Journeys

A journey is an ordered list of steps through a space. Each step is a vignette: a name, a block of text, and a list of points. Playing a journey walks the reader from step to step, selecting each step’s points and flying the map to them, so a colleague can follow your reasoning without reconstructing the selections themselves.

Where to find it

View menu, Exploration section, Journeys. The panel lists every journey saved in the current space, grouped by category, with a sort control per category whose choice is remembered in your browser.

What a step is

A step carries a name, its text content, and a list of point ids. Nothing else. When you move to a step, Mantis:

1. clears the current selection,
2. resolves the step’s point ids, fetching any that are not loaded in the current view,
3. creates a highlighted bag named Journey: <step name> from them,
4. animates the camera from the previous step’s points to this step’s centroid.

If none of a step’s ids resolve to real points, the step shows its text and nothing happens on the map. The Journey: bags remain in the Bags panel after you close the journey, so delete them there if you do not want them.

Journeys are not slideshows

There is no narration, audio, or text to speech anywhere in the feature, and a step cannot embed a plot, a flashcard, or a Reader view. Those are separate panels. What a step gives you is text plus a point set.

Playing a journey

Click Start on a journey card. The panel switches into journey view, showing the journey name, its complexity and category chips, and Step n of m. Previous and Next move through the steps; Next on the last step reads Finish. Close (or the back arrow) leaves journey view, which clears the selection and removes the Journey: bags it created.

Creating a journey

Click Create New Journey at the bottom of the panel. The form has two modes.

Manual creation

1. Fill in the header. Journey Name, Category (Cluster Exploration, Space Overview, Key Features, Miscellaneous), Complexity (Simple, Moderate, Rich), and a Summary. Complexity and category are labels shown on the card; they do not change behavior.
2. Set Public Viewing. Off means only you can view the journey. On means anyone can.
3. Add steps. Add Vignette opens a picker of your saved vignettes for this space. Each one you pick becomes a step, in the order you add them.
4. Optionally attach an action. The bolt icon on a step opens Configure Action (see below).
5. Click Create Journey. At least one vignette is required.

Steps come from vignettes you have already saved, so create those first in the Vignettes panel.

Generate from Logs

The Generate from Logs mode builds candidate steps from your own recorded activity in this space.

1. Pick a time range. Last 30 min, Last hour, Last 2 hours, Last 4 hours, Today, or a custom start and end. The panel shows how many logs fall in the range and refuses to generate on fewer than five.
2. Set Maximum Steps. A slider from 5 to 20, defaulting to 15.
3. Click Generate Journey. Mantis scans those logs, picks the most significant moments, and shows them as a preview list in chronological order. The journey name, summary and category are filled in for you.
4. Prune the preview. Delete any proposed step you do not want.
5. Click Create Journey. Saving turns each surviving moment into a waypoint and then a vignette, with descriptions written by the backend, and stores the result as the journey’s steps.

Configuring an action on a step

The bolt icon next to a step in the creation form opens Configure Action: an Action Type of AI Prompt, Filter Data, Cluster Data or Select Data, plus a free-text prompt or configuration. When the journey is played, a step with an action shows an Interactive Action block with the prompt and a Run Action button, and tracks a status of pending, running, completed or failed.

Actions do not run yet

The execution channel behind these actions has been removed. Run Action marks the step completed and returns empty output; it does not send the prompt anywhere. Treat the action fields as saved intent, not as a working automation.

Sharing

The copy icon on a journey card copies a link of the form …/space/<space-id>?share_journey=<journey-id>. Opening that link in a space brings the Journeys panel forward and opens the journey, fetching it from the backend if it is not already in your list. If the journey’s Public Viewing switch is off, copying the link warns you that recipients may not have access.

Managing journeys

Each card carries Edit, Start, Delete and the copy-link button, and shows the category, the complexity, the step count, the creator, and a Public chip when public viewing is on. Editing is restricted to the journey’s creator; trying to edit someone else’s shows an error. Deleting asks for confirmation first.

The ? button in the panel header opens the help modal and the guided tours: an onboarding tour of the panel and a second tour of the creation form.

Also called a journey

The map toolbar has a Journey tool (J) that builds a path from points you trace on the map. It lives in the Map (Legacy) toolbar; the current Map’s tool island does not include it.

Read nextVignettesThe saved text-plus-points units that become journey steps.Read nextJourney toolTrace a path across the map.