User Guide · Knowledger

Knowledger is a study workbench built on Code - OSS, the open-source core of Visual Studio Code. Each subject you study has its own place in it: your course materials, tasks that Knowledger checks, your progress, and Knowledger Chat, a tutor that teaches from your materials. This guide walks through all of it.

Getting started

Install Knowledger. On Windows, run the installer. On macOS, move Knowledger into your Applications folder.
Start it. The Welcome page opens and walks you through the first steps. You can open it again any time with Welcome from the Command Palette (Ctrl+Shift+P, on macOS Cmd+Shift+P).
Add your subjects (see Your library).
Connect an AI service for the tutor, if you want one (see The tutor). Everything else works without it.

Your library

Your library is one folder on your computer, with a folder for each subject. Everything Knowledger keeps about your studies lives there: your materials, your answers, your progress and the tutor's notes. Open My Library shows it in your file manager.

Subjects

There are two kinds of subjects:

Built-in subjects come ready, with their own tasks, data and tools: Databases (an SQL course against a real PostgreSQL database), Calculus 1 (with a calculator and 2D and 3D graphs) and Computer Architecture (the ARH-1R assembler and simulator). Add one with Add Subject…: Knowledger downloads it and keeps it up to date.
Your own subjects are for any other course. Create one with New Subject… and give it your materials; Knowledger builds the subject's topics from them.

Switch between subjects with Switch Subject… or from the Knowledger side bar. Rename Subject… and Remove Subject… are in a subject's context menu. Removing a subject asks first, then moves its folder (materials, the tutor's notes, progress) to the trash, where you can restore it.

Materials

Put your slides, lecture notes, exercises and past exams into the subject's folder, or use Add Materials…, which copies them there for you. Knowledger reads PDF, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, OpenDocument, EPUB, web pages, notebooks and plain text. Add Web Link… adds a page from the web, and Convert to Markdown turns a document into plain text (Markdown).

Only add materials you are allowed to use. Slides and past exams usually belong to your course.

Working on tasks

Built-in subjects come with tasks. The Subjects view in the Knowledger side bar lists them; click one to open it. The task's text opens on one side and your answer on the other.

To	Do this
Run your answer	Run Answer (`Ctrl+F5`), or Run in the answer's title bar
Run only part of it	Select it, then Run Selection; in SQL, each statement also has its own Run Statement link
Have it checked	Check Answer: the verdict appears in the task, with what is wrong or missing
Step through a program	Debug Answer (`F5`) in Computer Architecture: breakpoints, stepping, registers
Move on	Next Task, Previous Task, or Next Unsolved Task
Start over	Clear Answer

What you run shows up where it belongs: SQL results as tables in the Results panel (one table per statement; right-click to copy a value, a row or the whole table), program output in the Knowledger terminal, and the ARH-1R machine in the Simulator panel.

Subject tools

Databases: the Schema view shows the database's tables and columns; Preview Table shows a table's rows and Explain Query Plan shows how PostgreSQL runs your query. Open Playground gives you a free SQL editor, and Reset Database restores the original data if you changed it.
Calculus 1: the calculator evaluates expressions and draws 2D and 3D graphs. The tutor can draw graphs in it for you.
Computer Architecture: the simulator shows the processor's registers, memory and bus. Run a program, or step through it one instruction at a time.

Exam simulation

Start Exam Simulation picks a random set of the subject's exam tasks and starts a countdown in the status bar. Next and Previous stay within the set, and when time is up (or you choose Finish Exam) you get a summary. A running exam survives a restart; its clock keeps going.

The tutor

Knowledger Chat is the tutor. It is an AI: its answers are generated by the AI service you connect, not written by a person, and they can be wrong. Check what matters against your materials.

Connecting an AI service

Knowledger does not include or resell an AI. The tutor runs on a service you choose, with your own account or key, and you pay that service directly under its own terms:

Sign In with Claude uses your own Claude account.
Use an API Key… takes a key from Anthropic, DeepSeek or another compatible service. Knowledger recognizes which service a key belongs to.
Connect… offers other services and models.

You can change the service at any time. A key you enter is kept in your operating system's credential store; signing in with Claude is Claude's own sign-in, which keeps its session in your user folder. Neither ever reaches Knowledger's servers.

Studying with it

Ask in your own words: "Make me a study plan until my exam", "Quiz me on this week's topics", "Explain this slide", "Why is my query wrong?". The tutor:

teaches from your materials, and every fact it takes from them is a link: click it and the PDF opens at that page;
quizzes you with cards you answer right in the chat (multiple choice, numbers, short answers, code);
sees what you have open (the task, your answer, a selection) when you ask about it; Ask About Selection and Add Current File to Chat send it explicitly;
remembers you, subject by subject: what you know, what not yet, and how you like to be taught. Open Tutor Memory… shows what it keeps, and you can edit or delete any of it.

The Settings view in the Knowledger side bar holds how you want to be taught: the language (by default, the one you write in), the tone, guided or direct, how deep to go, and how visual to be; for all subjects or one.

Conversations and where the chat lives

New Chat starts a conversation, and the conversations button in the chat's header switches between them. Each subject's conversations are also listed in the Knowledger side bar, where Rename… and Delete are in their context menu.
The chat can sit anywhere: right-click its title and choose Move To: the side bars, the panel, the editor area or a new window. You can have several chat views open; two views showing the same conversation stay in sync, including a reply that is still being written.
Moving or closing a view never stops a reply.

Progress

For each subject, Knowledger keeps the topics (built from your materials), how well you know each one, when each is due for review, your quiz results and your solved tasks. Exams and deadlines are dated lines in the subject's overview (Open Overview): tell the tutor your dates, or write them there yourself, and the side bar counts down to the next one. Reset Progress starts a subject's progress from scratch; your materials and answers stay.

Subjects online and offline

Built-in subjects are downloaded encrypted, and stay encrypted on your computer: a copied subject folder is of no use without Knowledger. Each time Knowledger starts with an internet connection, it quietly fetches the keys to open your subjects, and keeps them, protected by your operating system, so that your subjects also open offline.

Knowledger works offline for up to 3 days since it was last online. After that, a built-in subject asks for a moment online before it opens again. Your own subjects, materials, answers and progress never need a connection.

Your data

On your computer: your library (materials, answers, progress, the tutor's notes) and your conversations. Knowledger's servers never receive them.
To the AI service you connected: what the tutor reads to answer you (your question, and the parts of your materials, tasks or answers it needs). That service's privacy terms apply to it.
To Knowledger's servers: only what is needed to deliver built-in subjects: a random identifier for your device with its public keys, the app's version, and which subject versions it downloads.

Troubleshooting

The tutor does not answer. Check your AI service: your plan's limits, your key, or the service's status. Show Log shows what Knowledger last did.
A built-in subject does not open. Connect to the internet for a moment: Knowledger fetches its key and opens it.
The database behaves oddly after you changed its data: Reset Database.
Something else. Write to info@knowledger.courses, with what you did and what Show Log says.

Keyboard shortcuts

Action	Windows	macOS
Command Palette	`Ctrl+Shift+P`	`Cmd+Shift+P`
Run Answer	`Ctrl+F5`	`Ctrl+F5`
Debug Answer (Computer Architecture)	`F5`	`F5`
Quick Open (files, tasks)	`Ctrl+P`	`Cmd+P`