Getting started
In Settings › Virgil, connect DeepSeek, OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini or Grok (xAI) with Verify and Save: it reads the catalog and stores your API key in Keychain, without generating responses. Choose a model for Ask, Reread, Synopsis and Variant; Continuity and Typos use Reread. Model… in the Virgil tab changes the choice for subsequent requests. Catalogs refresh on demand and when opening the selector if older than 24 hours. Unknown models remain visible as Needs verification: an explicit test with synthetic text may use credit. Drag the inspector’s edge to make it wider or narrower, just like the left sidebar; the project remembers your chosen width. The tab appears only when enabled, with a key and permission from the project.
Choose the task first
Ask answers your question (Return sends it); Reread looks for Repetition, Pace, Dialogue, Clarity or Continuity, with optional instructions. Synopsis uses the open document. Variant needs a selected passage. In the Ask, Reread and Variant fields, Return sends and Shift-Return adds a new line. If you have just typed the question, Return waits for the local search for relevant chapters; changing the question or action cancels that submission. Shortcuts in Info, Review, search and the text menu all open this tab.
Typos, among the choices of Reread, goes alone and looks for typos, agreement and punctuation: the text is sent in pieces of about 2,000 words and the corrections arrive together, each with the words it changes. Propose in Text or Propose All in Text write them as suggestions, to decide in Review; a passage with italics or links is corrected by hand. Virgil leaves quotation marks, apostrophes and dashes alone, and respects period spelling and the author’s choices.
Even without Virgil, a Mac with Apple Intelligence has Apple’s Writing Tools: select a passage and choose them from the right-click menu. They answer in plain text and leave code, links, images, footnotes, suggestions and comments as they were. With Track Changes While Writing on they don’t appear: they would change the text without marking it.
Choose what to send
Before the first request to each service, Finis asks for specific consent to share texts. Saving your key or verifying the connection does not grant consent. You can withdraw it in Settings › Virgil: that service’s ongoing requests stop, but data it has already received is not deleted. Help › Privacy and Data explains what is sent. Service requests are billed separately from the Finis trial and unlock.
The line above Send shows the texts, word count and recipient. Ask proposes relevant chapters using local search. Change lets you choose a document, its folder or the whole book, turn documents on or off and read their text. Notes and references are never added automatically. Narrow the scope if it exceeds 60,000 words. Finis also checks the model’s context with a conservative estimate when its limit is known; it never silently cuts texts or switches services. Nothing is sent until you press Send.
Responses and your text
Responses remain when you switch tabs or documents, and requests continue. A dot on the tab shows work in progress. Each response retains its service, model, time and a close button; Save as Note keeps it after the window closes, with a title describing the response’s topic. A laurel in the sidebar and “Generated with Virgil” in Info and Notes show its origin; you can rename it like any other note.
Add as Comment places the observation on the quoted passage, with its ✳ in the text and an entry in Review. Add All as Comments takes one Undo per document. Unverified or ambiguous quotations, passages already marked and changed texts cannot be applied.
For a variant, Propose in Text inserts a marked substitution to accept or reject in Review. Replace changes the passage directly. Both require the passage to be unchanged. Edit a synopsis before choosing Use as Synopsis. Undo changes with ⌘Z in the document.