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Connect your accounts
Use this when you want Pencel to read from or work in another service: your inbox, calendar, books, chat or project tools. You can connect from wherever you are when Pencel asks, or from Settings ▸ Connections at any time.
Connect from where you are
You rarely need to go looking. Pencel asks for a connection at the moment it needs one:
- On Home. The Connect your email setup card has Connect Google and Connect Microsoft. Choosing Handle my inbox offers Connect Gmail. The calendar box offers Connect Google Calendar or Connect Microsoft 365.
- In a room. A setup card says "I need read access to …" and names the service. Click Connect to set it up without leaving the room, or Not now.
- When you create a room. The last step, Connectors, lists the accounts the room needs. Click Connect next to anything missing. Until the required accounts are ready, the final button reads Finish connector setup instead of Build team and create room. See Set up your own Room.
- In Settings. Settings ▸ Connections has three tabs: Recommended (the connections Pencel has tested), Installed (yours) and Custom Tools.
Three ways a service connects
| How it connects | Services | What you do |
|---|---|---|
| Sign in | Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, Slack, QuickBooks Online, GitHub, Asana, Notion, Atlassian, Linear, Stripe, Monday.com | Click Install. Your browser opens the service's sign-in page. Sign in and allow access. GitHub shows a short code to enter on GitHub instead. |
| Key or address | Brave Search, Tavily, HubSpot, PostgreSQL, SQLite, Redis, Filesystem | Click Install, review the permissions, click Grant All & Continue, paste the key, address or folder, then click Install & Connect. |
| Nothing to enter | Web Fetch, Memory, Playwright | Click Install. It connects straight away. |
The government bid sources and market data that ready-made rooms use normally run on Pencel's shared access, so there's nothing to set up. If a Home card says a source couldn't be reached or ran out of allowance, it offers a fix, such as Add my own key.
Connect from Settings
- Open Settings ▸ Connections.
- On the Recommended tab, find the service. Use the search box or the category tabs.
- Click Install and follow the sign-in or key steps above.
- When it's done, the card says Installed and the connection appears on the Installed tab.
Stuck? Click Need help? Ask AI on the card (or Need help connecting? Ask AI in the dialog) and Pencel walks you through the service's own setup.
Check that it works
On the Installed tab, open the connection's ⋯ menu and click Test Connection. You'll see Connection OK, or Test failed with the reason.
Inside a room or the Connectors step, click Check access. Pencel confirms it can reach what the room needs with that account.
Choose which account a room uses
When exactly one healthy account fits, the room uses it automatically. When you've connected more than one (two Gmail accounts, say), pick one from Select an account, then click Check access. A room only ever uses the accounts connected to it. To see them, click the room's name and go to Advanced ▸ Tools & accounts.
When a connection needs you to sign in again
Sign-ins expire or get revoked on the service's side. When that happens, the connection shows Needs sign-in.
- Open Settings ▸ Connections and go to the Recommended tab.
- Find the service. Its card shows Needs sign-in.
- Click Sign in and sign in again in your browser.
This works for every service you connect by signing in, including Slack and Asana. GitHub is the exception: remove it (⋯ ▸ Remove on the Installed tab) and install it again. For Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 and QuickBooks Online you can also click Re-authorize on the Installed tab, or Reconnect next to the account in a room. The rooms that use the connection carry on once you're signed in.
If you connected Google some time ago, reconnect it once so the inbox room can mark messages as read.
Control what a connection may do
Open the connection's ⋯ menu and click Manage Tools:
- Use the switch next to each action to turn it on or off. Enable All and Disable All do every action at once.
- Under Auto-Approval, choose None (everything that could change something asks you first), All tools (nothing asks) or Custom (tick Auto-approve for the actions you trust).
- Click Save changes.
Turning an action off here turns it off everywhere, including every room. Auto-approval covers chats on Home and workflows. Rooms ignore it and keep their own approvals.
All tools means no prompts outside rooms
With All tools, that connection's actions run in chats and workflows without asking, including deletions such as removing a calendar event. Only QuickBooks changes still ask. Choose it only for connections you fully trust, and prefer Custom for just the actions you're happy to run unattended.
The Activity tab in Manage Tools lists what the connection has done recently. To try a connection without real changes, choose Enable Simulation on the ⋯ menu: Pencel skips anything that would change the service and reports what it would have done. See Approvals and permissions.
Disconnect, revoke or remove
On the ⋯ menu:
- Edit: change a key, address or folder.
- Disconnect: stop the connection for now. Your saved sign-in is kept, and rooms that use it will ask you to reconnect and check access again.
- Revoke: block the connection completely until you choose Restore.
- Remove: delete the connection and its saved sign-in right away. This doesn't cancel Pencel's access on the service's side; to do that, remove Pencel in that service's connected-apps settings.
See what a connection did
Choose Audit Log on the ⋯ menu for a dated list of what happened to that connection, such as when it was installed, connected, disconnected or revoked. For everything across Pencel, use Settings ▸ Activity Log. See Data handling.
Tips
- Connect only what you'll use. Fewer connections are easier to keep track of.
- Give keys the least access that works. For example, a read-only database login.
- Your keys and sign-ins stay on your computer, encrypted. See Data handling.