Help

Windows 10 version 2004 or later, or Windows 11, on x64 or Arm64. The first start downloads the model Volatic builds with, 2.7 GB, and it stays on the computer. A graphics card with 6 GB or more of memory makes builds much faster. Without one, builds run on the processor and take longer.

Get the file from the download page and open it. The download is a signed MSIX bundle: Windows’ App Installer opens and shows Volatic with its publisher, Ontiqo Pty Ltd. Press Install.

At first start Volatic shows the beta notice and asks you to sign in to your Ontiqo account. It also downloads the model it builds with, 2.7 GB.

Volatic checks for a new version at most once a day and tells you when there is one. In Settings you choose how updates are handled: install automatically, tell me, or do not check. “Tell me” is the one it starts with.

In Windows Settings, open Apps, find Volatic among the installed apps and choose Uninstall.

To keep a tool first, use Save a copy as a file on its tile. For a tool you made an app of its own, Remove the app takes its shortcuts away.

There is a table on the comparison page.

Volatic 0.5 is a test release, free for testers signed in to an Ontiqo account. Parts of it are unfinished, and things will change from one release to the next.

The beta is for testers signed in to an Ontiqo account. Volatic asks once, at first start: enter your email address, then the six-digit code sent to it. A new address makes an account.

Yes. The beta is for testing, and your Ontiqo account holds the licence to use it. When Ontiqo ends the beta, or a build is too old to be used, Volatic says so the next time it starts and stays closed until you get the current build. The tools you made and what is in them stay on your computer.

Volatic asks your account when it starts and a few times a day while it runs. With no connection, the account’s last answer stands for two weeks.

Anything you would not want to lose. A tool’s tile has Save a copy as a file.

Check it first. A tool is built by a small model on your computer: look at what it built, and its sums, before you rely on them.

Something you design for a job of your own: lists, the figures worked out from them, charts, checklists, somewhere to write. It can be one page or several.

On the Tools page. Open one to use it or change it. Remove takes one away and keeps a summary of what was in it, and Undo brings it back.

Ctrl+K finds a tool or a page. Ctrl+, opens Settings. F1 opens Help. Escape closes a dialog or a menu.

Draw boxes on the blank page of a new tool. Drag to draw a box where you want something, and write in it what should go there: “the jobs and who is doing each”, “total owed”, “a chart by month”.

Draw as many boxes as you like, then press Build tool. Each box becomes a working part where you drew it, and the table gets columns that suit what you described. Then press Use tool to fill it in.

A line under the page says which step the build is on. Stop ends it and leaves the tool as it was.

Yes. Say what the tool is for in the box under the page and press Build tool. A new tool shows three examples under the box: press one to start from it, and change the words to yours.

Yes. Say what each row should work out and the table does the sum: “the hours and my rate, and what each day comes to” gives a column that multiplies the two, and a total adds that column up.

When what you describe is a few figures typed in and answers worked out from them (the litres off a roof, the boxes of tiles for a floor), Volatic builds a working-out sheet: a box for each figure, and each answer with its sum under it. Press Change under an answer to type its sum another way.

Yes. Attach a file and Volatic works out what it is for: rows to put in the tool, an example of the rows, or a description of the tool to build. The choice is shown beside the file, and you can change it. After the build a line says how each file was used.

When it has one of that kind (a club’s membership, a tutoring practice, a rental property), it starts from that and fits it to what you wrote: its pages, its columns and its titles.

Yes. Add a page from the More menu, name it, and sketch on it like the first. Or ask for pages in a description (“a page for takings, a page for staff shifts”) and Volatic plans each one.

As a tab, or from a button as a pop-up or a side panel over the tool. Choose with “Opens as”.

A page with a table of its own keeps its own list of rows, so a page of jobs and a page of suppliers do not mix.

Select it, rename it or say what it should show, then press Update this part. Tick “Keep this name” and a later build leaves the name alone.

A selected part shows them: what it counts down from, how many print to a page, which column a figure is worked out from. Set them there, or ask in words (“stop the count at 50”, “print them eight to a page”).

The row above the page adds everyday parts. Drag the strip under the page to draw another box.

In a table, Add several makes many rows: “1 to 180”, “A to M”, or a list, and each of those again for each of a second list.

Yes. A picture to work on takes a plan, a photo or a diagram you add. Stamp a mark for each thing and have them counted and priced, set the scale from one length you know, trace round shapes for their areas, measure a length, or draw and write on it. Save the marked picture gives a new file and leaves the clean one in the tool.

Look changes the tool’s colours, typeface, cards and spacing. Use tool is where you fill it in and work with it, and Edit brings you back.

Ctrl+Z undoes the last change. Delete removes the selected part and Ctrl+D copies it.

Yes. Choose Make it an app from the tool’s menu and it gets a shortcut in the Start menu or on the Desktop, as you choose (on Windows 10, on the Desktop). The shortcut opens the tool in a window of its own, with its own name and icon. Volatic’s window can stay closed.

It is a tile in a colour with one symbol on it. A build picks a symbol for what the tool is. You can find another by typing what it shows, let Volatic choose again, pick a colour, or use a picture of your own.

Remove the app takes them away. The tool stays in Volatic.

A job with several steps, such as “add every invoice in my Downloads folder to the renovation tool”.

When you press Run task. Describe the job and Volatic lists the steps it would take first.

The steps say where it goes, what it sends and what it will do there, and ask you to allow that before it runs.

A fixed list of things at one outside service. Settings shows the whole list: what it reads and what it changes.

As far as you set: not allowed, reading only, or reading and changing. A task that needs more than you have allowed stops and says what it wanted to do.

Volatic adds it to each request to that service. Enter it in Settings. Tick “Keep it on this computer” to have it there next time. Otherwise it lasts until Volatic closes. Forget it removes it.

Scan the code on the Phone capture page with a phone on the same Wi-Fi. Type a note, photograph a receipt or send a voice note, and it goes into the tool you pick.

The model on your computer reads a photo, and its speech program writes out a voice note. The phone shows what was added, or that nothing in it could be read.

A file that adds to the library Volatic builds with: single parts, groups of parts for a purpose, whole ready-made tools, looks, and connections to outside services.

In Settings, under Library, Check a file says what a file does. Library also shows what each added file brought and what was left out.

A list of packs other people have sent in, in Settings and on this website. Each says what it does: the services it asks, whether it can change anything there, whether it asks you to sign in, and whether it brings script of its own. Each was checked to do what it says. Whether to use one is yours to decide from that.

Sign in to your Ontiqo account, then use Send a pack, in the Catalogue in Settings or on this website. The steps take your file, ask what it does, and show where that differs from the file before anything is sent.

It is checked that it does what it says: first by a program, then by an automatic check that uses Anthropic’s Claude, and by a person when that check does not pass it. Then it is published or sent back with the reasons. Your submissions shows what became of each. The privacy policy says what is stored.

Use the support form, or Report a problem in Volatic: it is in Settings under Account and in Help, and About has Support. Say what you asked for and what you got.

They are kept on your computer, in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Volatic\Logs\crashes. A report is sent only when you attach it to a support request. On Windows 10 the folder is among the app's own files: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Packages\Ontiqo.VolaticWeb_scfev8qqh96he\LocalCache\Local\Volatic\Logs\crashes.

The first beta, for Windows. Sketch or describe a tool and Volatic builds it on your computer. It has tasks, phone capture, packs and the catalogue, and a tool can be made an app of its own.