Tools overview

Tools help Optimizely Opal take action on your behalf. Each tool performs a specific task, like creating a campaign, uploading files, or generating images. They connect natural language requests to specific actions, so you do not need to know the underlying systems or commands.

Think of tools as attachments on a Swiss Army knife. Each one serves a unique purpose. 

Tools are what make Opal powerful. They let you make simple, natural-language requests while Opal handles the technical details behind the scenes. Without tools, you would need to manually upload files, search for data, or run API calls yourself. With tools, Opal connects to multiple systems and services for you, so you can focus on the outcome instead of the process.

For a visual walkthrough of tools, watch the video overview. 

Types of tools

Opal offers two types of tools

• System tools – Optimizely builds and maintains these.
• Custom tools – Your organization builds and maintains these.

Where tools are used

Opal uses tools in various ways, and it automatically chooses the right tool to complete each request. Most users experience tools through Opal Chat or agents without needing to know which tool is running in the background.

Opal Chat

You do not need to call a tool directly in Opal Chat. Opal analyzes your request using natural language processing to determine the best tool to use. It looks for keywords, phrases, and the overall intent of your message to determine the appropriate action to take.

Here are a few examples of how Opal automatically uses tools based on your requests:

• If you ask, Can you create a campaign for our Q4 marketing efforts?, Opal uses the create_campaign tool.
• If you ask, What is the current date?, Opal uses the get_today tool.
• If you say, Find me some images of dogs, Opal uses the search_web tool with the image search type.

Agents

Specialized agents can call specific tools if you include them in the prompt template. See Create specialized agents for details. Additionally, Optimizely provides many default agents that include tools.

Tools page overview

1. Tools – View a listing of tools in your Opal instance categorized by registry.
2. Registries – View a listing of registries in your Opal instance.
3. Search tools – Enter a name or description to filter the tools list.
4. Provider – Filter the tools list by a specific tool provider (registry).
5. Active Status – Filter the tools list by enabled or disabled tools.
6. Enabled in Chat – Filter the tools list by tools enabled or disabled in Opal Chat.
7. Add tool registry – Add custom tools self-hosted or hosted on Optimizely Connect Platform (OCP). See Add a custom tool to Optimizely Opal.
8. Enabled in chat – Indicates whether the tool is enabled and if you can call it in Opal Chat. You can enable a maximum of 128 tools across an Opal instance at a time.
9. Restore tools for chat – Reset which tools are enabled for Opal Chat to the defaults.
10. Tool registry name – The name of the tool registry and the total number of tools in that registry.
11. Tool registry active toggle – Use this toggle to activate or deactivate the entire registry and its tools. 
    • When toggled on, agents can use the tools in the registry. 
    • When toggled off, the tools in the registry are unavailable. 
12. Tool registry chat enablement toggle – This toggle enables access to all tools in the tool registry in Opal Chat. Agents triggered from Opal Chat can use these tools regardless of this setting. 
13. Tool information – The tool's name and description. This information lets you call the tool from Opal Chat or add the tool to a specialized agent. See the Define tools section in the Create specialized agents documentation.
14. Auth Provider – Indicates whether the tool requires authorization to use. 
15. Individual tool active toggle – This toggle enables or disables an individual tool. 
    • When toggled on, agents can use the tool. 
    • When toggled off, the tool is unavailable.
16. Enabled in chat (individual tool) – This toggle makes an individual tool available for use in Opal Chat. Agents triggered from Opal Chat can use this tool regardless of this setting. 
17. Preview – Indicates this tool is in Preview mode and is in beta. See the System tools in beta section of the System tools overview documentation.

Registries page overview

1. Tools – View a listing of tools in your Opal instance categorized by registry.
2. Registries – View a listing of registries in your Opal instance.
3. Search registries – Enter a name or description to filter the registry list.
4. Add tool registry – Add a custom tool registry. See Add a custom tool to Optimizely Opal.
5. Name – Name of the tools registry.
6. Discovery URL – The tool's discovery HTTP endpoint.
7. Owner – Who owns the tool registry.
8. Last Sync – Date when the registry was added or synced.
9. Tools – List of tools available in the registry.
10. Actions – More options, including the option to sync the registry to get any new or updated tools.