A bot talks to people on many channels. Before People, each chat was its own thread, so Dana on Telegram and Dana by text were strangers. Now the bot knows they are one person.

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What a person is

A person has a name, an optional photo, notes and organisation, and a list of identities: a Telegram user, a phone number (on text and WhatsApp), an email address, a Slack, Discord or Teams user. Open the People app on the bot’s phone (it used to be called Contacts) to see everyone, the channels they use, and why each identity is linked.

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How people are linked

  • Automatically, on an exact match. The same phone number on text and WhatsApp, the same email, or a contact or invite that carries a number the bot already knows: these are the same human, so they link without asking. The identity says Linked automatically: same number or email.
  • By your confirmation, on a likely match. Two people with the same name and the same organisation, and no handle in common, appear under Might be the same person. Choose Same person to merge them or Not the same to dismiss it for good. Nothing is merged on a guess.
  • Group chats stay separate. Someone you already know is named correctly in a group, but a stranger in a big channel is not added to People.

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One thread per person

A direct message from a person lands in that person’s one thread with the bot, whichever channel it came in on. Chats that already had a thread of their own before People existed are kept as sub-threads under it, so no history is lost. Group chats stay their own threads, with each message attributed to the person who wrote it.

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Where replies go

By default the bot replies on the channel the person just used. Under Reply on in a person’s details you can pin one channel instead. The bot can also choose another channel for a person, but only one they have already written to you on, so consent rules are unchanged: a number that never texted you is still off limits.

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What the bot remembers

The bot’s notes about a person belong to the person, not to a chat. What it learns on Telegram is known when they text, and the bot sees it at the top of each of their turns. The bot writes these notes itself while it works, and can add people you mention: The tools are served on your computer’s connector endpoint (/internal/connectors/mcp) beside the mail and phone tools, act only on your own people, and are what every Allternit bot sees. Vendor bots don’t get them; they can only suggest a note for you to approve (twin_propose, see Your twin). To see them, open the bot’s phone, then Contacts, and expand a person: What the bots know lists every note with Remove, and you can type a note of your own. Developers: the notes are facts ({id, fact, botId, createdAt}) on GET /api/v1/people/:id, and DELETE /api/v1/people/:id/facts/:factId removes one.

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Merge and split

  • Merge with folds another person into this one: identities, notes and threads move, and the other person’s old thread becomes a sub-thread.
  • Split takes one identity off a person and makes it a person of its own, for when a link was wrong. A pair you split is not proposed again. A person’s last identity can’t be split off.
On the web app and the m.allternit.com phone app the People list is the same, at phone size. The runtime applies the same rules wherever the bot runs; the developer reference is People API.