📚 Forge Tutorials

Get the Most Out of
Your AI Assistant

Step-by-step guides to set up your Forge Assistant, connect your tools, and start delegating work that actually moves your business forward.

Start with Setup → ← Back to Home
Step 1

Get Set Up — We Create Your Bot for You

No technical setup. No BotFather. No token copying. Send us three things, and we'll have your Forge Assistant live on Telegram within 5 minutes during business hours.

⏱ 5 minutes
📨 Telegram account required
1

Fill Out the Inquiry Form

Open the Start with Forge page and submit your details. Pick a plan (you can change it later), tell us what you want help with, and include the three Telegram items below.

2

Send Us Three Things

Inside the inquiry form, include:

  • The name of your Forge Assistant — e.g. "Ava", "Max", "Maya". This is what you'll call it in conversation.
  • Your Telegram handle — e.g. @janedoe. The one you log in with.
  • Your numeric Telegram user ID — get it by messaging @userinfobot on Telegram. It's a string of digits like 123456789.
Why the user ID? We bind your bot to your user ID so only you can talk to it. Anyone else who finds the bot gets a polite "this is a private assistant" message.
3

We Create the Bot

Once your inquiry is in, we create the bot, name it @forge_<your-handle>_bot, and bind it to your user ID. You'll get a Telegram message from us when it's live — usually within 5 minutes during business hours (PH time, Mon–Fri 9am–6pm).

4

Start Talking to Your Forge

Open the bot in Telegram, tap Start, and send your first message. That's it — your Forge Assistant is live, and you can move on to Step 2: Brainwriting to teach it how you work.

Heads up: Your bot is now routing infrastructure we hold, not a credential you hold. You never see or manage a token — and you don't need to. This is part of why onboarding is fast.
Step 2

Brainwriting — Teach Forge How You Think

The first conversation with your Forge Assistant should be a "brainwriting" session. This teaches Forge your communication style, priorities, and how you think — making every future interaction faster and more accurate.

⏱ 15–30 minutes (one-time)
💬 Telegram conversation
1

Why Brainwriting Works

Most people give their AI assistant generic instructions and get generic results. Brainwriting is the practice of teaching Forge the specific context of your work, your preferences, your tone, and your goals — upfront. After this session, Forge anticipates what you mean, not just what you say.

2

Start the Brainwriting Session

Send this prompt to your Forge Assistant on Telegram:

Suggested opening prompt:

"I'd like to do a brainwriting session. I want you to understand me deeply so you can represent my thinking well. Here's what you need to know about me:

1. My role and what I'm working on right now:
2. Who I typically communicate with (clients, team, management) and what they care about:
3. My communication style — do I prefer direct/comprehensive/brief? Any words or phrases I use often:
4. My biggest pain points and what I wish I had more time for:
5. My goals for the next 30, 60, and 90 days:
6. Anything you should know about how I think about problems:

Ask me follow-up questions one at a time. Be curious. This session will shape how you assist me going forward."
3

Be Specific and Honest

The more honestly you answer, the better Forge becomes. If you're disorganized, say so. If your manager cares about cost metrics, mention it. If you prefer short messages over long paragraphs — say that too. There's no ideal profile Forge is optimizing toward. It's optimizing toward you.

4

End with Your Top 3 Priorities

Close the session by listing your top 3 things you want Forge to help with immediately. Forge will weight these in future task interpretation and proactively suggest actions in these areas.

Step 3

Connect Gmail via IMAP

Give Forge read and/or send access to your Gmail so it can manage your inbox, draft replies, summarize threads, and extract action items — on your behalf.

⏱ 10 minutes
🔐 Gmail account + App Password required
1

Enable IMAP in Gmail

Open Gmail → Settings (gear icon) → See all settings → Forwarding and POP/IMAP tab → Select IMAP Access: Enabled → Save Changes.

2

Generate an App Password

2FA is required for Gmail app passwords. Go to myaccount.google.com → Security → 2-Step Verification and turn it on. Then go to myaccount.google.com → Security → App passwords. Select "Mail" and "Other (Custom name)" and type "Forge Assistant". Click Generate and copy the 16-character password.

Important: Never use your actual Gmail password for IMAP. Use an App Password. You can revoke it anytime from the same page if needed.
3

Give Forge Your IMAP Credentials

Share the following with the Forge team during onboarding:

  • Your Gmail address
  • Your IMAP server: imap.gmail.com
  • IMAP port: 993 (SSL)
  • Your App Password (16 characters, no spaces)

Forge uses the himalaya CLI under the hood for reliable IMAP/SMTP access. Your credentials are stored securely and never logged.

Step 4

Onboard Your Forge Assistant

After connecting Telegram and Gmail, here's how to set up your assistant's memory, preferences, and your first working session together.

⏱ 30 minutes (first day)
🧠 Memory + preferences setup
1

Set Up Your Memory Profile

After the brainwriting session, Forge saves a memory profile. You can update this anytime by saying things like "Forge, update my memory — I now work on X" or "My priority this quarter is Y." Memory is persistent across sessions.

2

Connect Your Tools

During onboarding, Forge will prompt you to connect the services you use. The more connected, the more useful Forge becomes:

  • Telegram — your communication channel (already done if you set up the bot)
  • Gmail — email reading, drafting, sending
  • Calendar — scheduling and meeting preparation
  • File storage — Google Drive or local file access
3

Run Your First Task Together

Start with something small and measurable. Try:

  • "Summarize my unread emails from today"
  • "Research the top 3 trends in [your industry] this week"
  • "Draft a response to [paste email thread]"

Evaluate the output. Give feedback: "That was too long, make it shorter" or "Good, but include the link." Forge adjusts. This is the beginning of the learning loop.

Step 5

Delegating Tasks Effectively

The quality of Forge's output is directly tied to the quality of your instructions. Here's how to structure prompts for different task types.

⏱ Ongoing practice
📝 Prompting patterns
1

Research Tasks

Be specific about scope, depth, and format. Instead of "research competitors," try:

"Research the top 5 SaaS companies in the Philippines with 50-200 employees. For each, note: founding year, product focus, approximate pricing tier, and one interesting fact. Return as a bullet list."
2

Scheduling & Calendar Tasks

Include constraints. Forge can check your calendar, suggest meeting times, and draft scheduling emails. Try:

"Find a 30-minute slot this week between 9am-5pm for a strategy review. Draft an invite to [email] with agenda: Q2 goals, blockers, action items."
3

Drafting Tasks

Give Forge your voice. The more it knows about your style (from brainwriting), the better the drafts. Always specify tone:

  • "Draft it as if you're a senior consultant — direct, no fluff"
  • "Keep it under 150 words, conversational, SEA market"
  • "Write it for a C-suite reader — assume they have 60 seconds"
4

Automation Tasks

Describe the trigger, the action, and the output you want. Forge can set up recurring workflows:

"Every Friday at 6pm: pull my Gmail for any invoices, extract the sender, amount, and date, and save to a file called weekly_invoices.md."
Step 6

Scheduling with Cron Jobs

Forge can run tasks on a schedule — daily briefings, weekly reports, or automated data collection. Here's how to set them up using natural language.

⏱ 5 minutes per schedule
⏰ Automated recurring tasks
1

How Scheduled Tasks Work

Forge's cron system runs tasks automatically at set times — no manual triggers needed. You set the schedule once, and Forge executes and delivers the output to your Telegram, every time.

2

Set Up a Daily Morning Briefing

Ask Forge to set up your morning digest:

"Set up a daily briefing every weekday at 7:30am. It should summarize: (1) my unread emails from the past 24 hours, (2) my calendar for today, and (3) any news relevant to [your industry]. Keep it under 300 words."
3

Set Up a Weekly Report

Automate your weekly review:

"Every Monday at 8am: pull my Gmail for the past week, categorize by sender, and give me a summary of the top 5 conversations I need to follow up on."
4

Manage Your Schedules

To check or remove a scheduled task, just ask Forge:

  • "What scheduled tasks do I have running?"
  • "Remove the Monday morning briefing"
  • "Pause the weekly report for two weeks"

Ready to Get Started?

Set up your Forge Assistant and start delegating today. No credit card required.

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