YakDesk Documentation
Installation Guide
Windows
Downloading gives you a Windows installer (.exe). Run it — it installs YakDesk for your user account only (no admin rights required). YakDesk's Windows builds are not currently code-signed, so on first run Windows may show a “Windows protected your PC” SmartScreen warning. Click “More info”, then “Run anyway” to continue.
macOS
Downloading gives you a .dmg disk image. Open it, then drag the YakDesk icon onto the Applications shortcut shown in the same window — the standard macOS install pattern. macOS builds are code-signed and notarized by Apple, so you should not see a Gatekeeper warning.
First launch
The first time you open YakDesk, you'll be asked to sign in with your Microsoft (YakChat) account. After signing in, YakDesk checks a few prerequisite tools (below), then a short setup wizard walks you through everything else.
Why YakDesk needs these prerequisites
| Dependency | Why it's needed | How it's installed |
|---|---|---|
Azure CLI (az) |
Lets the agent query Application Insights logs and sign in to Azure DevOps on your behalf | Windows: downloaded MSI installer. macOS: via Homebrew (brew install azure-cli) |
application-insights extension for Azure CLI |
Lets the agent read Application Insights logs and metrics when investigating issues | Installed automatically (az extension add --name application-insights) |
azure-devops extension for Azure CLI |
Gives the agent access to Azure DevOps repositories and work items | Installed automatically (az extension add --name azure-devops) |
| Git | Needed to clone and work with Azure DevOps repositories | Windows: via winget. macOS: via Homebrew (brew install git) |
| Homebrew (macOS only) | The package manager macOS uses to install Azure CLI and Git | Not installed automatically — if missing, YakDesk links you to brew.sh to install it yourself first |
If any of these fail to install automatically, YakDesk shows the exact command so you can run it yourself.
AI Model Access
YakDesk works with a wide range of AI providers. During setup you'll be asked to choose one:
- Claude Pro / Max — use your Claude subscription
- Codex · ChatGPT Plus — use your ChatGPT subscription
- GitHub Copilot — use your GitHub Copilot subscription
- I use other provider — Anthropic, AWS Bedrock, OpenRouter, Google, or any compatible provider, via an API key
- Local model — run a model locally with Ollama
YakChat currently provides Claude subscription seats company-wide. If you'd like to use Claude Pro/Max, request a seat from Jimmy.
You can skip this step during setup. Until a provider is actually configured, YakDesk will keep asking on every launch — you can set one up any time from Settings → AI.
Features
Once you're set up, here's what you can do inside YakDesk:
Skills
Skills are how YakDesk's agent knows how to do specific YakChat tasks. A skill is just a folder with a SKILL.md file describing what it's for and when to use it, plus anything it needs bundled alongside it. The agent only reads a skill's short description up front, and pulls in the full instructions automatically once it decides the skill is relevant to what you asked — you don't run a skill directly, you just ask naturally (e.g. “is TICKET-123 done yet?”) and the agent picks the matching skill itself.
YakChat ships seven built-in system skills that are installed for everyone automatically and can't be removed:
| Skill | When to use it |
|---|---|
checking-workitem-status |
Ask whether a ticket, story, bug, or feature is done, shipped, or what its current status is in Azure DevOps. |
creating-bug-ticket |
Ask to file or log a bug in Azure DevOps. |
creating-feature |
Ask to raise a feature request in the Azure DevOps backlog. |
creating-presentation |
Ask for a slide deck, sprint review, or team update; it builds a reveal.js HTML deck in the YakChat house style, pulling every number and status from live sources, and saves it as a local file. |
creating-user-story |
Ask to add a user story or backlog item in Azure DevOps. |
triaging-production-issue |
Hand it a raw customer complaint about production; it investigates via Application Insights and tells you whether it's a real bug worth a ticket, offering to hand off to creating-bug-ticket if so. |
usage-investigator |
Ask about product usage or feature adoption (visitors, senders, MAU, messages, companies, integrations), including questions from the Usage page; it queries Application Insights and can export the companies behind a number. |
Beyond these, you can browse a marketplace of additional skills (open it via the Store icon in the “All Skills” header), install or uninstall the ones you want, and publish your own local skills for teammates to use.
The Store also has Claude and Codex tabs, which list skills from the public Claude Code and Codex plugin marketplaces, grouped by plugin. Each plugin and skill shows its licence, and installing one downloads it directly from GitHub at a pinned version. YakDesk checks the files against the published checksums, refreshes unedited skills daily, and keeps skills you have edited as they are. Skills installed this way can't be published to the YakChat store. The catalogue itself comes from the signed-in endpoint GET /skills/sources/{claude|codex}, which is rebuilt about once a day.
Support Hub
Open “Support Hub” in the sidebar to see which problems YakWatcher is watching and which bugs are open, in plain words. “Now” shows what is affecting customers, “Open bugs” lists the bugs and where each is on the way to a fix, and “Timeline” shows the last days with the releases marked. Click a problem, bug or release to see its details, or use the chat dock to ask about it.
“Provider status” shows live health for messaging providers, identity services, platform integrations, and supporting services, grouped by category with color-coded status. It refreshes automatically every 90 seconds, or click refresh to check now.
“Integration issues”: pick an environment (Dev / Staging / Production) and a company, and see any open or stale integration problems — with error details and an inline “how to fix” article you can copy.
YakDesk is built on Craft Agents — for the full agent feature reference, see the official Craft Agents documentation.