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Getting Started

Quickstart

Five minutes to your first useful result. By the end you'll have a project Deck remembers, an assistant address you can forward to, and a routine that runs every morning.

1. Create a project​

A project is where everything on one topic lives — a customer, a deal, a hiring loop, a research thread. Give it a name you'll recognize later.

Start a project

2. Upload your documents​

Drop in any files you want Deck to remember — contracts, reports, slide decks, notes, spreadsheets. Deck reads them in the background — most are ready in under a minute.

Projects · Acme renewal
Recently uploaded
Uploaded via email
Q3 board update
Report
Renewal contract
Signed agreement
Pricing model
Spreadsheet
Pitch — May
Slide deck
Call notes
Notes
Statement of work
Doc

3. Personalize your assistant​

Tell Deck how you'd like it to work with you — your role, your voice, your priorities, and your objectives. The objectives field in particular is what guides Vigil when it decides what to surface.

See Personalize your assistant for the full set of fields and examples worth stealing.

Personalize your assistant

4. Forward your first email​

Send a thread to your assistant address. Add a note at the top — "summarize this" or "store this in [project name]". Deck files attachments, replies in your inbox, and the documents wait for you in Deck.

See Set up your assistant if you haven't picked your assistant name yet.

5. Set up a routine​

Create your first Scheduled Task. The highest-leverage starter for most people: a 7 AM weekday brief that summarizes your calendar for the day and gives you a brief on upcoming meetings.

Looking for more routines? Browse the Scheduled Tasks overview for patterns worth copying.

What to do in your first week​

You've got the core loop. The next moves compound it:

  • Forward one thread a day for five days. Deck gets sharper as it sees the kinds of mail you actually file.
  • CC your assistant on a long conversation. Customers, vendors, candidates — anything with history worth a second set of eyes. See CC the assistant.
  • Write your first playbook. When you notice yourself re-briefing Deck on the same kind of work twice, write it down as a one-page playbook file and reference it by name when you forward the next one in.
  • Wire one passive source. Subscribe Deck to a newsletter or set up an auto-forward filter — see Auto-forwarding.
  • Let Vigil settle in. Vigil is paying attention from day one. The notes get sharper the more it sees of your work.