Personal preferences | SoAI Documentation

Each signed-in account has its own language, theme, navigation, Dashboard layout, chat presentation, and saved page layouts. Most changes take effect after you select Save and do not require a SoAI restart. Built-in wallpaper and solid background choices apply as soon as you select them.

Account-scoped preferences are restored when that user signs in from another browser. Conversation display names belong to their conversation, and one user's theme or layout does not change another user's interface.

Open and personalize settings

In the SoAI WebUI, select the Settings button at the right of the header, then Settings. The General and Theme tabs are available to regular users and Administrators. Both use the page-header Save button, except where a control has its own Edit and Save actions.

Set language and regional preferences

Settings > General contains interface language, OCR extraction language, clock format, regional locale, date format, measurement units, notification duration, interface scale, notification sounds, header clock, seconds display, and the live status overlay. Interface language changes WebUI text. Locale, date, and measurement options change how values are displayed, not the stored timestamps or measurements. Arabic and Persian use a right-to-left layout. Code, logs, file paths, model IDs, addresses, keys, and charts remain left to right.

To change the language used by Tesseract for future image and document text extraction, choose OCR extraction language, then select the page-header Save. SoAI tries RapidOCR first and uses Tesseract as a fallback. The setting does not reprocess text that SoAI has already extracted. Languages that are not installed are marked as unavailable, while installed languages remain selectable.

Choose theme, color, and motion

Settings > Theme > Colors offers Auto, Dark, and Light themes, plus accent and surface colors. Auto follows the browser's light or dark preference. Theme also controls chart colors, code recognition, glass effects, page-header behavior, the back-to-top button, and page, modal, and notification animations. Disable animations affects interface motion only.

Reduce browser work on a low-end client

Turn on Disable animations, turn off Glass effects, and turn off Code recognition when large code blocks make the page slow. In General, hide the header clock or its seconds and turn off the live status overlay if you do not use them. Removing a shared wallpaper also avoids a full-window image and overlay. These choices reduce browser rendering and timers; they do not change model speed or server capacity.

Keep only the Dashboard elements you read, use list view for large Models, Plugins, Prompts, or Files collections, and leave live pages such as Hardware, Metrics, and Logs when monitoring is finished. Each additional browser tab or detached window uses resources on your device, so close copies you no longer need.

Arrange navigation and pages

Under Settings > Theme > Sidebar, choose a Default page, then select the page-header Save. SoAI opens that page after you connect. If it is unavailable or the account can no longer access it, SoAI opens Dashboard. With the main sidebar collapsed, rest the pointer on the menu button to open it over the page. It closes shortly after the pointer leaves.

Open Settings > Theme > Sidebar.
Under Visible pages, select Edit.
Check the destinations you want, then select Save in Visible pages.

The default sidebar layout hides Settings, About, and Logs. They remain listed in the Settings menu at the right of the header. Opening Logs requires Log access (LOG_ACCESS). Opening About requires both System status access (SYSTEM_STATUS_READ) and Hardware read access (HARDWARE_READ). Dashboard is always visible and cannot be unchecked. The editor lists only pages the account can access; a later permission change can still remove a checked page. Status indicator controls the system-status item at the bottom of the sidebar.

Chat and Automation have a separate first-run gate. Both stay out of the sidebar until this browser sees at least one model that is loaded or available and is not recognized as embedding-only. The browser remembers that event, so the pages can remain visible if the model later becomes unavailable. They cannot run work again until an eligible model is loaded or available. Changing sidebar visibility does not enable a feature or grant permission.

Customize Dashboard

Open Settings > Theme > Dashboard > Dashboard elements, select Edit, and choose the sections to show. The editor covers logs, plugins, models, hardware, requests, quick actions, and other optional cards. System status cannot be hidden.

The Dashboard Image card stores a personal image and saves uploads, removal, Fit, and Fill immediately. The Memo card stores a personal plain-text note through its own Edit, Save, and Cancel controls.

Arrange page layouts

Dashboard, Metrics, and Hardware have movable sections on screens wide enough for the full layout. Select Edit layout, drag sections by their headers, and select Save changes. The editor is unavailable in compact layouts and in a detached Hardware window.

Settings > Theme > Dashboard > Lock layouts removes the layout editor from all three pages. Turn it off and save Settings before rearranging a layout. It does not change Dashboard element visibility.

Customize chat presentation

In a conversation, open Chat configuration. Its General tab controls the display names and photos for you and the model, the conversation model, technical model-ID visibility, PDF export, and whether new chats reuse the latest model, tool, and Knowledge choices. Appearance controls text zoom, widescreen mode, rich-text rendering, previews, automatic titles, activity display, notifications, microphone sounds, message-box actions, and whether automation or messaging conversations appear in the chat list.

Show activities chooses whether response activity details begin expanded or collapsed. While a response is running, select its loading activity to show or hide the individual activities and their details. The collapsed loading activity continues to show what the model is doing in real time. Turn off Show activities elapsed time to stop updating the timer while an activity runs; its final duration still appears after it ends. Select Save after changing these settings.

Auto hide chat composer is on by default. When the composer is empty and unfocused, it folds away as you scroll up through earlier messages, then returns when you scroll down or start typing. A running response keeps its Stop button visible. Turn the setting off in Chat configuration if you want the composer to stay in place. Auto hide chat header hides the conversation header while you scroll up through earlier messages. Scroll down or move the pointer to the top edge to reveal it. The header also stays visible near the start of the conversation.

Most chat choices wait for the Chat configuration Save action. Photo upload and removal save to the account as soon as the operation succeeds. Display choices are not sent to the model as inference parameters. See Conversation context, compaction, and history for request-affecting controls.

Choose a background

An Administrator with UI customization (WEBUI_APPEARANCE_ADMIN) can open Settings > Theme > Background and choose from 10 Built-in wallpapers. Select No wallpaper to clear that choice. A built-in wallpaper belongs to the signed-in account and applies immediately, without the page-header Save.

The same permission allows an Administrator to upload a custom wallpaper or enter an HTTP or HTTPS URL under Download from URL and select Download. An uploaded or downloaded wallpaper is shared by every account and takes priority over personal background choices. While it exists, the built-in picker is hidden; select Remove to make it available again. Upload, download, and removal take effect when the operation succeeds.

Administrators can select a Solid background color for their own account. It applies immediately and clears a built-in wallpaper selection; an uploaded shared wallpaper remains visible until an Administrator with UI customization removes it. An Administrator with that permission can adjust Wallpaper overlay for their account while either type of wallpaper is visible, then select the page-header Save.

Reset preferences and understand their scope

Settings > Reset > WebUI restores the current Administrator's non-advanced WebUI preferences, including language, layout, and appearance. Page layouts restores the saved Dashboard, Metrics, and Hardware layouts. An Administrator with UI customization permission can use Appearance to remove the shared wallpaper and reset personal background and visual settings. Read the confirmation scope before continuing.

Know when a change is saved

General, Theme, Chat Appearance, avatars, navigation, Dashboard cards, and page layouts belong to the signed-in account and return in another browser. Conversation display names belong to their conversation. Most General, Theme, and Chat configuration changes wait for that page's Save action.

Avatar upload or removal, the Dashboard image, and the shared wallpaper save when their operation succeeds. Built-in wallpapers and solid background colors save when selected. Sidebar pages, Dashboard elements, the Memo card, and movable page layouts each have their own Edit and Save controls. A visible preview is not evidence that a pending preference has been stored.

Know what preferences cannot change

WebUI preferences customize the available appearance and layout options. They do not add pages or replace product branding.