Piper Morgan Alpha - Quick Start

Rewritten 2026-08-31 (PPM), per #1708 and PM’s in-conversation ruling (“yes I bless the plan”). This doc previously told testers to build a local copy from an abandoned branch. It doesn’t anymore — see the note below for what changed and why.

For: Alpha testers who want to try Piper Morgan. For engineers who want to run the code locally or contribute: see CONTRIBUTING.md — local setup now lives there, not here.

ℹ️ What changed, and why (2026-08-31): this doc used to send testers to clone a production branch that turned out to be 7,614 commits behind main and not a real deploy source (.github/workflows/docker.yml builds on main), and called the hosted app a “planned for 2026” future feature. Neither was true — ESSENCE v1.0 (ratified) names the live web-chat app as the current surface, and it’s what the existing alpha testers are actually on. The fix is the surface change below, not a corrected clone command: testers use the hosted app; local install is now an engineer path in CONTRIBUTING.md, pointing at main, never production. Full record: #1708.

⚠️ If you hit issues, see ALPHA_TESTING_GUIDE.md for comprehensive troubleshooting.

Getting Started

Piper Morgan runs as a hosted app — there’s nothing to install. Go to alpha.pipermorgan.ai and log in.

(URL updated 2026-09-21: this doc previously pointed at a fly.dev address; the alpha testers’ instance — the one invites are issued for — is alpha.pipermorgan.ai, matching docs/README.md and your invite email.)

New tester? Alpha is invite-only — codes come directly from xian@pipermorgan.ai. With your invite code in hand: go to alpha.pipermorgan.ai/setup, create your account (the form asks for the invite code), log in, then add your own LLM key under Settings → LLM Keys (an Anthropic or OpenAI key — Piper runs on your key and can’t answer substantive requests without one).

That’s it — no clone, no Docker, no Python version to check. Time to first use: however long it takes to log in and paste a key.

What’s New in 0.8.14

A fast follow to v0.8.13.0 — cut two days later, and the first release deployed to the consolidated host (alpha.pipermorgan.ai has been served by Fly since 2026-09-22; you were asked to log in again once — that was the move). Theme: on your clock.

Your preferences survive restarts (#1574) — timezone, reminder settings, working mode, and the calendar-setup offer used to reset silently on every deploy (“why does it keep asking me?”). They now persist per user.

Every clock face is yours, and labeled (#1576, #1575, #1577, #1556) — standup exports, the agenda, and “what’s my day look like” answers render in your timezone with the zone named (“3:00 PM PDT”). “Today” and “yesterday” are your calendar days, and free-time blocks are computed on your clock — after 5pm Pacific you no longer get tomorrow’s day.

The agenda shows real meeting times (#1576) — it had been printing “TBD” for everyone with a connected calendar (a key mismatch, not a missing meeting). Fixed, along with the unreachable “Focus Time Available” section.

Add a project in one line (#1856) — add project One Job with repo Design-in-Product/one-job creates and links it in one turn. Leave the name out and Piper tells you the exact line to type.

Honest outcomes on GitHub writes (#1858) — closing an issue that doesn’t exist now says “There’s no issue #99999 in owner/repo — nothing was changed” instead of “it may or may not have gone through”.

The preferences pages work again (#1864) — every /api/v1/preferences/* route had errored since its auth dependency landed. Also: one “Add to Slack” path instead of four (#1499), and the four honest LLM-key error sentences from 0.8.13 are now actually deployed.

See Release Notes v0.8.14.0 for full details.

Want to run it locally instead?

Local install is now an engineer/contributor path, not a tester one — see CONTRIBUTING.md for the full setup (Python, Docker, Postgres, the setup wizard). Point at main, never production (that branch isn’t a deploy source and drifts stale — see release-model.md).

First Commands to Try

Via Chat Interface

# In Piper's chat interface:
"Hello, what can you help me with?"
"Add a todo: Test Piper Morgan"
"What tasks do I have?"
"Upload a document and summarize it"

Via UI Features

After logging in at alpha.pipermorgan.ai:

  1. Lists Management → Click “Lists” → “Create New List”
    • Add list name and description
    • Try sharing with another user (if multi-user testing)
  2. Todos Management → Click “Todos” → “Create New Todo”
    • Full CRUD operations
  3. File Upload/Download → Click “Files” → Upload a file
    • Supports: PDF, DOCX, TXT, MD, JSON (max 10MB)
    • Download and delete files
  4. Daily Standup → Click “Standup” → “Generate Standup”
    • AI-powered standup generation (2-3 seconds)
  5. Logout → Click user menu (top right) → “Logout”
    • Token revocation and logout working
  6. Permission Management → Try conversational commands:
    • “share my project plan with alex@example.com as editor”
    • “who can access my shopping list?”

Testing Focus for 0.8.14

What’s Stable (light testing recommended):

Where to Focus Testing (these need your attention):

What’s Working in 0.8.14

✅ Conversational AI:

✅ Time, on your clock (new):

✅ Todos, Lists & Projects (via chat and UI):

✅ Personalization:

✅ Files:

✅ Integrations:

✅ Core Infrastructure:

See ALPHA_KNOWN_ISSUES.md for current limitations.

Getting Help

Remember

This is alpha software (0.8.14.0). Expect bugs. Don’t use for production. You’re responsible for API costs. See ALPHA_AGREEMENT_v2.md for details.

Testing Focus: Is every time you see on YOUR clock, with the zone named? Do your preferences stay set across deploys? Does the agenda show real times? Does a one-line add-project work — and does a bad GitHub write say so honestly?

Happy testing! 🚀

Last Updated: September 23, 2026