Core Concepts
The eight objects Triplo AI is built from, how a prompt is actually assembled, and where everything lives on disk.
Triplo AI has a reputation for a steep learning curve. Almost all of it comes from one gap: the app never tells you what its pieces are or how they fit. This page is that missing explanation. It is worth ten minutes.
The eight objects
Everything in Triplo AI is one of eight things. Learn these names and the whole app becomes navigable.
A place answers come from — an API endpoint plus an optional key. OpenAI, OpenRouter, a company gateway, Ollama on your own laptop, or an agent with tools of its own.
The specific model that answers, chosen from a Connection. You pick one at a time in the top bar.
A saved prompt template with a short command. Typing /sum expands into a paragraph of careful instructions you never have to write again. Triplo ships hundreds; you can write your own.
Standing context about you, applied to every prompt while it is selected. Two halves: What (who you are, what you do) and How (tone, format, depth). One is active at a time.
One knowledge repository inside Training, built from your files, web pages and notes. Triplo indexes it on your machine and injects only the relevant passages into a prompt. You can keep as many as you like and switch between them.
A webhook or API call that runs after a response. The model works out the parameter values from what you wrote; Triplo fires the request.
A pin attached to a SmartPrompt that forces a particular Model, Instruction, Mind and/or Automation whenever that prompt is used — then restores your previous choices afterwards.
A keyboard shortcut. Some control the app; some run a SmartPrompt instantly, in the background, without showing the window.
How they relate
In one sentence: a Hotkey fires a SmartPrompt, whose Magnets select a Model, an Instruction and a Mind; the answer comes back, and an Automation may run on it.
Every one of those is optional except the Model. You can use Triplo for months with nothing but a model and the prompt bar.
What actually gets sent
When you press Enter, Triplo does not send what you typed. It assembles a stack of messages in a fixed order, then sends that. Knowing the order explains most surprising results.
Why this matters in practice
- An Instruction outranks a SmartPrompt in position, not in force. Both are just text the model reads. If they contradict each other, the model picks; Triplo does not arbitrate.
- Mind context is sized, not dumped. Triplo works out how much room is left in the model's context window after your history and prompt, then retrieves to fit. Choosing a model with a bigger window gets you more grounding, automatically.
- Chat mode changes the cost of every prompt. With it on, the whole conversation is re-sent each turn.
- Attachments and scrapes are text by the time they are sent. An image becomes a description, audio becomes a transcript, a URL becomes an excerpt. The model never sees the original file.
There is one deliberate exception. A prompt beginning with // skips all of steps 1 to 5 and sends only your raw text. See Raw pass-through.
Two ways to run a prompt
Triplo has two execution paths. They behave differently, and confusing them causes a lot of "why did nothing happen?".
| Foreground | Background | |
|---|---|---|
| Triggered by | Typing in the prompt bar and pressing Enter | A hotkey assigned to a SmartPrompt |
| Window | Visible; the answer streams in | Never appears |
| Where the answer goes | The chat area | Pasted at your cursor in the app you were in |
| Selected text | Only if you add //selected// | Captured automatically, always |
| Saved to history | Yes | No |
| Instruction & Mind applied | Yes | Yes |
| Conversation memory | Yes, when Chat mode is on | No — always a single turn |
Background execution is the faster of the two by a wide margin, and it is the one most new users never discover. How background execution works →
Where everything lives
Triplo AI keeps your content as plain files in your Documents folder, not in a database. You can open them, edit them, back them up and put them under version control.
Two things live outside that folder, because they are machine-local rather than content:
config.json in the app's user-data directory — your licence key, preferences, window position, selected model.Vectors/ directory in the same place, holding one vector index per Mind. Rebuildable at any time, so it is not worth backing up.| Platform | User-data directory |
|---|---|
| macOS | ~/Library/Application Support/Triplo AI/ |
| Windows | %APPDATA%\Triplo AI\ |
| Linux | ~/.config/Triplo AI/ |
Triplo watches these folders. Edit a SmartPrompt in your text editor, save, and the app picks it up within about half a second — no restart, no import. See Files as configuration.
What leaves your machine
A short version here; the full account is in Privacy & Security.
| Action | Leaves your machine? |
|---|---|
| Sending a prompt | Yes — to the model provider you chose. With a local model, nowhere. |
| Searching a Mind | No. Indexing and search are entirely local. |
| Grounding a prompt in a Mind | Yes — the retrieved passages travel with the prompt to your model. |
| Enriching a newly added document | Yes — a summarising call to Triplo's endpoint, once per document. |
| Attaching an image or audio file | Yes — to Triplo's vision or transcription endpoint. |
| Storing prompts, instructions, history | No — local files only. |
| Sharing between your own devices | Yes, if enabled — see Sharing across devices. |
| Validating your licence | Yes — key, device ID, CPU model and username. |
Glossary
Every term this documentation uses, defined once. These definitions do not vary from page to page.
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