The lead can hand a self-contained part of the job to a discussion of its own, without asking you, and carry on with the answer. Each delegated task appears in the sidebar under the discussion that started it, and only its final report comes back. A lead may start up to six at once; in a git repository they run side by side, each in its own copy of the checkout, and their changes are applied back when they finish.
Two kinds of task
Each task has a kind, chosen by the lead:
- Explore only looks: it can read files, list folders, search and run commands that change nothing. Writing a file or running anything that changes something is refused, by the app and by the seat's own command line tool. Because it cannot change anything it needs nobody's approval and runs in any permission mode, and it uses the seat's cheaper model unless the lead asks for the full one. Use it for "find where this is", "read these and summarise", "sift this log".
- General has the lead's own tools, for work that changes files or runs the build. It runs only in Auto or Bypass mode, because a delegated task has nobody watching it to approve a command.
Settings
Mac only: Settings → Billing → Spending → Brakes.
| Setting | Default | What it does | Change it when |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tasks the lead may delegate at once | 6 | 1 to 6 tasks per call. | You want parallel work to run up the bill more slowly. |
| Spread delegated tasks across seats | Off | Gives each task to the next seat that can use tools, starting with the lead, instead of running them all on the lead. The lead can still name a seat for a task. | You want the room's other models doing some of the work. |
| Run read-only delegated tasks on the cheaper model | On | A task that only reads runs on its seat's cheaper model; one that fails or comes back empty is run again once on the full model. | You want every delegated task on the full model. |
A delegated task never delegates further, and it counts against the ceiling of the discussion that started it.