# Eternego > The operator's manual for Eternego — a persistent autonomous AI persona that lives on your hardware. Install her, run her, talk to her, read and edit her files, drive every panel screen, and control her over the HTTP API. ## Getting started - [Getting started](https://docs.eternego.ai/getting-started/): From zero to a persona you can talk to, then edit by hand. - [Install](https://docs.eternego.ai/getting-started/install/): Pick the path for your machine. - [Your first persona](https://docs.eternego.ai/getting-started/your-first-persona/): The setup wizard is the door. - [Talk to her](https://docs.eternego.ai/getting-started/talk-to-her/): Once she's running, there are two ways to reach her: the web dashboard and a chat channel (Telegram or Discord). - [Read her files](https://docs.eternego.ai/getting-started/read-her-files/): Everything a persona is lives in plain files under `~/.eternego/personas//home/`. - [Edit her](https://docs.eternego.ai/getting-started/edit-her/): Eternego's design values transparency: everything she knows is a plain file on your disk — no database, no hidden state. ## The panel - [The panel](https://docs.eternego.ai/panel/): The dashboard at `http://localhost:5000` — every screen you use to operate a persona, and the API call behind every control. - [Onboarding](https://docs.eternego.ai/panel/onboarding/): The create-or-restore wizard — the screen you see before any persona exists, or when you click **+** in the sidebar. - [Chat](https://docs.eternego.ai/panel/chat/): The conversation screen — where you talk to her and watch her think. - [Status](https://docs.eternego.ai/panel/status/): The health screen — is she well, and the controls to change her lifecycle. - [Memory and instructions](https://docs.eternego.ai/panel/memory-and-instructions/): Two sidebar screens, one data source. - [Calendar](https://docs.eternego.ai/panel/calendar/): Her schedule as a month grid — what she's done (past) and what she's planning (future). - [Settings](https://docs.eternego.ai/panel/settings/): How she's configured — her organs, her channels, the app's appearance, her lifecycle, and the one irreversible action. ## Her files - [Her files](https://docs.eternego.ai/files/): Everything a persona is lives in plain files under `~/.eternego/`. - [config.json](https://docs.eternego.ai/files/config/): `~/.eternego/personas//home/config.json` is the persona's configuration: her name, her organs (the models she thinks, draws, speaks, sees, hears, teaches, and researches with), her channels, he… - [Identity files](https://docs.eternego.ai/files/identity/): Six Markdown files under `home/` hold what a persona knows — about you, and about herself. - [Runtime files](https://docs.eternego.ai/files/runtime/): These are the files her thinking writes as it runs: her live mind, the running transcript, her heartbeat log, her recurring triggers, and her calendar. - [Instructions](https://docs.eternego.ai/files/instructions/): An **instruction** is a situation she knows how to handle, written as a short procedure she follows. - [Workspace, diary, logs](https://docs.eternego.ai/files/workspace-diary-logs/): Three more places hold a persona's working files, her portable backup, and the daemon's record of what happened. ## API - [API](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/): This section documents every HTTP endpoint the daemon serves. - [Personas](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/personas/): This page covers the two read-only config routes: listing every persona, and reading the provider base URLs the daemon will use. - [Lifecycle](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/lifecycle/): This page covers the endpoints that control whether a persona is **running** and what state she's in: start, stop, restart, sleep, update, delete. - [Create and migrate](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/create-migrate/): This page covers the two endpoints that bring a persona into being: **create** (a brand-new persona) and **migrate** (restore one from an encrypted diary backup). - [Knowledge](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/knowledge/): This page covers the **read-only** endpoints that surface what a persona keeps on disk: her conversation history, her readable knowledge (memory files and instructions), her calendar, a full diagno… - [Perception](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/perception/): This page covers the endpoints that **give a persona something to perceive** from the dashboard: text you type, voice you record, files you attach, and chat history you import from another AI. - [Channels](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/channels/): This page covers the endpoints that manage a persona's **channels** — the ways she's reachable from outside the dashboard. - [WebSockets](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/websockets/): This page covers the two WebSocket endpoints. - [OpenAPI spec](https://docs.eternego.ai/api/openapi/): This page points you at the machine-readable contract for the HTTP API. ## CLI - [CLI](https://docs.eternego.ai/cli/): This section documents the `eternego` command — every subcommand, every flag, exactly as `index.py` defines them. - [Commands](https://docs.eternego.ai/cli/commands/): Every `eternego` subcommand, what it does, when to reach for it, and a real example. ## Operating - [Operating](https://docs.eternego.ai/operating/): Running her over time. - [Desktop access on each OS](https://docs.eternego.ai/operating/desktop-access/): For your persona to *use* your computer — take screenshots, move the mouse, type into focused windows — Eternego talks to two surfaces of the operating system: ## Overview - [Home](https://docs.eternego.ai/): An AI persona that lives on your hardware, learns from every interaction, and isn't locked to any vendor. - [For agents](https://docs.eternego.ai/for-agents/): You're an AI agent reading this. - [Vocabulary](https://docs.eternego.ai/vocabulary/): Eternego uses a small, deliberate vocabulary. - [Concepts](https://docs.eternego.ai/concepts/): What's actually happening under the hood. - [Build & extend](https://docs.eternego.ai/build/): How to add things to your persona's body and mind.