Every MateFlow community can offer members an AI assistant that answers questions using the community's own content. Instead of scrolling through months of posts to find an answer, a member can just ask, and the assistant replies in seconds with the sources it drew from. This guide is for members using the assistant. If you are an admin who wants to set it up, see the setup links at the end.
Asking a question
- Open the AI assistant from your community's navigation. You will see a greeting and, usually, a chat window with a message box at the bottom.
- Type your question in plain language and press Enter (or the send button) to submit.
- The assistant shows a Searching indicator while it looks through the community, then streams its answer back word by word.
- Press Stop at any time to halt a long response.
Starter prompts
On a fresh chat, the assistant may show a set of suggested prompts chosen by your community admins, for example "How do I get started?" or "What are the community rules?". Click any suggestion to send it instantly, which is the quickest way to see what the assistant can do.
Citations and sources
The assistant does not just make claims, it shows its work. Answers include:
- Inline citations โ small numbered markers like [1] in the text. Hover to preview the source's title and summary; click to open it.
- Source cards โ a labelled list beneath the answer. Each card shows the source type (Post, Course, Event, Blog, Space, or External), its title, a one-line summary, and a relevance score. Click a card to read the full source in a side panel.
- A confidence indicator โ a percentage showing how sure the assistant is about its answer.
Because every answer is grounded in real community content, you can always verify it by opening the linked source rather than taking the reply at face value.
What it can and cannot answer
The assistant answers from the knowledge your community has published: posts, courses, events, blog articles, and space descriptions. Ask it about your onboarding, past discussions, course material, or upcoming events and it will find the relevant threads. If your question falls outside what the community has published, it will tell you it does not have enough information rather than guessing. Answers are AI-generated, so treat them as a helpful starting point and confirm anything critical against the cited sources.
Handy extras
- Copy an answer to reuse it elsewhere.
- Turn an answer into a post to share it with the community, sources included.
- Past conversations are saved in a sidebar so you can reopen or rename them.
- Some communities set a daily question limit; a banner appears when you are running low.
Next steps
- See the bigger picture in AI.
- Admins: fill the assistant's knowledge with Build your AI knowledge base.
- Admins: shape its tone and prompts with Train your AI copilot.