3. Find and focus the right tan
Learn your actual bindings
OMP slash command — Main only:
/hotkeys
Use the displayed bindings rather than treating this workbook’s defaults as immutable.
On macOS, OMP may label Alt as Option. Terminal applications, multiplexers, and custom bindings can intercept or change delivery of a chord. Ctrl+Enter is especially dependent on terminal support; Ctrl+Q is the alternative default.
A current documentation gap: the generated /hotkeys sheet shows the resolved Hub shortcuts and many other application actions, but the supplied generator omits follow-up and dequeue rows. Their absence from that sheet does not mean the actions are disabled.
For those bindings, ask Main to inspect the effective configuration for:
app.message.followUpapp.message.dequeue
The keybinding loader supports keybindings.yml, keybindings.yaml, and legacy keybindings.json, with profile inheritance. Do not infer an effective binding from one file without considering overrides.
Default controls by surface
| Surface | Default control | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Ordinary editor | Alt+A or Ctrl+S | Open the runtime Agent Hub. |
| Hub roster | Up/Down or k/j | Select a row. |
| Hub roster | Enter | Focus a local, usable agent; revive a parked one if possible. Successful activation closes the Hub. |
| Hub roster | t | Switch between Flat and By parent views. |
| Narrow Hub | Tab | Toggle the selected-agent details view. |
| Visible Hub details | Page Up/Page Down | Scroll details. |
| Narrow details view | Escape | Return to the roster. Use Escape rather than Left when the Hub is open over a focused tan. |
| Hub roster | Escape, or its Hub toggle key | Close the Hub, revealing the prior chat view. |
| Hub, selected parked row | r | Attempt revival without submitting a new task. |
| Hub, selected agent row | x | Explicit kill/release. Inspect the target first. |
| Focused tan chat | Enter | New prompt when idle; steering when streaming. |
| Focused tan chat | Ctrl+Q or Ctrl+Enter | Follow-up when streaming; ordinary new prompt when idle. |
| Focused tan chat | Escape | Ordinary behavior: clear text draft, otherwise return to Main. |
| Empty focused editor | Deliberate Left, Left | Return directly to Main. |
Focused-Hub caution: with a tan focused and an empty composer, the global Left handler consumes the key before the Hub details view receives it. Repeating Left can return the underlying chat to Main instead of dismissing details. Left is a details-back action only when that focused-agent interceptor is inactive; use Escape here and recheck the prompt recipient after closing the Hub.
The Hub’s By parent view is agent lineage, not Main’s /tree conversation-branch selector. Changing that display does not move files, merge conversations, or change the current prompt recipient.
Main is the ambient chat and is excluded from the runtime Hub roster. Do not look for a Main row as the normal way back.
Worked scenario: inspect, then focus
- Open the runtime Hub.
- Select the row for the label audit.
- Read its full Tan ID, lifecycle state, task information when available, and lineage.
- If the information is ambiguous, use Main’s discovery procedure in Observe jobs and read results.
- Press Enter only once the intended row is identified.
- Wait for the focus notice identifying that exact agent.
Expected observation: the Hub closes and that agent’s conversation becomes the visible chat.
Failure recovery: if activation fails, the Hub keeps the failure visible as a notice. Do not type the task into an uncertain surface. Diagnose the reported revival or session problem first.
A parked row is not automatically a promise of revivability. An aborted row opens a read-only transcript viewer rather than becoming a writable focused session. Advisor rows are also observation-only.
The “parent” banner is misleading
The current focus notice includes:
Viewing agent <agent-id> — Esc returns to main, ←← hops to parent
The second clause is not the implemented key behavior.
The focused double-left handler calls unfocusSession(). It goes directly to Main, including when the focused agent has a non-Main parent.
To inspect another parent agent, select its exact row in the Hub. Do not use double-left as a one-level-up navigation instruction.
Optional detail: double-left is a gesture, not key repeat
From Main, deliberate double-left on an empty editor opens the Hub only when it has agent content to show, including saved agents. The explicit Hub shortcuts can open an empty roster.
The editor detector rejects very rapid synthesized bursts and held-arrow repetition. Its accepted second-tap interval is at least 40 ms and less than 500 ms. You do not need to time this precisely; use two deliberate taps, or use the explicit Hub key.
These are source-backed input rules. The supplied runtime proof did not test physical keyboard decoding.
Tangent work and live control · Source chapter: tan/3-find-and-focus-the-right-tan. Original evidence remains scoped to its recorded snapshot.