Volath FAQ: setup, AI providers, plugins and control

Volath is a local dashboard that takes a ticket from idea to merged code with AI doing the development work. You write a ticket, an AI agent analyzes it, writes the code in your git repository, opens a pull request, fixes CI failures and review comments, deploys to staging and runs a live browser test.

The default workflow runs To Do, Analyzing, Not Ready, Ready, In Development, Development Done, Waiting for CI, Code Review, On Staging, On Testing, Awaiting Merge and Done. After analysis, a ticket is either Not Ready or Ready. The Done column is hidden on the board by default, and each project can change the steps in Workflows.

Yes. AI development includes automatic CI fixing and answering of review comments, after the AI opens the pull request.

After a staging deploy, Playwright drives a browser against the environment and stores screenshots. Volath downloads the Chromium browser it needs the first time you run a live test.

Yes. In the Project Planner, in the Tools menu, you describe a project and add documents. The AI creates the project with its tickets and subtasks, all left in To Do.

An agent is a role with its own instructions and optionally its own model. A skill is a reusable playbook, such as a review checklist, that you attach to an agent or a ticket. A squad is a leader agent with members: the leader hands each step to the right member, one at a time.

Yes. Memory keeps lessons per project from merged tickets, rejected pull requests and review comments. Active lessons are added to the prompts of analysis and development. You can review, edit or delete them, and turn learning off per project and per ticket.

New Relic errors, SonarCloud issues, Dependabot alerts, and Composer and NPM package health: outdated, major updates, vulnerable, deprecated and usage. Each finding can become a ticket.

Yes. Issue tracker sync imports tickets from Jira, Linear or GitHub Issues and writes progress back per step.

A computer with Windows, macOS or Linux, Git in PATH, at least one AI provider, and a token for your Git host. Nothing else has to be installed: the installer brings what Volath itself needs. Chromium for live testing is optional, and Volath downloads it the first time you run a live test.

GitHub, GitLab (including self-hosted) and Bitbucket Cloud. You choose the host per project in Settings › Git host, with a token that can access the repositories you work on.

Download the installer for your system from the download page and open Volath. The setup wizard asks for your license key, creates the administrator, lets you choose your AI and add your first project. Then create a ticket from the Board.

Yes, if you want to work on Volath itself or read the code: the run from source guide lists the commands. For everyday use the installer is the way to go, because it updates cleanly and needs no Node.js on your machine.

Claude Code, Codex, GitHub Copilot and OpenCode as CLIs, and the Anthropic and OpenAI APIs. You need at least one: a CLI (claude, codex, copilot, opencode) or an API key.

Yes. The provider and model are configurable globally, per project and per ticket. An empty project field uses the general value.

Yes. SQLite is the default and needs no setup. To use MySQL 8 or later or MariaDB instead, create an empty database and set the VOLATH_DB_ variables in backend/.env. Versioned migrations and the automatic backup before a migration are SQLite only, so back up a MySQL database with mysqldump before updating Volath, and note that existing SQLite data is not moved over.

Quit Volath and delete its data folder: %APPDATA%\Volath on Windows, ~/Library/Application Support/Volath on macOS, ~/.config/Volath on Linux. Volath then starts with the setup wizard again. It deletes the database and stored screenshots, so tickets, projects, developers, API tokens and every setting are removed, and it cannot be undone. Export a backup from Settings first if you want to keep anything.

Yes. The columns of the board are the steps of a workflow that you edit in Workflows, in the gear menu. A step can be a plain step, a decision, a parallel step or a gate, and each step can run actions such as analyze, develop, create a pull request, check CI, review, run tests, merge or run a security scan. There is a general workflow, and each project follows it unless it has its own. To Do and the final step are fixed.

Yes. The Catalog in Workflows lists Full pipeline, with CI, code review, staging and testing before Done, and Local, for a project with no remote repository and so no pull requests, CI or reviews. It also lists the workflows you save and the ones plugins publish. Using one gives the project its own copy, and workflows can be exported as JSON and imported into another Volath.

A plugin extends Volath with your own page, board widgets, automations or integrations, without changing Volath. It is a zip with a plugin.json that an administrator installs in Settings › Plugins. A declarative plugin has no code and calls an HTTP API or a Volath function when an event happens, and a code plugin is a Node file that talks to Volath through ctx.

Plugin code runs in its own Node process with the permission model of Node, with none of the environment of Volath, and every call is checked against the permissions the administrator accepted. A plugin stays off until they are accepted, and it can never delete tickets or projects. Node cannot close the network for a process, though, so install plugin code only from people you trust. Declarative plugins have no code.

No. Any plugin is a zip you can install from Settings › Plugins. The marketplace is a list of official plugins you can install from the app, and every download must carry a sha256 that matches the list. Administrators can set a marketplace-only policy that refuses zip installs.

Yes. In Settings › Plugins, Build with AI lets you describe the plugin and copy the prompt together with the full plugin guide into an AI chat. Check the files it returns with the SDK tool, then drop the zip. The SDK is on GitHub at volath/sdk.

No. The calls a plugin makes follow your plan on every call, so a plugin cannot use a feature your plan does not include, and a plan that ends or changes takes effect without reinstalling the plugin. The marketplace does not accept plugins that reimplement a feature of a paid plan, and the install screen warns when a plugin looks like one.

No. Volath is licensed software. Only the plugin SDK (github.com/volath/sdk) and the plugin marketplace (github.com/volath/marketplace) are public, under the MIT license.

Yes. Volath is an app you install and run on your own machine. Your code, tickets and settings live in a local SQLite database on your computer by default, or in your own MySQL or MariaDB.

You follow every ticket from a Kanban board. Under Project settings › Policies you can hold steps until a human approves: before the AI starts developing, before the pull request is opened, or before the merge into staging. By default the pipeline runs on by itself, and nothing is held until you turn a policy on.

Yes. A policy can auto-run only tickets labelled, for example, safe, and only while the AI spend on the ticket stays under a limit.

Volath runs AI agents with write access to the project folder and can push branches and open pull requests with your GitHub token. Use it on repositories you trust, and review the pull requests it opens.

Yes. Webhooks send events such as ticket.status_changed, pr.opened, ci.failed and deploy.finished as a JSON POST, signed with HMAC-SHA256 when you set a secret. Set Send as to Slack or Teams to get a readable message instead.

Yes. Add the Slack signing secret or the Teams security token to a webhook to make it two-way: create, status, approve and reject work from the chat, and Slack approval messages get Approve and Reject buttons.

Yes. The API documentation is at /api/docs on the address of your local Volath, in OpenAPI, generated from the NestJS decorators.