> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://alike.help/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Alike in your agent > What your coding agent gets from Alike, when it gets it, and what to ask. After you install Alike, your coding agent has two new abilities: * **It gets context automatically.** At some points in a session, Alike gives your agent short notes about the work: decisions, related tasks, and other sessions on the same branch. See [When Alike adds context](#when-alike-adds-context). * **It can ask Alike.** Your agent can call Alike's MCP tools to search your past sessions, read a decision, log what it is working on, or ask a teammate a question. See [MCP tools](https://alike.help/reference/mcp-tools.md). You do not have to learn new commands. Ask your agent in normal words. ## What to ask > [card] Start work > > "I'm starting on the `fix-login-timeout` branch. What does Alike know about this work?" > [card] Recall a decision > > "Why did we pick token rotation over long-lived tokens? Check Alike." > [card] Search past sessions > > "Find the session where I debugged the webhook retries last week." > [card] Record a decision > > "Record in Alike that we use one queue per tenant, and that we rejected a shared queue because of noisy neighbours." > [card] Plan the day > > "What's on my plate today? What should I pick up next?" > [card] Check on teammates > > "Is anyone else working on the billing migration right now?" More examples: * "Where did Alike get this decision from?" The agent reads the item's sources, for example the session, email, or issue. * "Get the full Alike brief for this work again." Use this after the agent's context was compacted. When the agent links the same work again, it usually gets only a short update with what changed. ### The first time your agent uses Alike After your first Alike tool call, Alike asks the agent to greet you and to show one or two things that need your attention. The agent then offers to log what you work on. If nobody else in your workspace uses Alike, it can offer to invite a colleague. This happens once in each workspace. ## When Alike adds context Alike adds context at these points. Not every agent supports every point. See [Supported agents](https://alike.help/get-started/supported-agents.md). | Point | What your agent gets | | - | - | | **The session starts** | A brief about the current work: the task, recent decisions, related work, live sessions on the same work, and questions that wait for your answer | | **You send a prompt** | What changed since the last turn, and items that match your prompt | | **Before the agent edits or reads a file** | A short note if a decision or task is attached to that file. Claude Code, Codex CLI, and Factory droid only. This check runs on your machine and sends nothing | | **After a tool call** | Items that match your prompt or the work. Claude Code, Codex CLI, Cursor, Factory droid, Devin CLI, and VS Code only | | **The agent finishes a turn** | If a teammate or another of your sessions asked you something, the agent can continue for one more turn to tell you | Alike tries not to show the same item twice in one session. ### What the context looks like Alike wraps its context in a block that your agent can recognize: ```text theme={null} Alike Coordination Pointers — workspace context from Alike, your user's shared work-world. ... - [decision] Use one queue per tenant urn:alike:decision:3f9c... ``` Each item is a lead, not an instruction. The agent reads the item with Alike's tools when the item is relevant. Items marked `(confirmed)` were confirmed by a person. Items without the mark were inferred by Alike from your sessions and sources. ### Do you see this context? Usually not. Alike gives the context to the agent, not to you. Two exceptions: in Cursor, a follow-up at the end of a turn appears as a new message in the chat. In Copilot CLI, Alike adds its context to your prompt. The agent tells you when Alike's context changes what it does, for example: "Per Alike, the team decided...". If you want to see what Alike knows, ask the agent: "What did Alike tell you at the start of this session?" ## Log your work Alike works best when your agent logs what it works on. The agent does this without asking you, because it records only your own work. * **Starting**: the agent links the session to a work item, for example the git branch, the GitHub pull request, or the Linear issue. If no item exists, it creates one. * **Deciding**: when you choose an approach and reject an alternative, the agent records a decision. Later sessions that touch the same code get that decision. See [Decisions](https://alike.help/use/decisions.md). * **Finishing**: the agent updates the task status and ends the work focus. A work focus that has no activity for 5 minutes becomes idle. The agent logs it again when work continues. ## Work across many sessions You can run several agent sessions at the same time. Each session can see your other live sessions, and send them a message. The message arrives when the other session starts or ends its next turn. No confirmation is needed, because all the sessions are yours. Example: "Tell my other session on the `api-refactor` branch that the schema changed." See [Run parallel sessions](https://alike.help/use/parallel-sessions.md). ## Messages to other people Alike tells your agent to ask you before it sends anything to another person: a question to a teammate, an update, a reply, or a suggested change to a teammate's task. Alike does not block these sends. Only invitations wait on Alike's side until you confirm. See [Work with teammates](https://alike.help/use/teammates.md). ## If Alike is slow or down Your agent does not wait for Alike. If Alike does not answer within a few seconds, the hook stops and the agent continues without Alike's context. After a few network failures in a row, the session-start and prompt hooks stop calling Alike for some minutes. The other hooks keep trying, but each one stops after a few seconds. If your machine's credential stops working, the agent receives this message at session start or with your next prompt: ``Alike auth expired — run `npx @alikeai/setup --doctor` ``. Run the command to pair again. This documentation is built and hosted on [Mintlify](https://mintlify.com), a developer documentation platform.