What Lino AI can do

Lino AI works with a fixed set of tools. This page lists them by what they let it do, so you know what to ask for — and what it cannot do. You never call these tools yourself; you ask in plain words and Lino AI picks the tools.

Two rules apply to everything that changes your work:

• New things go to the Inbox. Cards, Tables, Charts, imports and other new Artifacts land in your Inbox Stack (bottom-left). Lino AI never places things on a Canvas; you drag them where you want.
• Every change is in the review. Each reply that changed something ends with a review card where you can undo it. See Changes, review & undo.

Read your workspace

Write Cards

• Create Cards — one or many at once, with references (chips) to other Artifacts in the text.
• Edit a Card's content — rewrite text, change formatting, tick or add checklist items.
• Edit Properties — Properties, captions, titles, and a Card's Concept.
• Comment — leave a comment on a Card or Image, or reply in a thread. Comments post right away and show as Lino AI's.

Example: "Turn my lecture notes into one Card per key idea, and tag each with the week number."

Canvases and Spaces

• Make a Canvas — an empty Canvas inside another Canvas or Space. Lino AI makes one when you are starting something new (or offers to, if a new subject comes up mid-way). It does not take you there, and it does not move things onto it — the Cards it made still arrive in the Inbox.
• Make a Space — only as a last resort and only after you agree. Not on the Free plan.
• Update a Canvas — write its Canvas memory, and rename it or change its icon. It renames only when you ask, or when the name is still a placeholder like "Untitled".

Connections

Lino AI can add Connections between any two Artifacts, give them a Relationship (e.g. "Photosynthesis" — requires → "Chlorophyll"), relabel them, or remove them. New Connections and changes to ones it drew take effect right away; changing or removing a Connection you drew waits for your Apply. It cannot change embeds (the automatic Connections from references).

Tables

• Create a Table — columns and first rows in one go.
• Edit a Table — cells, rows and columns. If a change would lose values (e.g. changing a column's type), the review shows exactly which. It cannot change a Table's views (sort, filter, freeze).

Charts and diagrams

• Diagrams — flowcharts, sequence diagrams, mind maps and the like, written in Mermaid. They become a Sketch.
• Charts — bar, line, scatter and other charts, written as a Vega-Lite spec. They become a Chart. The data can come straight from a .csv, .tsv or .json file, so the numbers are copied by code rather than retyped.
• In the reply — a diagram or chart can also appear inside a reply; drop it onto the Canvas with one click.

A chart you only read is a Chart; something you click, type into or that keeps state is a Spark.

Sparks

A Spark is a small interactive page — a calculator, a flashcard drill, a tracker. Lino AI can build one from a description, change it later, and restyle it. A Spark can save its own data, read Tables you name, and use live-data sources. Lino AI checks it for errors before saying it is ready. See Sparks, How Sparks work and Live data.

Example: "Build a Spark that quizzes me on the Concepts in this Canvas."

Bring things in

• From the web — a web address becomes a Link; a picture address becomes an Image.
• Pictures from your computer — PNG, JPEG, GIF, WebP and ICO files become Images.
• Reuse — put Artifacts you already have back into the Inbox, without making copies.
• Find open pictures — search Wikimedia Commons and Openverse for openly licensed pictures; you see thumbnails and can place one yourself.

Your Schedule and calendar

• Read your tasks — checklist items in Cards and Table rows with a date and a checkbox or status, the same list as the Schedule panel.
• Read your calendar — events from the calendars on your Mac and bound iCloud accounts. Read-only: it cannot create or change events. Controlled by Read calendar events in Settings → Capabilities.
• Tick tasks — mark a checklist item or a status as done, by editing the Card or Table.
• Plan — /plan-my-day lays out today from both. See Plans.

Files and commands on your computer

When a Canvas has a folder (or you attach one), Lino AI can:

• Read files — text, code and PDFs (a scanned PDF is transcribed). Word, Excel and similar files are not read directly.
• Search files — find lines matching a pattern across the folder.
• Edit and write files — only inside the Canvas's folder.
• Run commands — in a sandbox that confines them to that folder. Long commands move to the background and keep running; it can check on them, read their output or stop them.

It asks before going beyond that: another folder, a website a command wants to reach, or a command that has to run outside the sandbox. See Modes & permissions.

The web

With Web access on (Settings → Capabilities, on by default), Lino AI can:

• Search the web — find sources and snippets.
• Read a page — a web page, a raw text file, a PDF or a picture at a URL.
• Use a site login — borrow your sign-in to one website from Lino's own browser (the Browser tab in the Right Panel), for a command that needs it — for example to download subtitles only your account can see. It asks you first, per site. See Privacy & what is sent.

Memory, questions and organization

• Remember — save a fact about you, or a note in the Canvas memory. See Memory.
• Ask you — multiple-choice questions when a decision is yours.
• Mark chapters — in long chats, so you can jump back.

Subagents

For work that splits into independent pieces (reading a large folder, researching several topics, checking its own work), Lino AI can start subagents that run on their own and report back. Up to three run at once. See Background Tasks.

What it cannot do

• Place things on a Canvas or move them around — that is yours.
• Delete your Artifacts.
• Create or change calendar events.
• Generate new pictures (not available yet).
• See anything marked Hide from AI, or files listed in a .linoignore. See Privacy & what is sent.
• Write files outside the Canvas's folder, or reach the network from a command, without asking.

Related: Skills add instructions for specific kinds of work on top of these tools.