> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.vowen.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Ask AI

> Ask questions about a meeting note, edit its summary by asking, and ask live while the meeting is still running.

Every meeting note has an **Ask AI** tab. Ask questions about the meeting, and the assistant can
rewrite the note's summary and title when you ask it to. Every conversation is saved.

<Note>
  This is Ask AI **on a meeting note**. The same conversation surface exists on manual
  transcriptions, documented separately in [Ask AI for transcriptions](/features/chat). Meeting
  notes add live questions during recording, context cards, and summary editing.
</Note>

## Where it lives

Open any note from the **Notes** page. The tab row across the top of the note is:

| Tab        | What it shows                                   |
| ---------- | ----------------------------------------------- |
| Summary    | The generated summary, editable                 |
| Transcript | The final transcript with speaker labels        |
| My Notes   | Only when you jotted context during the meeting |
| Ask AI     | The open conversation                           |

The composer is docked below the note on every tab, not just Ask AI. Type a question while you are
reading the Summary, press Enter, and Vowen brings the Ask AI tab forward with the answer. It is the
same box, the same draft and the same conversation wherever you ask from.

## Asking a question

<Steps>
  <Step title="Open a note and start typing">
    The composer sits under the note on every tab. Enter sends, Shift+Enter adds a newline.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Or pick a starter">
    An empty conversation offers five starters: **Summarize the key points**, **What decisions were
    made?**, **List the action items**, **What is still unresolved?** and **Draft a follow-up
    email**. Clicking one sends it immediately.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Read the answer">
    Answers stream in. A jump-to-bottom button appears if you scroll away mid-stream.
  </Step>
</Steps>

### Composer shortcuts

* Type `/` at the start of the box to open the command menu. It holds the same five starters.
* Type `@` at a word boundary to attach a context source.
* The button on the right of the toolbar shows which AI provider will answer. Click it to switch.

## Saved conversations

Every conversation is kept. On the Ask AI tab, the note's right sidebar gains a **Chats** section
listing them newest first, grouped as **Today**, **Yesterday**, **Previous 7 days** and **Older**.

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Starting a new conversation">
    The plus button in the Chats header opens a fresh conversation and puts the caret in the
    composer. The unsaved conversation shows up in the list as **New conversation** until you ask
    something.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Renaming">
    Hover a row and click the pencil. The title is edited in place: Enter commits, Escape cancels,
    and clicking away commits as well. Titles are capped at 64 characters. Clearing the field hands
    the title back to being derived automatically from your first question.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Deleting">
    The trash icon on a row asks for confirmation, then removes the conversation permanently.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Searching">
    Once a note has five or more conversations, a search box appears above the list. It matches on
    the conversation title and on the last message.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Where they are stored">
    Conversations live in `chat-threads.json` in Vowen's application data folder, separate from the
    note itself. Each is scoped to one note, so one note's conversations never appear on another.
    Deleting the note deletes its conversations. Vowen keeps up to 100 conversations per note and
    240 messages per conversation, dropping the oldest beyond that.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Context cards

Above the composer, small cards show exactly what the assistant can read for the next question.

* **Summary** and **Transcript** are both attached by default.
* A card only exists if the note actually has that content.
* Each card shows its size: word count for the summary, block count for the transcript.
* Click the X on a card to detach it. Detaching the transcript is the usual reason to do this, on a
  long meeting where you only want the assistant working from the summary.
* Click **Add context**, or type `@`, to attach something back.

The open tab does not decide the grounding. Switching from Summary to Transcript does not change what
the assistant can see. Only the cards do.

### Attachments

The paperclip button attaches one image or PDF to the next question. The file picker accepts
`image/*` and `.pdf`, with a 10 MB limit. Images need an AI model that can read images.

Attachment contents are sent with the question but are not written to disk with the conversation.
Reopening an old conversation shows that a file was attached, and its name, but not the file itself.

## Reasoning

When the model streams its reasoning, Ask AI shows a collapsible block above the answer, labeled
**Thinking** while it runs and **Thought for 4.2s** once it finishes. It stays open while the
reasoning is the only thing happening and collapses when the answer lands. Click the header to
reopen it.

Nothing here turns a reasoning mode on. The block appears only for models that already emit
reasoning as part of their response, such as DeepSeek, OpenRouter and Gemini. Models that do not
emit it render no block and cost nothing extra.

## Editing the note by asking

Ask AI can change two things about the note: its **summary** and its **title**.

Ask for a change in plain language:

* "Translate the summary to English"
* "Make the notes shorter"
* "Rewrite the summary as bullet points"
* "Rename this note to Q3 pricing review"

The assistant writes one short line of acknowledgement, and the new value lands in the note itself
rather than in the chat. A row appears under the answer reading **Summary updated** or **Title
updated**, with an **Undo** button next to it.

Asking a question about the note is not a change. The assistant only edits when you actually ask it
to.

<Warning>
  **Undo only lasts for the session.** The previous value is held in memory, not written to disk, so
  once you close the note or restart the app the Undo button on an older turn is gone. The change
  itself is saved the moment it is applied, exactly like an edit you typed by hand.
</Warning>

### The transcript is read-only

The transcript is the record of what was actually said, and Ask AI can never write to it. Ask it to
edit the transcript and it will say so plainly and offer to change the summary instead. If you need
to change the transcript, edit it directly on the Transcript tab.

### Notes on summary rewrites

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="The summary must already exist">
    Summary editing is offered only when the note has a summary and is not still recording. On a
    note with no summary yet, use the **Regenerate** button on the Summary tab instead.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Citations survive a rewrite">
    If your summary carries [citation anchors](/meeting-notes/summaries), the assistant is told to
    carry every one across unchanged, and is given them as an explicit checklist. Anchors it invents
    are stripped before the new summary reaches the note, so a rewritten summary can never gain a
    timestamp pill that points at a moment nobody chose. An anchor on a line the rewrite deletes
    goes with it.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="How it works under the hood">
    Editing is not provider tool calling. The model writes the complete new value between in-band
    markers of the form `<<<VOWEN_EDIT:summary>>> ... <<<VOWEN_EDIT:end>>>`, and Vowen filters that
    block out of the stream as it arrives, so you never see the markers. This is why editing works
    on every provider Vowen supports, including ones with no function-calling channel and the
    non-streaming fallbacks. A block the model never finishes, because it was cut off or you pressed
    stop, is discarded rather than half-applied.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Asking during the meeting

Ask questions while a meeting is still recording, from two places:

* The **hover card** on the floating recording indicator, on its Ask AI tab.
* The [meeting panel](/meeting-notes/meeting-panel), on its Ask tab, opened with `Cmd+\` on macOS or
  `Ctrl+\` on Windows.

Each question pulls in the latest transcript, so follow-ups stay in sync as the conversation moves.
Screenshots you capture from the panel are attached to your next question as visual context, if the
selected model can read images.

The live conversation is saved with the meeting itself and is shared between the indicator card and
the panel, so a question asked in one shows up in the other. **Clear chat** in the panel erases it.

<Note>
  The note detail page does not offer Ask AI while that note is still recording. During a recording
  it shows the live transcript instead. Ask from the panel or the indicator.
</Note>

### Live Ask without real-time transcription

Live Ask works without a streaming transcription engine.

For every meeting, Vowen runs a second 16 kHz mono recorder alongside the main one and buffers its
audio to a temporary file. When you ask a question and no live transcript is available, Vowen
transcribes only the span of audio since your last question and appends it before answering. Two
questions ten minutes apart cost exactly one transcription of those ten minutes, never a re-run of
the whole meeting. The buffer file is deleted when the meeting ends.

Spans shorter than about 1.5 seconds are left alone and roll into the next one, so a question asked
moments after the previous one does not send a fragment of a word to the model.

<Note>
  The Ask AI tab is offered whether or not real-time transcription is on. With it off, a short banner
  on the Transcript tab explains what is happening: "Real-time transcription is off — this fills in
  each time you ask a question."
</Note>

### The Catch up button

On the note detail page, while that note is recording, the recording bar carries a **Catch up**
button whenever the catch-up buffer is in use. It runs the same transcription a question would
trigger, without you having to ask one, so the live pane fills in on demand. While it runs the
button reads **Catching up…** and is disabled.

Catch up exists only on the note detail page's recording bar. The meeting panel and the floating
indicator show the explanatory banner instead and fill in when you ask a question.

## Requirements

<Note>
  Ask AI is a Pro feature, on both the note page and live during a meeting. It also needs an AI
  provider configured under **Configure your AI** in the sidebar. With no provider set up, the tab
  shows "No AI provider configured".
</Note>

Live Ask answers with the meeting's own **AI Summary Model** from the Notes settings, falling back
to your global provider when no override is set. On the note page you pick the provider from the
composer's model button.
