Capture an idea

An idea is where a request enters the pipeline. You describe what you want; the agent turns it into elaboration questions until you both share the same understanding; then you resolve it so a proposal can be drafted. This guide covers creating an idea, running one or more elaboration rounds, confirming, and resolving — and how a theme idea differs from a derived child idea.

Create an idea

Ideas live on the project Overview, in the idea tracker.

1. Open the project Overview. The tracker has a segmented switch for Ideas, Lineage, and Stats views, and a New Idea button.
2. Select New Idea. The dialog offers two modes:
   • Fill a form — enter a Title (“What’s the idea?”) and an optional Description with context, goals, or details.
   • Describe to an agent — talk through the idea conversationally instead. This mode needs an online agent runtime; it is disabled when none is connected.
3. Select Create.

The new idea appears in the tracker with a status badge that starts at Open.

Describe an idea to an online agent

Instead of filling the form, you can hand the idea to a connected agent and let it draft, elaborate, or decompose the idea for you. This is the conversational path, and it needs an online agent: with none connected, the Describe to an agent tab shows a hint to connect a runtime instead of opening a conversation.

In the New Idea dialog:

1. Switch to the Describe to an agent tab.
2. Pick the Agent you want to talk to, then its Working directory. If that agent has a single online directory it is selected for you; if it has more than one, choose which one before you can send. When the project already has a fixed working directory, that fixed directory is used and there is nothing to pick.
3. Optionally check Help me break this into child ideas to have the agent propose a set of child ideas (a decomposition) rather than a single idea.
4. Optionally check Research before clarifying to have the agent check the facts it needs before it asks you anything. Leaving it unchecked does not forbid research — the agent still looks something up when a checkable fact could change what it asks you. When the goal itself is unclear, it asks you first rather than searching.
5. Type a description of what you want and select Send to agent.

Chorus creates the idea, assigns it to the agent and working directory you picked, and hands it to that agent. The dialog closes and confirms that the request was submitted; you stay on the page you were on. From there the agent takes over: it gives the idea a proper title, polishes your description, and starts elaboration. An idea created this way therefore arrives already assigned and in elaboration, and you answer its questions in the idea’s Elaboration tab (below). If you checked the decompose option, the agent instead proposes candidate child ideas for you to confirm.

The request also starts a conversation with the agent, tied to the new idea. It does not open by itself; to watch the agent work, select the online-agents indicator in the bottom-right corner, then Open chat. The request shows there as a Create Idea turn.

Because this path assigns the agent for you, you can skip the manual Assign step in the next section.

The Describe to an agent tab: pick an online agent and its working directory, then describe the idea and send it.

Get an agent onto the idea

An agent runs elaboration, so the idea needs one assigned. Open the idea and use Assign to give it to an agent (the Describe to an agent entry does this for you when a runtime is online). Once assigned, an online agent picks the idea up and posts the first round of questions; if no agent is connected yet, bring one online first — see the agent platforms reference.

Ask for research before development

Sometimes an idea needs facts before it needs questions — how comparable products solve this, what a library actually supports, whether an approach has a known catch. You can ask an agent for one short research pass: open the idea, select Actions, then Research.

• Assign an agent first. Research requires an assigned agent that you own, with permission to read the plan, edit ideas, and attach references. With no assignee or a human assignee, the action stays visible but disabled and tells you to assign an agent.
• Bring that agent online. At least one of the assigned agent’s connections must be online. Another agent’s connection or a stale connection is not enough. Availability updates as assignment and presence change, without reloading the page. Hover or focus the disabled action to read the reason; the action sheet shows it inline.
• If the assigned agent’s new Research conversation needs a working-directory choice, choose it when prompted. An online indicator does not guarantee that the required directory is still available: Chorus checks the target again and reports a failure if it has changed or disconnected. An accepted request leaves the idea’s current stage and questions unchanged.
• Research is available only before development starts. Once execution begins, or the idea is already complete, the action is disabled and says which of the two applies.
• You can ask more than once. Each request is queued for the agent and shows up in the idea’s conversation as a Research turn. The conversation does not open by itself; open it from the online-agents indicator (Open chat), as described above, to follow what the agent did.

Findings go into the idea’s own description, each with an inline citation to the source it came from, and those sources appear in the idea’s references. There is no separate research report to open.

What the agent does

The agent decides what is worth checking and keeps the pass short. It adds only findings that change this idea; if nothing useful turns up, it says so rather than inventing evidence. It looks up facts; your goals and preferences still come from elaboration.

Research sits in the idea's Actions menu and is available until development starts.

Run elaboration

Elaboration is a short, structured back-and-forth that pins down the requirement before any proposal is written. Open the idea to see its detail panel, then select the Elaboration tab.

Elaboration proceeds in rounds. Each round is a set of questions, and you answer them one round at a time:

1. The agent posts a round of questions under Requirements Elaboration, each with options (and an Other free-text choice).
2. Answer every question in the round, then select Submit answers. The panel tracks progress as “n of m answered”.
3. Your answers may raise new questions or reveal a gap. When they do, the agent opens another round. Keep answering rounds until nothing is left open — elaboration is a loop, not a single pass.

If the request is trivially clear (for example, a bug fix with exact steps), the agent may offer to Skip Elaboration instead of asking questions.

What the agent does

The agent writes the elaboration questions from your idea, reads your answers, and decides whether another round is needed. You only ever answer and confirm — the agent drives the questioning. For how an agent connects and acts on your project, see the agent platforms reference.

Elaboration runs in rounds; answer each question, then submit the round.

Confirm the shared understanding

Before resolving, make sure the answers really capture what you want. The agent typically summarizes its understanding and mentions you in a comment to check. Read that summary:

• If it matches your intent, you are ready to resolve.
• If something is off or a new concern surfaces, say so. The agent opens a fresh round rather than resolving, and you answer again.

Confirming is the gate — nothing resolves until you are satisfied.

Resolve elaboration

Resolving marks the whole elaboration phase complete and signals that a proposal may be drafted. On the idea panel, select Verify Elaborate. This confirms the shared understanding and moves the idea from elaborating to elaborated.

Its status badge advances (for example to Planning / Review proposal), and the idea is ready for the proposal stage. Later progress — planning, building, verifying, done — updates automatically from the idea’s linked proposals and tasks.

What the agent does

When you select Verify Elaborate, Chorus resolves the elaboration and — if the idea’s assigned agent is online — has the agent start writing the proposal. You do not draft the proposal yourself; the agent produces the documents and task drafts and submits them for your review. See the agent platforms reference for how that connection works.

Verify Elaborate confirms the shared understanding and moves the idea to elaborated.

Theme ideas versus derived child ideas

Most ideas are single deliverables. Two related shapes help you organize larger work:

• A theme is an idea that only groups related child ideas under a shared direction — it is not delivered on its own. Create one by checking Make this a theme in the New Idea dialog, or flip the Theme switch later on the idea’s Overview tab. A theme can elaborate to set shared context, but a theme cannot become a proposal: to deliver its direction, you derive a child idea and write the proposal there. A theme shows a progress ring that rolls up from its children.
• A derived (child) idea is a full idea with its own elaboration, proposal, and tasks, linked to a parent. To create one, open the parent idea and select Derive in the panel header. Reach for a derived idea when a new direction needs its own end-to-end lifecycle; add a task to the current proposal instead when the work is just how to build the current idea.

A parent shows a “n derived” rollup of its direct children. This lineage is informational — it never blocks either idea’s flow. The Lineage view in the tracker visualizes the parent-child tree.

A theme groups related child ideas; Lineage visualizes the parent-child tree.

Next

Once elaboration resolves and the agent submits a proposal, continue to Review a proposal.