Agent Mode

Agent Mode turns the panel into a render worker. It watches your connected data for rows whose status column is ready, renders them one at a time, and writes the result back into the row. Anyone who can edit the sheet can queue renders.

The status workflow

status value	Meaning
ready	You (or your team) set this. The agent will pick the row up.
rendering...	Written by the agent when it starts the row.
complete	Written on success.
sent to watchfolder	Written on success when watchfolder mode is on.
error: <message>	Written on failure, with the reason.

The agent only picks up rows marked ready and marks each one before it starts, so a row is rendered once. To render a row again, set its status back to ready.

Running the agent

1. Connect a data source. You can connect multiple files, worksheets or views; the agent watches all of them.
2. Set the Output Path and template dropdowns as for a normal render.
3. Click Run Agent.

Rows are picked up one at a time. Sources higher in the panel’s connection list come first, and within a source, rows are taken from top to bottom. Put your most urgent source at the top of the list.

The status bar shows a countdown to the next check for new rows. Click Stop Agent to stop; a render already in progress finishes first.

Requirements and notes

• The status column must exist in your data; sources without it are skipped.
• After Effects must stay open with the panel running. The agent runs inside your panel, on your machine.
• With Google Sheets and Airtable, status updates are visible to everyone immediately, which makes the sheet double as a live render dashboard.
• A failed row gets error: ... and the agent keeps watching for other ready rows. The failed row is not retried until you set it back to ready.
• If the panel cannot write a row’s status back (for example, a read-only file), the row is rendered once, the status bar says so, and the row is skipped until you restart the agent. It never holds up the rows below it.
• With delivery information turned on, the agent also fills in the br- columns of each row it renders.