Ask a question
Use the Ask pill, or any pill whose Ask AI action has Show in the chat panel turned on. To build your own, open a pill’s editor, choose Add an action, and pick Show an answer in the Ask group: it adds an Ask AI action with Show in the chat panel already on. You need an AI provider first; see Set up AI.
- Select text for context, or open the ring with nothing selected to ask a question of your own.
- Type in the prompt bar, then press Enter. To attach files, use the paperclip, or paste or drag them onto the bar. How much a model takes depends on the model. If a file is too big or the wrong kind, the bar says so and names the limit.
- Read the answer as it appears in the chat panel. Press Stop to end it; Retry appears if the answer failed.
- Type in “Ask a follow-up…” below the answer and press Enter. Shift + Enter adds a line break. In the follow-up box you can attach up to 20 files, and up to 50 MB of files at a time. Past that, the box says “Up to 50 MB of files at a time.”
Ask about selected files
In an Ask AI action, turn on “Send the selected files” to include the files selected in Explorer with your text. Folders aren’t sent.
Before a pill sends files to an online model without showing them in a prompt bar, Rondell asks you to confirm. Turn on Don’t ask in that action to skip the question. Local AI models running on your PC never ask.
Attached files are saved with the conversation and can go to the model again with later follow-ups.
Link to this sectionWeb search, sources and rich answers
Turn on Search the web in the Ask AI action to let the AI look things up before it answers. It works with Anthropic, Google Gemini and OpenRouter models. Other providers answer without searching.
When an answer has sources, open one to see it in your browser. Copy under an answer copies it with its sources. Code blocks have their own Copy and Save buttons.
Answers can include tables, highlighted code, math and diagrams. Images and video in an answer load only when you click them. A video also has Open in browser to watch it on its own site.
Pictures in answers have their own Save. Web page code in an answer shows as an HTML preview that can’t run scripts or load anything from the internet.
A long question in the chat shows its first lines with Show more; choose Show less to fold it again. If you scroll up while an answer is being written, choose the arrow button, Jump to the end, to return to the newest text.
Link to this sectionIntelligent UI
Open Settings, then Chat panel, and turn on Intelligent UI. New answers can then appear as cards, tables, charts, tabs and steps when that suits the answer. It’s off by default and applies to new chats only.
Answers take a little longer, and small local AI models on your PC may handle it less well.
Link to this sectionChoose where and how answers appear
Open Settings, then Chat panel. Drag the panel’s header to move it and its edges to resize it.
- Where answers appear: Where I left it, Right edge or At the cursor. With Right edge you also pick the Screen.
- What the panel shows: Just the answer, With the model, or Full details. Full details is the default and adds sources and cost information where the model has them.
- Light or dark: System, Light or Dark.
- Text size and Font: change how answer text looks. Buttons and labels keep Rondell’s font.
- Pinned: on by default. The panel stays open when you click elsewhere. Turn it off and the panel closes when you click away after using it.
- Source icons: shows each source’s site icon, loaded from Google. Turn it off and sources show their first letter, and Google isn’t asked.
Continue a recent chat from the prompt bar
Turn on “Follow up recent answers” in the pill’s Ask AI action. With nothing selected, a question that follows on from a recent chat offers to continue it. Press Enter again to continue, or choose a new chat.
This needs two built-in models. The Ask AI action’s settings show a download row while either is missing.
Open Settings, then Chat panel, and set Continue chats to 15 minutes, 1 hour, 4 hours or 1 day to choose how recent a chat can be. A follow-up keeps the original chat’s model and settings. To go back to an older chat, open it from History.
Link to this section