Customize your assistant
Tune the tone, pick an LLM, control max tokens and temperature, and decide whether answers cite their sources.
Once your assistant is answering questions, you’ll want to shape how it responds. Open your assistant’s settings to adjust any of the following. Changes take effect right away.
The instructions field
This is the single biggest lever you have. The instructions tell the assistant how to behave. A few ideas you can add:
- Set the tone — warm and encouraging, formal, Socratic, concise.
- Set boundaries — “Only answer using the course materials,” or “Don’t give away full solutions to homework; give hints instead.”
- Handle gaps gracefully — “If the answer isn’t in the materials, say so and point the student to office hours.”
Choosing a model
The LLM is the engine that writes the answers. We offer several open-source LLMs, and they all work the same way from your point of view — you don’t need to know the technical differences.
Stick with the default
The default LLM is a well-rounded choice that works for most courses. When in doubt, leave it.
Try another if needed
If answers feel too short, too long, or off-tone, switch LLMs and compare. It’s a safe experiment — nothing else changes.
Choose an open-source LLM
What each model is good at — multilingual, STEM, long documents, coding — so you can match one to your subject.
Temperature and max tokens
Temperature
Lower values keep answers focused and predictable — best for factual course material. Higher values make answers more “creative.”
Max tokens
A cap on how long (detailed) or concise each answer can get. 100 tokens are equal to roughly 75 English words.
Show sources
Turn Show sources on and every answer lists which of your materials it drew from. This helps students verify answers and go read the original passage. It’s a great trust-builder for academic use.
Appearance (for embedded assistants)
If you embed the assistant on a website, you can match it to your site’s look:
- Light or dark theme
- Position — bottom-right or bottom-left corner
- Button and chat colors
Next: Share and embed
Give students a link or drop the assistant into your course site.