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v1.14

Guided Onboarding, Host Browser, & Plugin Separation

May 12, 2026

v1.14 makes Agent Zero easier to start and cleaner to operate. The release adds guided first-run onboarding, brings Host Browser routing to the A0 CLI connector, separates Desktop and Office into focused plugins, and tightens tool, prompt, UI, documentation, and security behavior across the platform.

✨ New Features

  • Guided first-run onboarding — A new setup wizard walks through cloud or local provider choice, account connection, model selection, and the final ready state, replacing the older manual setup path.
  • New provider options — Ollama Cloud is available as an OpenAI-compatible chat provider with hosted API base and model listing, while Nebius Token Factory is registered for onboarding and model configuration.
  • Host Browser through A0 CLI — Browser actions can route through the A0 CLI connector into a local Chrome or Chromium instance with remote-debugging support, including existing-profile and clean Agent-profile modes.
  • Runtime switching for Browser — A protected connector endpoint lets the CLI switch between Docker Browser and Bring Your Own Browser mode without hand-editing runtime configuration.
  • Persistent Browser evidence in history — Browser tool calls now save static JPEG snapshots to chat history, giving transcripts stable visual previews even after live browser state changes.
  • Download and API chat lifecycle polish — ZIP downloads now show grouped progress toasts, and API chats can persist a validated lifetime_hours value with automatic cleanup for expired chats.
  • Connector model overrides in the UI — Per-chat custom model overrides now show their actual model names in the switcher and refresh live when connector settings change.
  • Chats header extension hook — Plugins can add controls to the chats-list header through the existing x-extension pattern.

🧩 Architecture & Plugins

  • Desktop moved into _desktop — Xpra and Xfce lifecycle handling, the /desktop route, Desktop state APIs, session APIs, surface registration, and the Linux Desktop skill now live in the dedicated Desktop plugin.
  • Office now owns documents only — _office focuses on document artifacts, Markdown sessions, LibreOffice-compatible file actions, and persistence. Binary document editing now routes through explicit Desktop requests.
  • Shared surfaces service — Browser and Desktop register docked or floating live UI through a shared frontend service, preserving active viewers while users switch between canvas and modal layouts.
  • Plugin-scoped runtime storage — Retired /usr/_office and /usr/_desktop trees migrate into /usr/plugins/<plugin> at startup.
  • Serialized package preparation — Desktop and Office package installation share an in-process retry guard, making transient apt locks less disruptive.
  • Clearer Desktop install state — The Desktop frontend now shows a neutral preparation message instead of presenting runtime installation as a missing-dependencies error.

🛠️ Tools & Prompts

  • Normalized tool action contracts — Multi-action tools now standardize on tool_args.action while preserving compatibility with older tool-call dialects.
  • Task-oriented skill names — Office skills are renamed to Writer, Calc, and Impress, high-impact skills receive clearer task names, and plugin-owned skills move into their owning plugin folders.
  • Lower default prompt pressure — Browser and scheduler guidance now load through skill-backed manifests, skill catalog descriptions are shorter, and noisy framework knowledge has been pruned.
  • A0 connector remote skills split by affordance — Separate text-editor and code-execution remote skills replace the combined CLI remote workflow skill. Computer-use remote control is scoped to desktop control and skill-gated as beta.
  • Browser tool ergonomics — Selector-based reference actions, coordinate fallbacks, focused-field typing, string key chords, and cleaner content snapshots make Browser automation more predictable.
  • Document artifact stabilization — File creation now requires explicit document_artifact intent, file cards appear only in final responses, and Desktop canvas sessions refresh after saved edits.

🛡️ Security

  • Image path-containment fixed — /api/image_get now resolves image requests against the Agent Zero base directory with symlink-aware validation. SVG and SVGZ responses include nosniff and sandboxed CSP headers.

🐛 Bug Fixes

  • History compression edge cases resolved — Stalled automatic compression no longer spins indefinitely, and very large single-line histories are split by a verified token budget.
  • Canvas attachment is more reliable — Browser canvas attaches to active Docker sessions with initial snapshots, and Markdown documents open through the right-canvas Desktop editor.
  • Bare Desktop canvas reports ready — Linux Desktop can now report healthy when Xfce has no active application window, as long as display and screenshots are available.
  • Computer-use rearm guidance corrected — Stale Free Run settings are no longer treated as ready, and agents now provide backend-agnostic rearm guidance.
  • Delegated-agent document affordances trimmed — Automatic Office document response cards are skipped for subordinate agents so review outputs keep their actual content.
  • Model provider controls fixed — Custom API base URLs reset when providers change, and the Supports Vision toggle moved out of Advanced Settings.

⚙️ Infrastructure & Maintenance

  • Browser Playwright cache relocated — Playwright cache now lives under /a0/tmp/playwright, with startup migration for retired user-directory caches.
  • Self-update cleanup improved — The self-update manager runs best-effort uv cache clean, skips live runtime sockets and vanished or unreadable files during backups, and avoids tripping rollback checks on device nodes.
  • Legacy Collabora retired — The old a0_office_collabora supervisor program and stale Collabora runtime paths are stopped, removed, and cleaned during Docker self-update.
  • Runtime artifact cleanup expanded — Stale directories and retired packages, including dynamically discovered collaboraoffice* package splits, are purged at startup or self-update.
  • Connector hello metadata hardened — Remote tool metadata now travels through a dedicated hello path with context-bound websocket SID acknowledgment.
  • Skill ownership enforced — Connector skill list and delete operations are scoped to the enabled catalog, built-in plugin skills cannot be deleted, and invalid skill YAML is surfaced instead of silently accepted.

🎨 UI & Documentation

  • Project model setup simplified — Project creation now focuses on basic details and Git cloning, with model selection moved into a collapsed Advanced Settings accordion on the edit screen.
  • Settings navigation redesigned — Sticky accordions with active-section tracking replace the previous two-step settings navigation.
  • Action ordering aligned — Primary actions now appear before Cancel across plugin settings and related modals.
  • Browser and project controls clarified — The Browser plugin no longer injects a chat-input button, Project Skills settings move closer to project instructions, and Host Browser configuration uses clearer Bring Your Own Browser language.
  • User guides refreshed — README, quickstart, and docs index coverage were updated around Browser, Desktop, A0 CLI, projects, memory, skills, profiles, and model presets with optimized screenshots.
  • New onboarding and quality references — First-run onboarding guidance, a model efficiency scorecard, and internal refactor guardrails document the new boundaries for surfaces, Desktop, Office, skills, and connector ownership.