Your First Assistant
End-to-end walkthrough to get your AI assistant up and running.
This guide walks you through setting up a fully functional AI assistant on Chelar from scratch.
Prerequisites
Before starting, make sure you have:
- A Chelar account (sign up)
- An AI provider API key (OpenAI, Anthropic, or Google)
- A Telegram account
Setup Steps
Configure Your AI Provider
Go to Settings in the Chelar dashboard. Under API Keys, add your AI provider key and select a default model.
Not sure which model to pick? See the AI Provider Setup guide for a comparison.
Connect Telegram
Go to Channels and connect your Telegram bot. You'll need a bot token from @BotFather, see the Telegram guide for step-by-step instructions.
More channels (WhatsApp, Discord, Slack) are coming soon. Telegram is the recommended channel to get started.
Start Chatting
Send a message to your bot on Telegram. Your assistant will respond using the AI model you configured.
If your assistant was paused, the first message may take a few seconds longer while it wakes up. After that, responses are fast.
Customize Your Assistant
Open your assistant's dashboard (linked from the Chelar dashboard) to customize:
- System prompt, define your assistant's personality and capabilities
- Scheduled tasks, automate recurring tasks (guide)
- Memory, manage chat history and context