Workspace and widgets
A desktop-style page where many apps run side by side as windows. You arrange them yourself, or Nova opens, arranges and operates them for you.
The Workspace is one full screen of tiled windows on a wallpaper: the chat, the cloud desktop, a terminal, maps, notes, a system monitor and more, all at once. Use it when one conversation is not enough and you want to see several things working side by side.
Open it from the faded Workspace tab on the right edge of the main screen. Press Esc to go back to the chat.
What you see
- The header. On the left are the Start Menu button (the star) and the title Workspace. In the middle is the clock. On the right are four buttons: Reset Layout, Grid Layout, Swap Windows and App Store.
- The tray, at the far right: network, volume, battery and microphone.
- Windows. Each window has a title bar with its icon and name, and Minimize, Maximize and Close buttons. Drag any edge or corner to resize it.
- The first layout. The first time you open the Workspace it fills the Classic 3-2-3 layout with eight apps: the desktop window, Chatbot, GeoSpy, IPTV Player, Terminal, AI Studio, Synapse and Monitor. Layouts with more slots add more apps, such as CCTV Station, Memory, Music Player and YouTube Player.
Open an app
There are three ways to add a window.
| Where | How | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| Start Menu | The star button, or Ctrl + E | A search box (Search workspace...), your Minimized Applications, the Applications grid, and System actions: Reset Layout, New Window and Shutdown (which closes the Workspace). |
| App Store | The App Store button | A searchable catalogue (Search apps...) with categories on the left and Powerhouse Apps, Featured, Recently Opened and Recently Updated sections. Click a card to open the app. |
| New Window | Ctrl + N, the right-click menu, or the Start Menu | The Add New Window picker, for adding one more window quickly. |
The Applications grid in the Start Menu holds the apps you can use today: Browser, Chatbot, Agency, Social, Terminal, Synapse, Monitor, GeoSpy, Settings, IPTV Player, 3D Lab, AI Studio, Mini Browser, File Manager, CCTV Station, YouTube Player, Music Player, Memory and Office.
Arrange the windows
- Press Grid Layout (or Ctrl + G) and pick one of the 24 presets, such as Classic 3-2-3, 2x3, 3x3, Side by Side, Dashboard, Quad Corners, Focus Center, Widescreen or Command Center. Custom Grid lets you set where the main space sits and how big it is.
- To swap two windows, press Swap Windows (or Ctrl + Shift + S) and click both windows. Press Esc to leave swap mode. You can also hold a title bar for about half a second and drag it onto another window.
- Double-click a title bar to maximize that window, and again to restore it.
- Press Reset Layout (or Ctrl + R) to forget all saved positions and tile everything again.
Choosing a layout with fewer slots closes the extra windows, and a message tells you how many. Choosing one with more slots fills the new slots with default apps. A window can be no smaller than 280 by 200 pixels.
The right-click menu
Right-click an empty part of the desktop for Refresh (reloads the page), New Window, Grid Layout, Reset Layout and Reset Side Buttons.
Tray and wallpaper
- Network and Battery show your own device's connection and battery level.
- Volume sets the level, from 0 to 100%, for every sound and video in the app.
- Microphone turns voice mode on and off.
- Wallpaper. Open the Settings app from the Start Menu. Its window, Workspace Settings, has a Wallpaper URL box with Apply, and Wallpaper Fit (Cover, Contain, Stretch, Center or Repeat). The Wallpaper button on the main screen's right edge also offers Static, Gradient and an Opacity slider.
What Nova can do here
Nova can work in the Workspace the way you do. Ask it in plain words, for example "open the terminal and GeoSpy side by side".
- Windows: it can open, close, focus, minimize, maximize and restore any app, and set a window's size and position.
- Apps: it can operate each app, for example searching a place in GeoSpy, writing a page in Synapse or playing a channel in IPTV Player. See Side-pane apps for what each app allows.
- Reading state: it can read what an app is showing, so it can check its own work.
- Layouts: it cannot change the grid layout or swap windows. Those stay with you.
Risky actions pause first. These include typing into the terminal, deleting files, notes or memories, generating images or video, clearing a feed, playlist or map markers, and controlling system processes. Nova asks in the chat and acts only after your next message. A request that is not answered expires after 30 minutes.
What is saved
- Window positions and the layout you chose are saved in this browser, on this device.
- Closing the Workspace stops what was running in its windows, such as terminal sessions and media.
Widgets
A widget is one of the app panels you can open while you work. SyntrofAI has a fixed set of them, and each can appear in two places:
- In the right pane next to the chat, one at a time. See Side-pane apps.
- As a window in the Workspace, many at a time.
| Where it opens | Apps |
|---|---|
| Right pane and Workspace | Browser, Office, 3D Lab, IPTV Player, GeoSpy, CCTV Station, AI Studio, Coding Lab, Terminal, Music Player, Memory, Agency, Social, Synapse |
| Workspace only | Chatbot, Monitor, File Manager, Mini Browser, YouTube Player, and the desktop window |
The Workspace-only apps:
- Chatbot is a second view of the main chat. It has Sessions, a RAG switch, an Agent switch for work mode, and split panes so you can follow several chats at once.
- Monitor is a live dashboard of your instance. It has a Resource Control Panel with ECO, BALANCED and PERFORMANCE modes, a Process Manager, system information, network and storage, top processes, and running widgets. Process actions ask before they run.
- File Manager lets you browse your files, sort by name, size or date, download, and delete. Office files, images and PDFs open in their viewers.
- Mini Browser shows a simple page in a frame. Some sites block this; use its open-in-new-tab button for those.
- YouTube Player plays a YouTube link you paste, with an Autoplay option.
- The desktop window is the cloud computer in a window, with an Audio chip that turns on desktop sound.
Nova works with this set of apps. It opens and operates them for you; it does not create new kinds of app.