Connect Slack to Cogno

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At a glance

Slack is where the work already gets talked about. Connect it, invite the Cogno bot to the channels that matter, and Cogno reads what your team is already saying there — turning messages into suggested tasks you accept with a glance, and reaching members over Slack DM when a task needs their eyes. You don’t file anything; Cogno does.

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Before you start

• You can open Settings in the target workspace. Slack setup is not owner-only — any member who reaches Settings can connect it.
• You can install apps in the Slack workspace you want to connect (or someone who can is available to approve it).
• Cogno only syncs channels the bot is a member of. Public channels can be added from Cogno with one click; for private channels you need to be able to invite the bot in Slack.
• Use a Slack workspace that represents the team, not a personal one, so the members Cogno maps are the people you work with.

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Connect Slack in Cogno

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Share Slack across Cogno Workspaces

Connect Slack separately from each Cogno Workspace. Each keeps its own member mapping, Project channel choices, permissions, Tasks, and Memory. Several Projects in the same Cogno Workspace can read the same channel as before. When a Project selects a channel also read from another Cogno Workspace, Cogno warns that different Workspace context may affect the answer. Choose Share and save to continue, or Cancel to keep the previous setting. Sharing is allowed; the warning does not grant access to another Workspace’s data. Allowed Workspaces can read the channel history, but they do not all execute the same request. Cogno retains an existing thread’s responsible Workspace. If a new direct request has several possible Workspaces, it privately asks the requester to choose among the Workspaces they can use. Selection is checked again before accepting it. An unclear ordinary conversation does not start competing replies. When exactly one currently readable Workspace explicitly selects a channel in a Project, it handles new requests from that channel. If multiple Workspaces explicitly select it, Cogno sends the requester a private, persistent DM to choose the destination. Existing thread ownership and explicit Task links take precedence. Permissions are checked again when the requester selects a Workspace. These selection DMs do not enable reading ordinary DM messages. In Slack’s Cogno Home tab, choose Select Workspace when your linked account belongs to several connected Workspaces. Only authorized choices appear. Slack DMs and group DMs remain outside message ingestion.

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Update Slack permissions

When Cogno gains a feature that needs a new Slack permission, workspaces that connected earlier keep the permissions they originally approved — Slack grants them at install time and never widens them on its own. Channel actions then fail with a permission error until the workspace approves again. You will see this as an error the first time you use a control that needs the new permission — Cogno names the fix rather than showing Slack’s raw error. On the Slack page, click Update permissions next to the workspace name. Cogno opens Slack’s approval screen; approve it and come back. Your channels and user mappings are untouched — this replaces the credentials in place, unlike Disconnect, which deactivates the mappings and starts the 7-day deletion window. Nothing else waits on this. Reading channels, turning messages into suggested tasks, Slack DMs, user mapping and syncing all run on the permissions approved when the workspace first connected, so they keep working whether or not you update. Only controls that need a newer permission are affected — channel switches under Channels require their channel-management scopes, emoji reaction actions require reactions:write, and agent file uploads require files:write. Adding a channel with /invite @Cogno in Slack works either way.

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What Cogno does with Slack

Once connected, Slack becomes an event source: your messages flow into the loop and Cogno acts on them. Three things happen. The sections below cover what Cogno reads, member mapping, and what happens when you mention the bot.

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Report a problem or request

Include /cogno-report and the report text in a connected channel message, for example @Cogno /cogno-report The Task page fails to load. Cloud organizes the report using conversation context and sends it to support without an extra confirmation. No native command registration or modal is used. Your Slack user must be mapped to a Cogno member. Images must be attached to this command message: up to 3 PNG, JPEG, WebP, or GIF images of 5 MB each. A running Engine is not required; saved information for your most recently seen PC is attached, with no live logs collected. A receipt arrives by email, and a short reply in the source thread gives the report ID and email delivery status without the report body or diagnostics. See Report a problem or request for the steps and what the receipt means.

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What Cogno reads — and what it never reads

Cogno reads only the channels the Cogno bot has joined — public or private. New messages in those channels arrive as they are posted, including replies inside threads, and edits and deletions follow: editing a message updates what Cogno holds, and deleting one removes it. On connect — and again whenever you click Sync data — Cogno backfills up to the 100 most recent messages per connected channel and reads the Slack canvases the bot has access to. Right after you connect, it also reads a sample of recent messages once to seed the workspace’s Memory with context about your team. Direct messages and group DMs are never ingested — Cogno doesn’t turn them into tasks or memory, and replying in a notification DM thread does not start a conversation with Cogno. Removing the bot from a channel stops future reading; what was already read stays. Links to newly ingested Slack source messages include the original thread, even when the source is a parent message. A link to a reply also keeps that reply as its message target.

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Search Slack from a Project

Project-scoped agent runs read Slack directly. Message search calls Slack’s current channel history, and thread reads call Slack for the current replies instead of answering from Cogno’s earlier sync. Search results are mirrored only to mint the numeric message ID used by thread, reply, and reaction tools; that mirror is not the source of the answer. Every provider request is limited to the Slack channels the Project reads. With no channels selected, the Project reads every channel the Cogno bot has joined; selecting channels narrows it to those. Knowing a message ID does not get around this. Disconnected connections and channels the bot no longer belongs to are excluded, and a private channel must be one the bot can access. A Project’s channel picker lists only the channels the Cogno bot has joined. To offer a channel there, turn it on under Channels on the Slack integration page first. An open Project settings page refreshes its channel choices when Cogno receives a Slack channel membership change or a completed sync. You do not need to reload the page after inviting Cogno to a channel. Search is a case-insensitive text match with optional channel and time bounds, returning at most 100 messages. Live searches have a bounded Slack request budget. If the budget runs out, or a temporary error interrupts the search after a page has been read, Cogno keeps the results already read and tells the agent which channels were not fully read. These results are marked incomplete, so the agent can narrow the channel or time range to continue. A failure before the first page, an access-permission error, or an interrupted channel read still returns an explicit error.

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Control agent Slack access

Under Agent tools on the Slack integration page, a workspace owner or admin can set Read Slack and Send to Slack independently for this exact connection: Use Search tools to find a capability by its name, description, permission key, or Tool name. Searching changes only the displayed rows; saved Block, Ask, and Allow settings stay unchanged. Each capability lists the Tools it grants under the choice, as Tools, and marks each one for the mode in force — a check when it runs without asking, a question mark on a dashed outline when it asks first, struck through when it is blocked: Read Slack covers live message search, reading a channel’s recent messages, current thread retrieval, reading a file shared in a channel the Project reads, listing the Project’s channels on a connection, and looking up Slack users by ID or name to mention them. Channel names and users come from Cogno’s last Slack sync. A file read returns the file’s details and what an agent can take in: the text of a text file or a PDF (up to 20,000 characters), or an image of a picture. A PDF with no text, such as a scan, comes back as an image of its first page; any other file type returns its details with a note that its content was not read. When Slack offers the original file, the read also includes a download link that expires after 15 minutes, so the agent can fetch the exact file, for example to edit it. The link stops working when the run that read the file ends, is checked against the Project’s channels again when it is used, and the Slack credential never leaves Cogno. Existing connections keep this allowed unless an owner or admin changes it. Send to Slack covers posting new plain-text messages, replying to a Slack thread, uploading an Input File or a file the agent produced for the current Task, and adding or removing the Cogno bot’s emoji reactions on Slack messages. A message the agent posts comes back with its message ID, so the agent can continue in that message’s thread, for example a short headline in the channel and the details as a reply. It starts allowed. A policy saved for one connection never grants another. Changes apply to the next run. Disconnecting Slack stops an already-running agent immediately. Send to Slack is the only standing-consent setting for these managed writes; the destination channel must still remain selected for that Project and joined by the Cogno bot. Every file upload targets a stored Slack message and appears inside that message’s thread, including images and files attached to progress or result updates. File uploads are limited to 100 MB and may include a plain-text comment. Cogno can send the exact file named in Input Files, or first attach a file produced during a Task run and then send that attachment. A Project Run without a Task keeps the file it produced on the run itself and sends it from there, without creating a Task. It never treats an arbitrary local path or URL as a trusted attachment, and it rejects files belonging to another Task or workspace. Reaction actions target a stored message ID and use a Slack emoji name such as thumbsup or a workspace custom emoji name. Provider operations are recorded before Slack is called so retries cannot silently repeat a write. Chat replies stay short: a post of more than 12 lines is refused and nothing is sent unless the person asked for the full text, so Cogno leads with the conclusion, turns a long list into an image or its top three, and keeps the details in the Task. Cogno does not automatically repeat a message whose delivery is unconfirmed. Slack can return an error after part of a request has already been posted, so Cogno keeps that outcome unknown rather than assuming nothing was sent or reporting successful delivery.

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Add the Cogno bot to channels

Cogno only reads channels the Cogno bot has been added to — nothing else is synced or turned into tasks. There are two ways to connect a channel: Public channels — from Cogno. Under Channels, every public channel the bot could join is listed with a switch. Turn it on and Cogno joins the channel for you; turn it off to leave. Private channels — from Slack. Slack does not let a bot join a private channel by itself, and it does not tell Cogno that a private channel exists until @Cogno has been invited to it. So the invitation happens in Slack: The channel appears under Channels with its switch on as soon as you invite the bot. You do not need to sync, and you do not need to reload the page. Turning a private channel’s switch off works like any other channel — Cogno leaves it. The row stays in the list, dimmed, with its switch off and locked: Slack has no API for a bot to add itself to a private channel, so the only way back on is to invite @Cogno there again. When Cogno joins or leaves a channel, it posts a short notice there so the people in the channel can see that it started — or stopped — reading. Slack’s own join and leave messages are not guaranteed to appear.

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Sync workspace data

Under Channels, each row shows a channel, its member count, and up to five member avatars (Slack users not yet mapped to a member appear dimmed); the switch is on for the channels the Cogno bot has joined, and those rows come first. When there are more than eight channels, a Search channels field appears above the list, which scrolls in place. The list keeps itself current: inviting the Cogno bot to a channel, or removing it, updates the list while you are looking at it. Choose Sync data from the ⋯ menu next to the workspace name to refresh everything else — member lists, topics, and recent messages; the workspace row shows the last sync time with channel and message counts. On a large Slack workspace a sync can take a few minutes; if it fails, the workspace row shows Sync failed with the reason.

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Map Slack users to members

Cogno links each Slack user to a workspace member so that everything it reads from Slack is attributed to the right person. Keep the mapping accurate — Cogno uses it in both directions: to attribute incoming Slack messages, and to reach the right person when it notifies or mentions someone. The picker lists human members only; agent members can’t be mapped. Use Search by name, user ID or member to filter the list by Slack name, Slack user ID, or mapped member name. Clear the search to show the full list again. While a Slack user is not mapped, their channel messages still flow in and still become suggested tasks — but they aren’t attributed to a member, and that person receives no DM notifications from Cogno.

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What happens when you mention @Cogno

Mention @Cogno in a channel the Cogno bot has joined and Cogno treats the message as a request for it. Within seconds an emoji reaction lands on your message to show it was received. Then a Project Run reads the thread and replies in it. A top-level mention starts a thread under that message; a mention inside a thread continues it. Once Cogno has replied there, you can keep going in the same thread without mentioning it again, and while the run is active your later replies reach it. If you ask for a file, Cogno posts it in the thread; when a file cannot be sent to Slack, Cogno attaches it to the Task and replies in the thread with the Task link. Keep follow-up questions in the same thread. A side question does not replace the original request; say explicitly when you want to replace or cancel it. Cogno’s reply guidance calls for useful comparisons and visible results in the thread, with a Task link only when you need to open the Task for detail or to continue the work. A link is not a substitute for the result. Saved delivery permissions still apply. Two settings decide whether the reply arrives. Both are in Cogno, not Slack: When several Projects read the channel, you can mention @Cogno without a Project name. Cogno reads the thread and uses the request, referenced Tasks, and conversation context to choose among the Projects handed to that run. If the intended Project is still unclear, it asks one short question in the thread before making Project-specific changes. Choosing a Project does not grant additional access or bypass saved approval settings. When either condition is missing, the mention still receives the reaction but no reply follows. The reaction is placed before any run starts and does not depend on Send to Slack. It does need the reactions:write permission: in a workspace that connected before Cogno asked for it, no reaction appears, but the reply still arrives. Any member with a role other than viewer can add it: click Update permissions next to the workspace name on the Slack page. Viewers do not see that button.

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Previews for Cogno links

When someone pastes a link to a Cogno task in Slack, Cogno adds a preview under the message. It shows the task title, status, assignee, Project and due date, then two lines:

• Now — where the work stands: waiting for someone’s approval, waiting for the assignee (with Cogno’s reason when it gave one), Cogno’s last run failed, Cogno is working on it, or queued. The line is left out when nothing is under way.
• Latest — the last change to the task, who made it, and how long ago, shown in each reader’s own time.

An Open in Cogno link follows. The labels follow the workspace language. A preview appears only when all of these hold:

• The person who pasted the link is a member of the Cogno workspace, with their Slack account mapped under Map Slack users to members. Links pasted by anyone else stay plain links.
• The channel is not shared with another organization through Slack Connect.
• The task is in the Cogno workspace that this Slack workspace is connected to and still exists.

Everyone in the channel can read the preview, including Slack guests, so think before pasting a task link in a channel that has guests. As with any Slack preview, the person who posted the link can remove it. Previews need the links:read and links:write permissions. In a workspace that connected before Cogno asked for them, links stay plain until a member with a role other than viewer clicks Update permissions on the Slack page.

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Disconnect Slack

Disconnecting stops that Cogno Workspace from reading Slack and deactivates its user mappings. Other connected Cogno Workspaces keep working. Turning off a channel stops reading in that Workspace without removing the shared bot while another Workspace still uses the channel. Disconnecting does not uninstall the Slack app.

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What happens to your Slack data after disconnecting

Disconnecting starts a 7-day window. Reconnect the same Slack workspace inside it and everything is where you left it — your channels, your user mappings, and the messages Cogno had read. After the window closes, Cogno deletes the Slack data it holds for that workspace: message bodies, thread and channel records, the Slack canvases it read, and the Slack-to-member mappings. The deletion is permanent. Reconnecting after the window gives you a fresh start: Cogno backfills the 100 most recent messages per channel again, and you map your Slack users again. Suggested tasks and tasks already created from Slack are yours and are not touched — they live on your board, not in the integration.

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Common states

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Reference URLs

• Slack: install and manage apps
• Slack OAuth scopes

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Remove a Cogno post

Mention Cogno in the post’s thread and ask it to delete that post. For example: “Cogno, delete your previous reply.” Cogno checks which post you mean and removes only its own message on that Slack connection. If several posts could match, specify which one. The Send to Slack permission applies to deletion too. Its saved approval or refusal setting remains effective. The existing chat:write Slack scope covers deleting the bot’s own messages.

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Related docs

• Integrations
• Task statuses — where messages Cogno picks up land on your board.
• Troubleshooting

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Privacy and support

For information about how Cogno collects, processes, and protects your data, see our Privacy Policy. If you need assistance with the Slack integration or encounter a technical issue, visit Technical Support.

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AI-generated content

Cogno uses AI to generate task suggestions, summaries, and responses based on information from Slack and other connected services. AI-generated content may be inaccurate, incomplete, or misleading. Review important information before relying on it or taking action.