Docs & Help

Getting started

PrivateOfficeAI runs entirely on your own hardware, in your building. There are two ways to run it — everything in these docs applies to both. Where it matters, "your box" means the appliance or the computer running the software (so "restart the box" means restart the app on that computer for the software edition).

The box (appliance)

Plug it into power and your office network with the included cable, then open a browser on a device on the same network and go to the address on the setup card — its .local name (the friendly network name printed on the card) or its network address. The box arrives with the AI engines and the Remote Access app already installed — there's nothing to download.

The software

Download the installer from your account and run it — it checks your machine and sets itself up in a few minutes. It runs on Mac and Windows (and Linux, for advanced users). When it finishes it opens your office AI in the browser; on most machines the address is http://localhost:8080 (the installer opens it for you). If the standard web port is free it may simply be http://localhost.

Finding your way around

Your features are in the menu at the top. On a computer they're spread across the top bar; on a phone, tap the page name with the ▾ arrow to open the list. Your name in that menu opens Your account (where you change your own password), and Log out is there too.

First-time setup

The first time you open your box or software, a single setup page asks for a few things, in this order:

1. License key — software only (from your purchase email). A box already has its license built in, so it skips this.
2. Your company / office name — brands the workspace for your team.
3. Your team's web address (optional) — claim something like yourcompany.privateofficeai.com so your team never types an IP. You can also set or change this later in Settings. Only the address points to your box; your data still never leaves the building.
4. Your name, email, and a password (at least 8 characters) — this becomes the owner/admin login.

Your office AI starts on the Swift engine so it's ready immediately. You can move to a stronger engine anytime in Settings — see AI engines below.

AI engines

The engine is the AI model doing the thinking. Pick one by how much answering power you want — change it anytime in Settings → AI Engine (needs the "Change AI engine" permission). A box comes with all engines preloaded, so switching is instant and offline.

• Swift — quick answers for everyday questions; lightest on the machine. Great for writing, summaries, and Knowledge answers. Software needs 8 GB+ of memory.
• Balanced — stronger reasoning and writing; the right choice for most offices. Software needs 16 GB+.
• Maximum — deepest reasoning, the best answers, and the only engine that reads images, screenshots, and scans and handles long, complex documents. Software needs 24 GB+ (32 GB recommended).

Using your office AI

These are the items in the menu at the top (on a phone, tap the page name with the ▾ arrow to open the list). Who can see and use each one follows the roles you set — see Team & permissions.

Chat

Chat is the home screen — ask anything, like any AI assistant, but it runs on your box. Start new conversations, rename them, and share a conversation with specific roles. (Chats are individual conversations; the folder system is part of Knowledge, below.)

Rooms

Rooms are shared spaces where a group works with the AI together — like a group chat with your office AI in the room. Great for a project team or a department. Each room follows the roles you give it.

Create

Create makes ready-to-send business documents in one click — proposals, price quotes, and follow-up emails — written in your company's voice. You can add your own templates too.

Contacts

Contacts is your office's client and people directory. Keeping it up to date lets the AI reference the right people and details when it helps you write.

Calendar

Calendar keeps your office's events, all in your building's timezone. The AI can add and find events for you, and it respects who's allowed to see each one.

Knowledge (your documents)

Open Knowledge to upload your policies, contracts, and files into folders. Your team then gets instant answers with sources, drawn from your own files rather than the internet — uploading, reading, and answering all happen on the box. Supported files include PDF, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, plain text, and CSV, up to 25 MB each.

Team & permissions

Everyone in your office can use the box — there are no per-seat fees, so add as many people as you like. Everything here lives in the Team menu (visible to anyone with the "Manage team" permission).

Adding someone

In Team, click to add a person and enter their name and email. They receive an email with a temporary password and choose their own the first time they log in. Sending that email needs the box to be online — if it can't send, the box shows you the temporary password so you can pass it along yourself.

Making an admin, resetting a password, disabling access

All from the Team page:

• Make someone an admin — give them the Administrator role (only a full admin can do this).
• Reset a password — issues a new temporary password they'll change on next login.
• Disable someone — the Disable button turns off their access; their chats and files stay in the workspace (there's no permanent delete in the app).

To change your own password, open Your account (your name in the menu) → Change password.

The two roles you start with

Every workspace begins with two built-in roles:

• Administrator — full access to everything, including team, settings, and billing. You (the owner) are an Administrator.
• Team member — the default for new people: they can use chat and see what's shared with them.

Ready-made roles you can add

Beyond those two, you can add any of these prebuilt roles with one click (they only ever add a role — nothing existing is changed):

• Manager — runs the team, settings, and knowledge; everything except billing and full admin.
• Contributor — uses chat and builds the knowledge base (upload files, create folders, share chats).
• Basic user — uses chat and reads shared knowledge, and can attach a file to a question.
• Guest — chat only; no uploading, sharing, or managing anything.

You can also build your own roles by ticking exactly the permissions you want. A person can hold more than one role, and gets the combined permissions.

What each permission controls

Permissions are grouped so they're easy to hand out:

• Administration — Full admin · Manage team (add/remove/edit people & roles) · Manage settings (workspace name, colour, web address) · Manage billing (add-ons & subscriptions) · Change AI engine.
• Knowledge — Manage all files (edit/delete anyone's folders & files) · Create folders · Upload files · Delete own files.
• Chat — Use chat · Share chats · Attach files in chat.

Reaching your box

On the office network, your box answers at:

• Your custom address — e.g. yourcompany.privateofficeai.com, once you've claimed one (with automatic HTTPS). Set or change it in Settings → Web address.
• Its local name — http://yourbox.local, which works on the office Wi-Fi even when a router blocks other names.
• Its network address — e.g. http://192.168.1.50 (a box listens on the standard web port; the software is usually http://localhost:8080 on the machine it's installed on).

To reach it from outside the office — at home or on the road — add Remote Access.

Remote Access

Remote Access lets you and your team use your office AI from anywhere, through a private, end-to-end encrypted tunnel straight to your box. Nothing is exposed to the public internet — no open ports — and only you can read the traffic. It's a $29/month add-on you can turn on or off anytime, from the Add-ons menu.

It runs over Tailscale, a free, trusted private-network app that builds the encrypted tunnel between your devices.

Step 1 — subscribe

Open Add-ons → Remote Access. If you haven't subscribed yet, click Add — $29/month and complete checkout on your account page. Come back to the Add-ons page afterwards — once the subscription is active, the setup controls below appear (if they don't show right away, click Just purchased something? Check now).

Step 2 — turn it on (the box)

Your box already has Tailscale installed. On the Remote Access panel:

1. Click Turn on remote access. A Tailscale sign-in page opens — sign in with a free Tailscale account and approve your box once.
2. That's it. The panel then shows the exact web address to use from anywhere.

Step 2 — turn it on (the software)

On the software, install Tailscale on that computer first:

1. Click Get Tailscale (free), install it, and get it running (open the app on Mac/Windows; Linux users run sudo tailscale up in a terminal — advanced).
2. Click I've installed it, then Turn on remote access, and sign in to approve.

Reach your box from anywhere

On the device you want to use — your phone, a laptop at home — install the free Tailscale app and sign in with the same account. Then open the web address shown on your Remote Access panel (a private address like http://yourbox.tailnet.ts.net that only your signed-in devices can reach). You'll use your office AI exactly as if you were in the office.

Turn it off

Click Turn off remote access anytime. On a box, this disconnects the box's tunnel. On the software, it stops your box answering over the tunnel without touching the rest of your own Tailscale network.

Add-ons & billing

Add-ons are optional monthly plans, cancel anytime with no minimum term. Start them from the Add-ons menu on your box (needs the "Manage billing" permission) or from your account:

• Remote Access — $29/mo — reach your box from outside the office (see above).
• Web Access — $19/mo — let the AI look things up on the web. Only the search words ever leave the building — never your documents, chats, or files.
• Care Plan — $99/mo — keeps software updates coming after your first year, plus priority support, remote fixes, and box-health monitoring.

Manage subscriptions, change your payment method, download invoices, or cancel anytime at privateofficeai.com/account. One license runs one box; to move a license to a new box, email contact@privateofficeai.com.

Updates & Care Plan

Every box and software license includes one full year of free software and security updates from purchase. Updates download, verify, and install automatically in the background (the box checks a few times a day) — there's normally nothing to do. When one installs, the app restarts itself once the box is idle: it waits for any answer in progress, so a live chat is never cut off, and it's the app restarting briefly, not a reboot of the hardware. When a new version is waiting, anyone who can manage settings sees an Update button in the top bar — click it to open Settings, then Update now to install it on the spot (it takes a few seconds and your data is kept).

After the first year, an active Care Plan keeps new updates and features coming. Either way, your box keeps working forever — without the Care Plan it simply keeps running the version it already has.

Backups & recovery

Automatic backups

Your box backs itself up automatically about once a day (at most once every 24 hours, whenever someone is signed in and using it) and keeps the 14 most recent backups, stored on the box itself — so a mistake is recoverable, and nothing ever goes to the cloud. Need to roll back to a snapshot? Email contact@privateofficeai.com and we'll walk you through a restore.

Power loss & restarts

If the box loses power or is restarted, it starts your office AI back up on its own as soon as it boots — the AI engine and web server heal themselves, so there's nothing to do.

Forgot the admin password

On the login page, choose Forgot password?. The box owner logs in at privateofficeai.com/account to generate a one-time recovery code, then enters that code on the box along with the admin email and a new password. It's a local reset — we never see or hold your box password. (To change a password you still know, use Your account → Change password instead.)

Troubleshooting

I can't reach the box on the office network

Try its .local name or its network address (both shown in Settings → Web address). Make sure your device is on the same Wi-Fi. A restart of the box clears most one-off issues.

Remote Access won't turn on

First make sure you've subscribed and the controls have appeared (click Just purchased something? Check now if not). Then make sure Tailscale is installed and running, and that you completed the Tailscale sign-in that opens when you click Turn on remote access. On the software, open the Tailscale app (Mac/Windows) or run sudo tailscale up (Linux — advanced) once to sign in, then try again.

An add-on I paid for isn't active

Add-ons apply within a few minutes of a box coming online, and within about an hour on a box that's already running. To apply it now, open the Add-ons page and click Just purchased something? Check now, or restart the box. If it still shows inactive, check your account billing, then contact us.

The AI can't read an image or screenshot

Only the Maximum engine reads images. Switch to it in Settings → AI Engine (a box has it preloaded; the software needs 24 GB+ of memory).

"This license is already active on another box"

Each license runs a single box. If you've replaced or reinstalled your box, email contact@privateofficeai.com and we'll move the license over.

Privacy & security

Your documents, questions, and answers are stored and processed on your box, in your building — never sent to us or any cloud AI company. The box is firewalled so only your office network (and your private Remote Access tunnel, if enabled) can reach it.

The box checks in with us periodically: a tiny license + version ping every few minutes, and about once an hour a fuller check that also sends an anonymous box id and basic machine-health numbers — which AI engine is selected and whether it's running, total and free disk space, total memory, uptime, and the operating system — so we can support it. Separately, if you claim a custom web address, the box registers that address and its local network address so it resolves. That's it: never document contents, chats, file names, or anything your team types. Full detail is on our Privacy and Security pages.

Your data — export & delete

Because everything lives on your box, your data is entirely yours. To export it, or to wipe the box before repurposing or returning it, email contact@privateofficeai.com and we'll walk you through it.

Get help

Still stuck? We're a real team and happy to help. Email contact@privateofficeai.com or use the contact form. Care Plan customers get priority support and remote fixes.