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Glossary

Definitions of terms used throughout HALO Core documentation.

A

Agent

An AI role with its own instructions, tools, and settings. Agents can work independently or as part of a team.

Agent Config

The configuration page for advanced agent-level settings including tools, MCP servers, and coordination mode.

C

Chat History

Stored conversation records, persisted in data/chat_history/.

Connector

An integration path to external systems for source discovery. Examples include Drive and Notion connectors.

Coordination Mode

A rule for how master and team agents collaborate. Options: direct_only, delegate_on_complexity, always_delegate, coordinated_rag.

D

Data Directory

The folder where HALO stores all persistent data. Default: data/. Configurable via HALO_DATA_DIR.

F

Fallback

Alternative generation path when primary streaming fails. HALO has built-in fallback behavior.

G

Grounded Answer

A response tied to selected sources rather than pure free-form output. Grounded answers cite actual source content.

H

HALO

Holistic Agent Logical Orchestrator — the full name of the HALO Core system.

K

Knowledge

The indexed content from sources, stored in LanceDB for retrieval. Enables RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation).

L

LanceDB

A vector database used by HALO for knowledge storage and similarity search.

M

Master Agent

The primary agent that receives user queries and optionally delegates to team members.

MCP Server

Model Context Protocol server — an external capability endpoint that provides additional tools to agents.

Memory Backend

An optional database layer for persistent user/agent memory. Enabled via HALO_AGENT_DB.

Multimodal

Input that combines multiple types: text, images, and audio.

N

Note

A saved text snippet from chat, summary, or manual input. Notes can be converted to sources.

P

Preset

A saved chat setup bundle containing model, tools, and team member configuration.

R

RAG

Retrieval-Augmented Generation — using retrieved knowledge to ground AI responses in source content.

S

Session

A single continuous interaction with HALO. Sessions maintain context and history.

Source

Any imported content item used as knowledge input for chat and studio.

Source Summary

A generated overview of all sources in the library, available in the Chat panel.

Stream Events

Real-time internal events shown during response generation. Controlled by stream_events setting.

Studio

The panel for template-driven output generation (reports, presentations, etc.).

Studio Output

A generated artifact saved in Studio-Ergebnisse.

T

Team Agent

A specialized agent that works alongside the master agent. Team members have specific roles and skills.

Template

A predefined studio output type (report, infographic, podcast, presentation, data table).

Tool

A capability available to agents, such as web search, calculator, or file operations.

Trace

Structured information about agent actions, tool calls, and reasoning during generation.

V

Similarity-based search using vector embeddings. Used for knowledge retrieval.

W

Workflow

A structured sequence of steps to accomplish a specific task in HALO.

Environment Variables

Variable Purpose
OPENAI_API_KEY OpenAI API authentication
HALO_DATA_DIR Custom data directory path
HALO_TEMPLATES_DIR Custom templates directory
HALO_AGENT_DB Memory backend database path

File Types

Extension Category
.pdf, .docx, .txt, .md Documents
.csv, .xlsx, .xls Spreadsheets
.pptx Presentations
.png, .jpg, .jpeg, .gif, .webp Images
.mp3, .wav, .m4a, .ogg Audio
.mp4, .mov, .avi, .mkv Video

Configuration Files

File Content
config.json App settings
presets.json Chat presets
data/agents/*.json Agent configurations
templates/studio_templates.json Studio templates
.streamlit/secrets.toml API keys and secrets