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Portals

Portals connect your Elisa project to external tools, services, and hardware. They let your AI agents interact with the outside world.

Mechanism types

Each portal uses one of four mechanisms:

Mechanism What it is Example
MCP Server A Model Context Protocol server that provides tools File System, GitHub, Brave Search
CLI Tool A command-line program the agent can run gcloud, curl, python3
Serial / USB A hardware device connected via USB serial ESP32 board, LoRa radio
Auto-detect Elisa figures out the best mechanism automatically General-purpose fallback

Creating a portal

  1. Click the Portals button in the sidebar.
  2. Click + New Portal to create from scratch, or From Template to start with a pre-configured one.
  3. Fill in the fields:
    • Name -- A label for this portal (e.g., "My ESP32 Board")
    • Description -- What it connects to
    • Mechanism -- Which type of connection to use
  4. Configure mechanism-specific settings (see below).
  5. Click Done.

Serial / USB settings

  • Serial Port -- The port name (e.g., COM3 on Windows, /dev/ttyUSB0 on Linux). Leave blank for auto-detection.
  • Baud Rate -- Communication speed (default: 115200).

If a board is currently connected, a green banner shows the detected board and port.

MCP Server settings

  • Command -- The program to run (e.g., npx).
  • Arguments -- Command-line arguments (e.g., -y @anthropic-ai/mcp-filesystem).

CLI Tool settings

  • Command -- The program to run (e.g., gcloud).

Portal templates

Click From Template to browse pre-configured portals:

Template Mechanism Capabilities
ESP32 Board Serial LED on/off/blink, Read sensor, Button pressed, Play sound
LoRa Radio Serial Send message, Message received
File System MCP Read file, Write file, List files
GitHub MCP Create issue, Read repo, Search code
Brave Search MCP Web search, Local search
Cloud Run Deploy CLI Deploy to Cloud Run

Selecting a template pre-fills the name, mechanism, configuration, and capabilities.

Capability types

Each portal has capabilities that define what it can do. There are three kinds:

Kind What it does Portal block
Tell (action) Sends a command to the portal "Tell ___ to ___"
When (event) Reacts when something happens "When ___ ___"
Ask (query) Requests data from the portal "Ask ___ for ___"

Dynamic parameters

Some capabilities have parameters that appear as additional fields on the block when you select that capability. Parameter types include text, number, boolean (checkbox), and choice (dropdown).

Using portals in your design

After creating a portal, drag Portal blocks (Tell, When, or Ask) onto your canvas from the Portals category in the toolbox. The first dropdown selects which portal to use, and the second selects which capability.

Try it: Click Portals in the sidebar, then "From Template", and select "File System". Save it, then drag a "Tell" block onto the canvas. Select "File System" and "Write file" from the dropdowns. Now your agents can write files to disk during the build.