Use Slack with Evergreen

Slack shows up in Evergreen in two separate ways, and they’re set up in different places.

You can use either one without the other. The app is the bot you see in channels. The integration is you, signed in, and isn’t a bot. Both live on the one Slack row of Workspace settings › Integrations: the left half adds the bot, the right half, Connect Slack as yourself (MCP), sets up and connects the integration.

Evergreen in Slack

What the app does

• Starts sessions. Type /evergreen, mention @Evergreen in a channel, send the bot a direct message, or use the Send to Evergreen shortcut on any message.
• Gives each session a place to talk. By default a session gets a private channel of its own. Evergreen opens it, invites the people on the session, and archives it after the session has ended and the channel has gone quiet. If you’d rather keep a session in the thread where you asked, you can switch to that, as described below.
• Mirrors the session. Each agent turn is posted in the session’s room along with a progress card that updates as the run works.
• Asks you in Slack. A plan card has Approve plan and Send back. A question has a button for each answer. A request to run a command has Allow and Deny. You can also answer in your own words by replying in the card’s thread. See Plans and asks for what each one means.
• Talks to the running agent. While a session runs, anything a participant posts in its own channel goes to the agent as its next message.
• Unfurls session links. A session link you post in Slack turns into a card with the title, status, and pull requests, as long as you could find that session in Evergreen yourself.
• Closes sessions. The progress card has a Close session button, and the /evergreen close command does the same.

A session you start on the web has no Slack room yet. Choose Continue in Slack on the session page to open one.

Add Evergreen to your Slack workspace

An Owner or Admin does this once for each Slack workspace.

A Slack workspace belongs to one Evergreen workspace. If it’s already connected to another, the sign-in comes back with a message saying so. To add another workspace, choose Add another workspace. Remove takes Evergreen out of a Slack workspace.

People need an Evergreen account to use the app, and Evergreen matches them by the email on their Slack profile.

Commands

Type these in any channel, or in a session’s own channel. Where a command takes a session, it uses the session the channel belongs to unless you give a session ID or paste a session link.

Here are a few to copy.

/evergreen start acme/web add a GET /healthz endpoint and a test for it
/evergreen start acme/web fix the flaky login test --validation ci --budget 5
/evergreen start acme/web rename the user_id field --no-plan
/evergreen status

In a session’s channel, these two work without a session ID.

/evergreen shepherd autopilot
/evergreen close

The three shepherd modes are:

• autopilot fixes CI, reviews, and conflicts, then merges once checks pass.
• approve-to-merge fixes CI and reviews on its own, and a person approves the merge.
• manual asks before each CI fix and review reply, and a person merges.

You can also talk to the app in plain words. Outside a session’s channel, a mention starts a session.

@Evergreen migrate the crm service to node 24, skip the plan

Inside a session’s channel, a mention goes to that session.

@Evergreen also update the README
@Evergreen shepherd autopilot
@Evergreen fork add a dark mode toggle

When you start a session this way, name a repository if you can, and say how it should run in your own words, such as whether to plan first or which validation to use. On a merged session, a mention continues the work, and fork starts a follow-on session instead. A direct message to the bot starts a session the same way, without the @Evergreen.

You can say it instead of typing it. Mention @Evergreen, or open your direct message with the bot, and record a voice note with Slack’s microphone button. Slack only writes out a voice note when you ask, so choose Generate transcript on it (on a phone, press and hold the voice note). Evergreen reads the transcript as if you’d typed it, and it waits up to 15 minutes for you to generate one. If you also type something in the same message, Evergreen sends what you typed straight away instead of waiting.

Choose where sessions talk

Each person decides this for themselves in Settings › Defaults, under Slack.

A private session always gets a private channel of its own, even when you start it from a thread. If a session in a thread is made private, it moves to a new private channel and leaves a line in the thread saying where it went.

In the thread mode, Evergreen is a guest. It doesn’t open a channel, invite anyone, or archive anything. People talk to each other in the thread, and the card buttons are how the session gets answered. To get a direct message when a session is waiting on you, go to Settings › Notifications.

Start sessions from Slack messages automatically

An automation can start a session when someone posts in a Slack channel the Evergreen app is in, and the session replies in that message’s thread. See Start sessions automatically to set one up. If an automation reads Not wired up, the app isn’t in the channel yet. Choose Join channel for a public channel, or invite the app to a private one.

Let the agent use your Slack

The Slack integration lets the agent work in Slack as you. It uses your own permissions, so it sees the conversations you can see.

What the agent can do

• Search messages, channels, people, and files you can see.
• Read channels, threads, profiles, files, and canvases.
• Send, draft, or schedule messages and add reactions when you ask.
• Create and update canvases and Slack lists.
• Use Slack’s own search and messaging skills, which guide how it looks things up and writes messages.

What it posts goes out as you. It’s told to send, schedule, or change something only when the task asks for it, and to leave a draft in your Slack drafts when it isn’t clear you want a message sent. It’s also told to cite the messages it relied on and to keep secrets out of anything it posts.

Who can connect it

Owners and Admins install it for the workspace. Then each person connects their own Slack account. Slack asks for a lot of access on your behalf, and the agent can’t go beyond what your account can do.

Install it

Slack’s consent page names the app Evergreen Integrations. That’s the app your workspace created from Evergreen’s manifest, or Evergreen’s own app for this. It isn’t the Evergreen bot you see in channels.

Connect it yourself

Open Settings › Integrations, find Slack, and choose Connect. Slack keeps each workspace separate, so you connect each Slack workspace you want the agent to reach. Once you’ve connected one, the row’s button reads Add workspace, and the Slack card’s reads Connect another Slack workspace. Either one adds the next. Disconnect removes a connection, and Test connection checks that it still works.

If the agent can’t find a channel or thread, it may be in a Slack workspace you haven’t connected. The agent asks you to connect it rather than guessing.

What it asks before changing things

While a session is in Plan, the agent only reads. Posting, scheduling, reactions, and canvas changes become available once you approve the plan, or from the start if you skip the plan. Owners and Admins can block any tool for everyone from the Tools tab in Manage, for example to stop the agent from sending messages at all.

Limits

• The agent sees what you can see in Slack, so it can read private channels and direct messages you’re in.
• While anyone is connected, Manage refuses to change or clear your workspace’s own Slack app credentials, and it tells you how many people have to disconnect first. A connection works only with the app that granted it.
• Slack limits how quickly search can run, so the agent searches to find a conversation and then reads it.
• Slack connections last as long as Slack allows, and Evergreen refreshes them for you. If one lapses, the card shows Reconnect.

Troubleshooting