The Canvas
The panel beside the conversation, where the work a room produces is collected and kept. Nothing on it is a snapshot — every card is a living object with a history.
Two views of the same work
The thread and the canvas are not two copies. They are two ways of looking at one set of cards, which is why the same card can show different versions in each at the same moment.
The thread is time
Every card is born in the message that produced it, and stays there showing the version you saw at that moment. Scrolling back is a reliable record of what happened, not a re-render of today's answer.
The canvas is state
The panel shows each card once, at its latest version — the working set. Reading back through the thread does not move it; going back in time is something you ask for.
Your work is versioned
Refining an answer does not scatter new cards across the room. A conversation about lifetime value leaves one chart with a history, not five charts.
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One card, many versions
Ask for a change and the same card gains a version. Its history is on the card, and each version records who was editing when it landed.
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The copy in the thread never changes
A card shown at an earlier message keeps showing that version forever, even after later turns move it on. Only the panel advances.
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Going back is deliberate, and read-only
You can rewind the whole panel to how it stood at a given turn. A bar says you are doing it, nothing can be changed while you are, and one click returns you to the latest.
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Sometimes Atlas keeps more than one take
When a card has more than one plausible answer, both are kept and the card asks which should be current. Nothing is lost either way — the other stays on your canvas.
Restoring a version or making one current is not open to everyone — see Roles & Permissions for who holds it.
What you can do with any card
These work the same whichever kind of card you are looking at. Most live behind the ⋮ menu in the card's header; the last two sit outside it.
- Versions
- Open the card's history and read any earlier version of it.
- Make current · Restore
- Bring an earlier version back as the live one. The history keeps everything — restoring adds a version rather than deleting any.
- Jump to turn
- Go to the message that produced this version, and read why it changed.
- Open fullscreen
- Blow one card up over the room — useful for a wide table or a dense chart.
- Download
- Take the card with you: a document as .docx, a table as .csv, a chart as a .png image of exactly what is on screen.
- Reference
- Beside the version badge, not in the menu: pins a card to your next message so Atlas works from that exact version rather than guessing which one you mean.
- Filter and maximize
- Narrow the panel to tables, charts, or documents, and widen it when a card needs the room. Cards from the newest answer open expanded; older ones stay collapsed to a single line until you open them.
The tabs across the top
A tab appears only once the conversation has produced something of that kind, so a room that has only answered questions shows one tab and no empty shelves.
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Answer
What the conversation worked out: the tables, charts, and documents it produced, newest first.
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Org setup
A proposed shape for your workspaces and areas, shown before anything is created, so an administrator can read it over and apply it.
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Knowledge
Changes the conversation proposed to the Knowledge Base, gathered into one change request per room. While it is still a draft you can mark it ready, which sends it to the owning group to agree.
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Tasks
Work the conversation filed to be built. Each card shows where the task has got to and, once it starts, opens the thread where it is being steered.
A Knowledge card is a handle on a change request — what it takes to get one agreed is in Knowledge Base & Definitions of Record. A Tasks card is a handle on a build, which carries on in its own thread after it leaves the room.
The kinds of card an answer leaves behind
You do not pick these. Atlas chooses the form from the shape of the answer — but knowing the three makes it easier to ask for the one you want.
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Table
Rows and columns — query results, breakdowns, anything tabular. A card holds the first 50 rows, so ask Atlas to narrow or summarise the question when the answer is longer than that.
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Chart
A trend or a comparison, in one of the forms below. Its subtitle names the measure being plotted, and the query that produced it sits on the card.
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Document
Prose this conversation produced — a summary, a write-up, a decision memo. Durable knowledge your organization reuses belongs in the Knowledge Base instead, where it can be agreed and kept current.
Chart forms, and the job each one does
Ask in plain language — "how did that build up, step by step?" gets you the right form more reliably than naming a chart type. These are the forms available.
Showing 10 of 10 forms — live charts, the same component a room renders.
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Bar
Compare a measure across a handful of categories. Ask for it ranked and it turns on its side, so long names stay readable.
barsales
128.4K96.2K74.8K51.3KNorth South EMEA APACBounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Line
Follow something over time — one line per series.
lineaccounts
820 905 880 1.0K 1.2K 1.2KJan Feb Mar Apr May JunBounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Area
Change over time, when the volume underneath is the point rather than the path.
areaqueries
4.2K 5.1K 6.3K 5.9K 7.4K 8.1KJan Feb Mar Apr May JunBounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Donut
One moment's split of a whole, when there are only a few slices.
donut966 TotalBounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Scatter
Whether two measures move together, one dot per thing being measured.
scattervalue
5 15.5 26 36.5 47Bounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Waterfall
How a starting number became an ending one, step by step. Steps up, steps down and the closing total each take their own colour.
waterfalldelta
Increase Decrease Total42.0K18.5K-9.4K-14.2K36.9KNew Expansion Contraction Churn TotalBounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Radar
Compare whole profiles across three or more axes that share one scale.
radarscore
8264719058Freshness Coverage Docs Ownership TestsBounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Box plot
The spread of values inside each category — where the middle sits and how far the tails run — rather than just an average.
boxplotstage Min Q1 Median Q3 Max Ingest 2 5 8 13 21 Transform 6 11 17 24 38 Publish 1 2 4 6 11 Bounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Heatmap
Where the weight falls across two dimensions at once, as a shaded grid.
heatmapmorningafternooneveningMon12318Tue18276Wed243911Thu152296 39Bounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail. -
Gauge
How far one number has got against a target you name.
gaugecovered
68 76% of the 90 target0 90Bounded in-Canvas visual — hover a point for detail.
These sample cards carry no ⋮ menu, so downloading one as an image does nothing here. In a room, that menu exports the chart you are looking at.
Names that are not forms
Ask for these by name and you will still get what you meant.
- Horizontal bar
- Not a separate form — it is a bar chart turned on its side. Ask for a ranked comparison and you get it.
- Histogram
- A bar chart over ranges. Ask for the counts grouped into buckets and the bars are the histogram.
- Pie
- The donut is the part-to-whole form here; a pie request becomes one.
- Two y-axes
- Deliberately not offered — the smaller measure always flattens into the baseline. Ask for two charts, or for both measures indexed to a common starting point.
Who is allowed to change all this
Anyone in the room can ask Atlas a question and get a full answer. Only the person currently editing can have an answer change the canvas — which is why two people can be talking to Atlas at once without overwriting each other.
Working in a room covers how editing moves between people, and how to ask for it.