The Inbox

The Inbox is where facts go when you save them without naming a collection. Say your assistant has just found Acme’s headcount while you were researching something else. Ask it to “save that to Infocrash” and the figure is kept in the Inbox, with its source, until you decide where it belongs.

Mention Infocrash by name, at least the first time in a conversation, so your assistant knows where you want it saved rather than just noting it in the chat.

A collection like any other

The Inbox works like any other collection:

• It is on your dashboard, and you read it the same way.
• Your assistant's write report tells you when something went there.
• Facts in it keep their sources and dates.
• Entities in it can be renamed, merged or retracted as usual.

A new fact about something you have already recorded is added to that existing entity, wherever it lives, rather than creating a second copy.

Filing things later

When you are ready, ask your assistant to file entities from the Inbox into a collection you name. They move there and leave the Inbox, so what remains is what you have not sorted yet.

You:        “What's in my Infocrash Inbox?”

Assistant:  [lists 9 entities: 6 companies, 2 people, 1 product]

You:        “Move the companies into Competitors.”

Filing can only be done through an assistant, because moving an entity is a write and writes come from assistants. You can still retract anything in the Inbox yourself from the dashboard, as anywhere else.

If you are building a collection on purpose, name it when you ask and the fact goes straight there. The Inbox is for single facts said in passing, so your assistant doesn't have to guess a collection and risk putting it in the wrong one.

Can the Inbox be deleted?

No. You have one Inbox, created the first time something is recorded without a collection, and it is the only collection you cannot delete. When you delete a collection, any entity that was only in that collection moves to the Inbox, so it always needs to be there.