browser?
It will be saved as a draft in the thread and restored to the message field when you reopen it. The draft disappears when you send the message or clear the field. Unused drafts are deleted after two weeks.
Can I delete a chat?
Yes, if you have permission to manage the chat and confirm the deletion by typing its name. You can also archive a chat - it will disappear from the default list, but its contents will remain.