Using Orion in Microsoft Teams

Orion is the CloudRadial AutomationAI assistant, and it can work with you inside Microsoft Teams. From a Teams chat you can ask Orion to plan and start work on your runners, approve or answer a step without opening a browser, send a Teams message to one of your Pulsars, and review what needs you in the Pulsars tab. This article is for everyone in a workspace that has connected Microsoft Teams; the connection itself is done once by an Owner or Admin.

• What You Can Do With Orion in Teams
• Getting Orion Into Teams
• Linking Your AutomationAI Account
• Chatting With Orion
• Planning and Starting Work on a Runner
• Approvals, Questions and Results in the Chat
• Pulsar Cards and Confirmations
• Sending a Teams Message to a Pulsar
• The Pulsars Tab
• When the Pulsars Tab Can't Sign You In
• What Isn't Available in Teams

What You Can Do With Orion in Teams

The Orion app in Teams opens on your chat with Orion, followed by the Pulsars tab. With it you can:

• Ask Orion to do work on a runner, the same way you would in the AI Playground, and press Start when the plan looks right
• Approve, deny or answer a step from a card in the same chat
• Ask how your Pulsars are doing, and pause, resume or check in a Pulsar
• Review and decide your Pulsars' proposals, answer their questions, and resume a halted Pulsar
• Send any Teams message to a Pulsar as context for a check-in
• See your Needs you list and your Pulsars in the Pulsars tab

Orion acts as you, with your AutomationAI Role. If you can't approve something on the web, you can't approve it in Teams either, and decisions you make in Teams are recorded with your name and "in Teams," for example "Approved by Dana Lee in Teams." Every change waits for someone to press a button; Orion never changes anything from message text alone.

For more about Pulsars, see Orion Pulsars: agents that keep watch for you. For planning work in the browser, see Testing your setup in the AI Playground.

Getting Orion Into Teams

An Owner or Admin connects your workspace to your Microsoft 365 organization once, then makes the Orion app available in Teams. If you are a Member, ask an Owner or Admin of your workspace to do this; Members can see the connection status but cannot change it.

1. Go to Settings > Integrations and find the Microsoft Teams card.
2. Click Connect Microsoft Teams. You are sent to Microsoft, where a Microsoft 365 global admin approves AutomationAI for your organization.
3. Back in AutomationAI, the card shows Connected, your organization, and who connected it and when. If consent wasn't granted, you see "Microsoft Teams was not connected — consent was not granted."
4. Click Download Teams app to download the Orion app for your workspace.
5. In the Microsoft Teams admin center, open Teams apps > Manage apps and choose Upload new app.
6. Make the app available to your people, or pin it for them with a setup policy, and add it to any teams that should get channel posts.

Each person then opens Orion in Teams once to link their account. The Microsoft Teams card also shows how many people have linked their accounts and which teams Orion is installed in. If the card says Microsoft Teams isn't available yet, Teams can't be connected for your workspace at this time.

Disconnect on the same card stops Teams messages right away, removes everyone's Teams link, and switches Teams notifications to email. If you connect again, people link their accounts again. A card that was already posted answers with "This organization has disconnected AutomationAI" if someone presses it.

Linking Your AutomationAI Account

Open Orion in Teams and send it a message. Orion recognizes you from your Microsoft 365 sign-in and links you to the AutomationAI account with the same email address, so there is usually nothing to click. If Teams can't do this silently, Orion shows a sign-in card instead. Once you are linked, Orion greets you by name and says which workspace you are signed in to.

• No AutomationAI account. Orion does not create accounts. It replies "You don't have AutomationAI access with" your email address and names the Owners of your workspace to ask.
• More than one workspace. If you belong to several AutomationAI workspaces connected to the same organization, Orion picks one, lists the others, and tells you to reply switch tenant <name> to use another. Send switch tenant at any time to see the list.
• Channels and group chats. Link in your personal chat with Orion first. Until you do, Orion asks you to message it in a personal chat.
• Access removed. If you are removed from the workspace, Orion replies that your access to AutomationAI has ended and acts for you no longer.

To check or remove the link, click your email or avatar to open your Personal Settings, then choose Notifications. The Microsoft Teams section shows the account you are linked to and since when, or how to link. Unlink (or the unlink command in Teams) disconnects your Teams account, deletes your chat history with Orion, and switches your Teams notification choices to email. Message Orion again to link.

Chatting With Orion

In your personal chat, Orion answers every message. In a channel or group chat, @mention Orion first; it ignores channel messages that don't mention it. Teams shows that Orion is typing while it works on a reply.

You can ask in plain language, for example "How's Patch Watch doing?" or "What has it learned about Acme?", or use a command from the app's command menu:

Chatting with Orion uses Usage Credits. The Usage page shows them on their own Orion in Teams line. Chats that never led to a plan, such as status questions, are deleted after 30 days. If Orion can't answer, for example while the AI service is unavailable, it says so, and the commands still work.

Planning and Starting Work on a Runner

Ask Orion for work the same way you would in the AI Playground, naming the runner and the company, for example "have Main-Office list KnowBe4 users for Acme." Orion turns the request into a plan, and nothing reaches the runner until you press Start.

• Orion's questions come as cards. Under "Orion asks," choose one of the suggested answers, or type your answer as your next message in your personal chat. When the question isn't required, Show plan lets you start without answering.
• The plan comes as a card listing the Goal, Runner, Company, Tools, Changes (reads only, or changes data with an approval for each change) and Mode (Live or Dry run), with Start, Cancel, and Open in AutomationAI. To change the runner, company or tools, use Open in AutomationAI.
• Only you can start your plan. If someone else presses Start on it, they see "Only the person who asked can confirm this."
• Plans are checked again at Start. If anything changed since the plan was shown, the card says "This plan changed — review it before starting." Review it and press Start again.
• Plans expire after 30 minutes without activity. Send your request again to plan it.
• Cancel ends the plan with "Cancelled. Nothing was sent to a runner."

Each new request starts a new conversation, and follow-ups stay in it. Send new to start fresh. If Orion starts a new conversation when you meant to continue, send continue and Orion moves the request into your earlier conversation. Your Teams conversations also appear in the AI Playground marked Teams, where you can continue them in the browser.

Approvals, Questions and Results in the Chat

After you press Start, the plan card becomes the step's card and keeps you posted: "Queued — waiting for" the runner, "Running on" the runner, then the result. Cards update as soon as the runner reports.

When the step needs someone or finishes, Orion posts a new card in your personal chat, so Teams notifies you. The newest card carries the buttons, and earlier copies keep showing the step's state without them. In a channel or group chat, the original card updates in place instead.

• Waiting for approval. The card shows the tool the step wants to run and its arguments, with Approve and Deny. Deny opens a Reason (optional) box. Only an Owner or Admin can approve or deny; anyone else sees "An Owner or Admin approves this — it's waiting in their AutomationAI inbox."
• Waiting for your answer. Under "Orion asks," type in the Your answer box and press Send answer. Anyone in the workspace can answer.
• Done, Failed, Timed out or Cancelled. The card shows the result and Open the conversation. A step that succeeded may also offer up to three Next steps. Pressing one plans it as the next step of the same conversation; it doesn't start anything until you press Start.

Your decisions here go through the same path as the AutomationAI Inbox, so the conversation in AutomationAI records them as made in Teams.

Pulsar Cards and Confirmations

Depending on your notification settings, your Pulsars send their proposals, questions and alerts to your personal chat with Orion, and to any Teams channels chosen on a Pulsar's Settings.

• Proposal cards show the Pulsar, the check-in, when the proposals expire, and each proposal with Approve and Deny. Deny has a box for your reason, which the Pulsar remembers.
• Members see Deny but not Approve, with the note "Only Admins and Owners can approve. You can deny with a reason."
• High-risk proposals, and proposals that must be reviewed one by one, show only Review in AutomationAI. A card lists at most five proposals; the rest are in Open review.
• Channel and group-chat cards leave out each proposal's arguments, because not everyone there may have AutomationAI access. Use Open review to see them.
• Question cards have a Your answer box and an Answer button for each open question.
• Halted cards say why the Pulsar stopped and offer Resume, Check in now and See what to do.
• Cards stay current. When someone decides on the web or on another card, every posted copy shows the outcome, such as "Approved by Dana Lee in Teams," and then the result.

When you ask Orion to pause, resume or check in a Pulsar, or to answer or decide something in chat, Orion replies with a confirmation card, for example "Pause Patch Watch? It won't check in until it's resumed." Nothing changes until you press the button. Cancel replies "Cancelled. Nothing was changed." Only the person Orion prepared the card for can confirm it.

Sending a Teams Message to a Pulsar

When a Teams message is about something a Pulsar handles, such as a client reporting a failed patch, you can hand it to that Pulsar:

1. From the message's ... menu, choose Send to Pulsar.
2. In Pulsar, choose one of your running Pulsars.
3. Optionally, fill in What should it do with it?
4. Click Send.

The Pulsar checks in right away with the message as context, and Orion replies "Sent. I'll post what it finds here when it's done." The result is posted in the same thread when Orion is installed there, and in your personal chat with Orion otherwise. The message is treated as information, never as orders: whatever it says, the Pulsar can still only propose changes for someone to approve. If you have no running Pulsars, you see "You have no running Pulsars to send this to."

The Pulsars Tab

The Pulsars tab in the Orion app signs you in with your Teams account and shows Orion Pulsars for your workspace, with two views:

• Needs you, with a count, lists what is waiting for you. Choose a proposal batch to review and decide it without leaving Teams, then use ← Back to return to the list.
• Pulsars lists each Pulsar with its status and how many proposals are waiting

The tab follows your Teams theme, including dark and high contrast. For anything else, such as creating a Pulsar or changing its settings, use Open in browser. If you belong to more than one workspace connected to your organization, the tab first asks Which workspace?; choose one to continue.

When the Pulsars Tab Can't Sign You In

If the tab can't sign you in or load your Pulsars, it says why:

What Isn't Available in Teams

• Changing a Pulsar's settings, such as its autonomy, what it may do on its own, its usage limits or who is notified, and deleting a Pulsar. If you ask, Orion links to the Pulsar's settings in AutomationAI. Letting a Pulsar act without asking, and raising a usage limit above the workspace default, need the Admin or Owner role.
• Creating a Pulsar. Use AutomationAI in the browser.
• Approving high-risk proposals, or proposals that must be reviewed one by one, from a card
• Changing a plan's runner, company or tools on the card. Use Open in AutomationAI.
• Answering Orion's planning question by typing in a channel or group chat. Use the card buttons there, or type the answer in your personal chat.
• Creating AutomationAI accounts. Only people who already have an account in a connected workspace can use Orion.

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