## A tan is already running

**What do you want to do\?**

Before typing\, distinguish three things\:

- **Main chat\:** ordinary prompts address Main\.
- **Agent Hub\:** selecting a row does not yet focus its chat\. Inspect the **full agent ID**\, not merely the display name `tan`\.
- **Focused tan chat\:** after successful activation\, look for the notice beginning **`Viewing agent …`** with the intended ID\. The transcript and status line are retargeted to that session\. The dimmed editor outline is only a secondary cue—not a unique identity\.

After any automatic return to Main\, **recheck the target before submitting an existing draft**\.

| I want to… | Action in this implementation | Important distinction |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Find the tan | Open the runtime **Agent Hub** with **Alt\+A** or **Ctrl\+S**\; inspect its exact ID\. From Main\, use `/jobs` for background\-job status\. | A Tan agent ID and its background job ID are different\. |
| Watch or talk to it | In the Hub\, select the exact Tan row and press **Enter**\. | A parked tan may need revival before focus succeeds\. |
| Correct its current work | In the verified tan chat\, type a plain\-language correction and press **Enter** while it is streaming\. | This queues steering\; it is not a guaranteed immediate hard interruption\. |
| Give it the next task | In the verified tan chat\, submit with **Ctrl\+Q** or **Ctrl\+Enter** while it is streaming\. | A follow\-up waits until the current work would otherwise yield\. |
| Return to Main without cancelling it | In ordinary focused chat\, **Escape clears a nonempty text draft**\; with an empty draft\, **Escape returns to Main**\. Inspect the result after each press\. | Do not blindly press Escape twice\: the second press might already be acting on Main\. |
| Return using Left | With an empty focused editor\, deliberately press **Left\, Left**\. | It returns **directly to Main**\, despite the current banner saying “parent\.” |
| Continue a finished tan | Find its **parked** row\, press **Enter**\, then send a new\, scoped prompt\. | This continues the agent conversation\; it does not restart its old background job\. |
| Interrupt a turn to advance a queued correction | With the tan **streaming**\, a message **already queued**\, and **no text or images in the editor**\, press **Enter**\. | This requests a turn abort\. Queues\, job cancellation\, and agent killing remain separate\. |
| Cancel its background job | Ask Main to discover the exact current job identity\, then cancel that **job ID** through the Hub tool\. | `/jobs` itself is a status command\, not a cancellation command\. |
| Explicitly kill the tan | In the runtime Hub\, inspect the exact Tan row\, then press **x**\. | The explicit\-kill path requests a durable tombstone and retains the transcript\. It does not undo edits\. |

The ordinary focused\-Escape behavior above assumes&#32;**no higher\-priority panel or speech playback and no global loop\-mode handling taking precedence**\.&#32;See&#32;[Leave and switch safely](<https://present-sketch-tp94.here.now/chapters/tan-5-leave-and-switch-safely#tan-5-leave-and-switch-safely>)\.

> **Two common wrong turns**
>
> - `/tan`&#32;launches work\.&#32;It has no management subcommands in this snapshot\.&#32;A word such as&#32;`stop`&#32;after&#32;`/tan`&#32;is work text—not an instruction to stop an existing tan\.
> - The runtime&#32;**Agent Hub**&#32;opened by Alt\+A\/Ctrl\+S is not the&#32;`/agents`&#32;dashboard for configuring agent definitions\.

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