First Launch

Open the Levee app, create your first project, share files with it, turn on an AI tool, and answer your first approval

This walkthrough takes you from a freshly installed computer to an AI agent working on your files. It takes a few minutes once Levee is ready. You do not need administrator rights.

Before you start, your IT team must have installed Levee, made at least one AI tool available, and given the computer a policy.

1. Open the Levee app

Start Levee from the Start menu (Vediram > Levee).

Levee first runs a quick startup check (the Doctor):

If everything is healthy, the main window opens.
If there is a serious problem, such as the Levee service not running, the Windows Containers feature being off, or too little disk space, a full-screen dialog titled "Levee can't start cleanly" explains it in plain language. Levee quietly tries to fix what it can first, for example by starting a stopped service. Copy details for IT copies a technical report you can send to your IT team.
If something is degraded but usable, a banner appears at the top of the window instead.

The full list of checks is in Doctor checks.

2. Wait for the container runtime

The first time Levee runs on a computer, it downloads the container runtime image, the starting point for every sandbox. The image is several GB, so this can take a while on a slow connection. The app shows a banner:

Preparing container runtime… 42%

You can use the app meanwhile, but projects cannot start until it finishes. This happens once per computer, not once per project. Your IT team can follow the same progress with levee runtime status. See Container runtime.

3. Check where projects are kept

Levee keeps your projects in one folder. By default it is:

%USERPROFILE%\LeveeProjects

To see or change it, open Settings (bottom of the sidebar) and look under Workspace > Default project directory. It must be a local folder inside your own user profile. Network shares, the root of another drive, and other users' folders are refused with Project root path is not allowed.

4. Create a project

A project is a folder of work that the agent can read and change.

Click New project at the bottom of the sidebar.
Type a name, for example q3-report, and confirm.

Levee creates %USERPROFILE%\LeveeProjects\q3-report and a small project.json file that identifies it. If Git is installed on the computer, Levee also starts a change history for the folder (a Git repository). Copy the files you want the agent to work on into this folder.

Inside the sandbox, this folder is always C:\workspace.

If the agent needs files that live elsewhere, such as a folder of reports on your computer or on a network share, share them with the project instead of copying them. See Sharing files.

The project tabs used here and in the next step appear in Advanced mode, the default. If you switched to Easy mode, switch back in Settings > Experience to make these changes (see step 7).

Select the project and open its Access Policy tab.
Under File access, click Add file or Add folder and pick the location.
Choose Read-only or Read and write, then click Grant access.

The agent finds shared items under L:\ inside the sandbox. A folder on your computer appears under L:\local\, for example C:\Users\you\Documents\Reports as L:\local\c\Users\you\Documents\Reports. A network share appears under L:\network\. The change applies right away, even while the project is running. To stop sharing, click Revoke next to the item.

See File access for what your administrator can allow or block.

6. Turn on an AI tool

Each project chooses which AI tools it can use.

Select the project and open its Settings tab.
Under Tools, find the tool you want (for example Claude Code or Codex CLI) and click Enable.
A dialog lists the websites the tool needs to reach, for example api.anthropic.com for Claude Code. Click Approve and enable to allow them all at once.

If an administrator has blocked one of those websites, the dialog says Blocked by admin policy and names it. You cannot turn the tool on until the administrator changes the policy.

The tool version is fixed when you turn it on. When a newer version is available, an Upgrade button appears. Upgrading is always your choice and never happens silently. If the project is already running, a tool you turn on or off takes effect the next time the project starts.

In Easy mode (below), Levee turns on the default agent for a new project automatically when you send your first message.

7. Start the project and talk to the agent

The Levee app has two modes. Switch between them in Settings > Experience:

Mode	What you get
Easy	A chat window. You type what you want and the agent works in the sandbox. Levee starts the sandbox and the agent for you. The chat shows the agent's edits as before-and-after changes, lets you preview files it read or wrote, and draws diagrams.
Advanced (default)	Project tabs: Console (a terminal inside the sandbox), Activity, Access Policy, Connected identities, and Settings. You start the agent yourself in the Console, for example by typing `claude` or `codex`.

In Advanced mode, click Start project (or Start Container in the project's Settings tab). The sandbox starts in a few seconds. The Console opens a PowerShell 7 prompt in C:\workspace, with the enabled tools ready to use.

Only one project can run on a computer at a time. If another project is running, Levee says Another project is already running. Stop it, then start this one.

Which agent Easy mode uses is set in Settings > Preferred agent. If your administrator has set a default agent in policy, this choice is locked.

Why doesn't the agent ask me before every step? Inside the sandbox, the agent can work freely, because the sandbox is the boundary. In Easy mode, the agent's own permission prompts are answered automatically, and each one is recorded in the audit log. Levee asks you only when the agent wants to reach something outside the sandbox that your policy marks as "ask".

8. Answer your first approval

When the agent reaches for something your policy says needs a person's decision, such as a website with an escalate rule, a model marked "prompt on first use", or a web search, an access request panel appears:

Approve allows it.
Deny refuses it.
Remember this decision keeps your answer for this project, so Levee does not ask again. A remembered decision belongs to this project and to you only.
Dismiss (deny once) refuses this one request without remembering anything.

If you don't answer within 5 minutes, the request is denied. See Approvals for how long decisions last.

9. Stop the project

Click Stop Container in the project's Settings tab when you are done. Levee stops and removes the sandbox. Your files stay in the project folder. If Git is installed, Levee saves a checkpoint (Levee auto-save: <timestamp>) so you can see what the agent changed.