Troubleshooting and questions

What to do when something does not work, and answers to common questions.

Installing and starting

Windows says it protected my PC. The builds are not signed yet. Choose More info, then Run anyway.

macOS says the app cannot be checked. Open System Settings → Privacy & Security and choose Open Anyway. The first time you open the app, you may also need to right-click it and choose Open.

The AppImage does not start on Linux. Install FUSE (libfuse2 on Ubuntu 22.04, libfuse2t64 on 24.04 and later), or run it with --appimage-extract-and-run.

Nothing opens, or a normal browser tab opens instead of a window. The workbench opens in Edge, Chrome or Chromium. On macOS and Linux, install one of them.

I closed the window. Is it still running? Only for about two minutes, or until running imports finish. Then it stops by itself.

My workbench does not update itself. Only an installed copy updates itself; a copy run from a .zip cannot. Check Settings → This computer → Updates, and press Check now.

Importing and reading

A PDF says Needs OCR. It is a scan, with pictures of pages but no text. The workbench cannot read scans yet. The file is stored and can be found by its details. Run it through an OCR tool and add the result.

A file is Waiting to be read for a long time. Reading happens while the workbench is idle. Activity → Work in the background shows what is queued. A file that failed can be read again from Needs attention, at the bottom of the project.

A table or heading in the working copy is wrong. Press Edit on the working copy and correct it. Once you have written in a copy, nothing converts over it again.

Zotero is not found. Enter Zotero's data folder (in Zotero, Settings → Advanced → Files and Folders) and press Use this folder.

Search and AI

Search says Searched by words only. Searching by meaning needs Ollama running and the embedding model installed. Follow the link under the results to Settings → Searching, which shows the command to run.

Ollama is not answering. Start Ollama, or install it from ollama.com. The workbench looks for it at 127.0.0.1:11434, or wherever OLLAMA_HOST says.

A summary or claim check is very slow. Local models are slow without a graphics card. Try a smaller model, or set a hosted model for that job in Settings → Writing → Which model does what.

A button is greyed out and mentions a label. The document's label keeps it from the model that job uses. Choose a local model for that job, or allow hosted models for its folder, with a reason. See Folders and sensitivity labels.

I cannot store a key on Linux. Linux cannot keep keys safely yet. Use Ollama there, or use the cloud workbench.

How do I know what a model was actually asked? Every answer and summary links to its record in Evidence, where the prompt, the answer, the model version and the cost are kept unchanged.

Cloud and sync

The cloud says Not invited yet. Ask for the cloud workbench from your website account, and wait for the e-mail saying an administrator agreed.

Link is greyed out in Settings → Sync. Privacy mode keeps the vault off the cloud. Turn off Prevent cloud sync and Never send anything to a hosted model.

The link code ran out. Codes last ten minutes. Press Link again for a new one.

A project says N to settle. The same text was changed differently on both sides. Settle each change under Settings → Sync → Changed in both places.

The browser extension

The popup says the workbench is not open. Pages you save wait in the browser and go in once it opens. Press Open the workbench.

The popup says the workbench has not been started since the extension was added. Start the desktop workbench once. It registers itself with your browsers as it starts.

It saved the publisher's page, not the PDF. The PDF could not be fetched. Open the PDF itself (Download PDF), then save that tab.

Your data

Where is my research? In Documents/Research Workbench. Back that folder up as you would any other. Removing the workbench leaves it alone.

Does anything leave my computer? Only what you choose: a call to a hosted model you set up with your own key, a project you choose to sync, and a PDF the extension fetches for you. Searching by meaning, local models and the record of calls all stay on your computer.

How do I start again with an empty vault? Settings → This computer → Start afresh. See Updates and starting afresh.

Asking for help

Ask in the website's forum. Say which version you have (shown under Settings → This computer → Updates) and what you were doing. The workbench's logs are in the logs folder under its local application data folder.