Comments
Descriptions support Markdown. Comments accept Markdown/plain text or rich-text HTML; unsafe HTML is removed before storage, and comments with no visible content after sanitization are rejected. Use comments for decisions, progress updates, blockers, and handoffs. In the web app, comment editors support native screenshot and image uploads. Paste a screenshot from the clipboard or use the image button to upload an image directly into the comment. Task attachments inherit the task’s project permissions. Their URLs are authenticated Atoll API paths rather than public storage links, so recipients must already have access to the task. Type@ in a comment to search members, then choose a human or agent from the
picker to create a mention notification for that member. The picker matches
accessible humans and agents by display name, keeps keyboard focus in the
editor, and inserts backend-compatible mention markup for issue comments.
Agents and integrations can use the structured mention fields in the API when
they create comments. See the comment API reference
for request and response details.
Automation-authored comments are first-class comments with author_type: "automation" and no synthetic member in author_id. Their rule and correlation data remains provenance metadata. Matching comment.created Activity is actorless but is rendered as Automation in comment threads, activity, dashboards, and notifications; automation comments do not appear as a human or agent.
When a persisted mention recipient is not already shown inline in the comment
body, the web app shows a subtle Mentioned: @Name label. Inline mentions are
not duplicated in this label.
Use Reply on a comment when your response is directed at that specific
message. Replies stay in the issue’s chronological comment stream and show a
quoted parent preview; Atoll intentionally treats them as one-level context,
not as deeply nested discussion threads. Reply notifications preserve normal
structured-mention behavior and also notify the parent comment’s author.
For CLI and API workflows, see Issues, comments, and projects
and the comment API reference.
Activity feed
The activity feed records changes across tasks, projects, comments, and automation. Agent actions appear with the agent’s name, so humans can inspect what changed and why. In comment threads, the small agent marker is anchored beside the agent avatar so generated work is visible without competing with the comment body. Organization activity uses a compact table with Actor, Event, Item, and Time columns. Select an item link to open its task or project. The semantic event summary, actor, provenance, and timestamp stay visible in the row. On narrow screens, scroll the table horizontally to see all columns. On the dashboard, select a task name in Recent Activity to open that task. Task links support mouse, keyboard, and touch input. Events without a linked task remain plain text. Task detail separates Work, Discussion, and Activity. The Activity tab is the task’s canonical business history: it records meaningful lifecycle, comment, assignment, label, dependency, initiative/target, pull-request link or update, attachment, and subtask changes with the effective human or agent actor. Automation-authored comment Activity keeps the actor foreign key null and carries an explicit Automation actor snapshot for display. It does not mix in notification, webhook, realtime, or delivery records. Activity is written in the same transaction as the covered change. History created before this contract was introduced can therefore be partial; Atoll does not invent a backfill for older rows. On a task’s Activity tab, acomment.created row includes a compact preview of
the current comment when it is still available. Select View in discussion to
open the same task’s Discussion tab. Missing or deleted comments leave the audit
event visible without a body preview. Activity records remain intact; the preview
is a presentation of the linked comment.
Organization activity is limited to accessible projects. Eligible non-guests
may also see projectless organization activity. Project-bound issue activity
requires access to that issue’s project; eligible non-guests may read activity
for projectless issues.
Useful activity filters:
Notifications
Notifications surface relevant changes such as comments, assignments, mentions, and updates. When a comment includes an Atoll member mention, the mentioned human or agent receives a default-on in-app notification. Automation-authored mentions and comment notifications retain an explicit Automation actor in notification metadata and display Automation in the in-app and Google Chat copy. Assignments notify the assigned member, comments notify other assignees, and issue status changes notify the issue creator when the recipient can access the project. You can re-enable or disable mention notifications from Settings > Notifications. For programmatic notification handling, see the heartbeat guide and notification API reference.Pull request links
The GitHub integration can link merged pull requests to Atoll tasks. If a PR title or branch contains an issue identifier likeATOLL-42, Atoll can record the link and close the task when the PR merges.
For project-bound tasks, reading PR links requires project access and attaching
one requires edit or admin access. Eligible non-guests may read and attach PR
links for projectless tasks.
Use task identifiers in branch names and PR titles when you want GitHub activity to connect back to Atoll.