Skip to main content
When the AI uses tools to answer you (for example, it searches the web, reads a file or makes a spreadsheet), the answer shows a list of steps. Each step is one tool call. The list shows under the thinking timeline, above the text of the answer.

​
Open and close the steps

A summary line shows above the steps, for example 4 steps, 1 failed, 12 s. Click the summary line to open or close the list.
  • While the AI works, the list is open. The summary line shows the step that runs now, for example Working: Searching the web.
  • When the answer is complete, the list closes. Click the summary line to see the steps again.
The steps stay with the answer. When you reload the page, open the conversation later or join a run that is still in progress, you see the same steps.

​
What a step shows

Each step has an icon, a title, the time that the step took, and one line of detail under the title. The title says what the step did, for example “Searched Gmail for invoices” or “Saved budget.xlsx”. When a tool gives no title of its own, the title is the plain name of the tool, for example “Searched the web” or “Ran a command”. The detail line shows the first line of an error, or a short note from RelayHub about why a step did not run. For a few tools, it shows the short description that the AI wrote for the step. A step never shows the result of the tool, for example the text of a web page or of an email. The AI reads the result. The step only tells you what the AI did.
An answer keeps up to 60 steps. When an answer has more steps, the list shows the first 59 steps and the last step, and a line tells you how many steps are not shown.

​
When you stop an answer

When you click Stop generating, RelayHub saves the text and the steps that you saw. A step that ran at the time of the stop shows Not known if complete. Check the result of that step yourself before you continue. For example, check that a file exists or that an email was not sent twice.

​
Steps in a shared chat

The steps of an answer can name your files, your emails or your data. For this reason, other people see less of your steps than you do. This applies when other people watch the answer live, when they open the conversation later, when they join a run that is still in progress, and when they export the conversation to PDF. Other people also do not see what the AI sent to a tool or what the tool sent back.

​
Steps in the PDF export

To export a conversation, click Export chat as PDF in the chat header. In the PDF, each answer that used tools has a Steps block above the text of the answer. Each line of the block shows the step, its status and its time, for example “Searched the web: done, 1.8 s”. A failed step shows its error on the next line, and a step that did not run shows the reason. The PDF follows the same rule as the chat. When you export a conversation that someone shares with you, the Steps block of their answers shows only the tool, the status and the time.

​
Steps in other places

  • Agent chains: the steps are in groups, one group for each step of the chain, for example “Step 1: Researcher”. See Agent Chains.
  • Skills: a skill that you run from the chat shows its steps under its answer. A skill that the AI runs inside an answer shows as one step. See Using Skills in Chat.
  • Dual Chat: when web search is on, each panel shows the web search as a step. See Dual Chat.
  • Co-browser: each browser action is a step, and the steps stay in the chat after a reload. See Co-browser.
  • Assistant panel and the automation wizard: their answers show their steps in the same way.