Slack

Each agent can be wired to a dedicated Slack app. When bound, the agent receives DMs and channel mentions as jobs and replies in the same conversation.

The binding is per-agent and per-app: one Slack app, one agent. You can have multiple agents each with their own app.

Prerequisites

• A Slack workspace where you can install apps.

Create the app from a manifest

Open api.slack.com/apps → Create New App → From a manifest → paste the JSON below → Create.

{
  "display_information": {
    "name": "Nodal Agent",
    "description": "Nodal Agent"
  },
  "features": {
    "bot_user": {
      "display_name": "Nodal Agent",
      "always_online": true
    },
    "app_home": {
      "home_tab_enabled": false,
      "messages_tab_enabled": true,
      "messages_tab_read_only_enabled": false
    }
  },
  "oauth_config": {
    "scopes": {
      "bot": [
        "chat:write",
        "im:history",
        "im:read",
        "im:write",
        "app_mentions:read",
        "channels:history",
        "groups:history",
        "files:write",
        "users:read"
      ]
    }
  },
  "settings": {
    "event_subscriptions": {
      "bot_events": ["message.im", "app_mention"]
    },
    "interactivity": {
      "is_enabled": true
    },
    "org_deploy_enabled": false,
    "socket_mode_enabled": true,
    "token_rotation_enabled": false
  }
}

Install & copy the tokens

1. Settings → Install App → Install to Workspace. Any later change to scopes or events requires reinstalling for it to take effect.
2. Settings → Install App → Bot User OAuth Token, starts with xoxb-.
3. Settings → Basic Information → App-Level Tokens → Generate a token with the connections:write scope, starts with xapp-.

Connect it in Nodal

1. Open the agent's edit page → Channels tab → Slack card.
2. Paste both tokens (bot token, then app token) → Connect. The status flips to Connected with the bot's identity shown.

How incoming messages become jobs

In DMs (channel_type: im), every plain message from an authorized conversation triggers a job. Edits, joins, and any message from a bot (including itself) are dropped before anything else runs.

In a channel, Slack's own app_mention event is the mention gate. There is no separate keyword check. The bot only sees a channel message when it is directly @mentioned in it, or the message is /ask <agent-slug> <text> (after the mention is stripped). Slack only forwards a channel's messages to a bot that is a member of that channel. Run /invite @your-bot there first, or the mention never arrives at all.

Image/file intake is not available yet on Slack. Inbound is text-only this phase.

Who can talk to your bot

Same ownership model as every other channel:

• You claim it by DMing it, then confirming in the dashboard. The first private conversation with the app records an owner claim, which grants nothing until you approve it under Agents → your agent → Channels.
• A new person is held for your approval. An unknown DM or channel mention gets no job. Instead the owner receives a message with Allow/Deny buttons in their own DM, and the requester is told their request is pending.

A channel can never bootstrap ownership. Until someone has DMed the app, mentions in channels are silently ignored. That is a deliberate security gate, not a bug.

Verify it works

1. Open a DM with the app and send anything. Expect a reply, and the run listed under Logs → Activity.
2. /invite @your-bot into a channel, then @mention it. Expect an approval request in the owner's DM, and a reply in the channel once approved.

Related

• Concepts: Agents
• Concepts: Connectors & MCP
• Telegram: the same ownership/approval model, on a different channel