AI Assistant

The AI Assistant is an in-app chat panel that can answer questions about your model and about Ashes, and carry out tasks for you — for example inspecting the current model, running a simulation, reading results, or generating input files. You describe what you want in plain language and the assistant does the work, asking for confirmation where needed.

Note: The AI Assistant is an optional, evolving feature. It sends your messages — and, when relevant, information about the current model — to the AI provider you configure, so it needs an internet connection for cloud providers such as Anthropic.

1 Opening the assistant

The assistant is hidden by default. Open it with the AI Assistant button on the top toolbar; clicking the button again closes the panel. You can also reopen it from the Window menu. The panel is dockable, so you can move it or float it, and Ashes remembers where you placed it.

2 Choosing a provider and setting a key

Before the assistant can answer, tell it which AI provider and model to use. Open Settings from the assistant panel. Ashes supports:
  • Anthropic (Claude models) — requires an API key.
  • Ollama — runs a model locally on your machine; no API key or per-use cost, and works offline.
  • OpenAI-compatible — any service that speaks the OpenAI chat API.
For Anthropic, enter your key in the API key field in Settings. Alternatively, leave the field empty and set the ANTHROPIC_API_KEY environment variable — Ashes will use it automatically. Your key is stored locally and passed only to the assistant; it is never shared.

If you send a message with no key configured, the assistant tells you and offers to open Settings. If you do not have a key yet, the Settings dialog has a Request one button that lets you request one from the Simis team without leaving Ashes.

3 Using the assistant

Type your request in the input box at the bottom of the panel and press Enter to send it (use Shift+Enter or Ctrl+Enter for a line break). The assistant replies in the conversation above and shows what it is doing as it works through a task.

Some examples of what you can ask:
  • “What is the total mass of the tower in this model?”
  • “Run a 60-second simulation at 12 m/s and summarise the rotor power.”
  • “How do I enable tower shadow?”
When the assistant creates a model for you, it may offer to open it — accepting opens it in the current Ashes window, prompting you to save the current document first.