Your first setup
The four short steps after you sign up, and which ones you can skip.
Setup takes a few minutes and asks nothing about what kind of person you are. It has four steps, shown down the left side like a table of contents: Title page, Bring history, Reading, and Take it with you.
1. Title page
Cranes sets up your personal workspace while you read the first page. When it’s ready, choose Bring history.
2. Bring history
Your first chapters are only as good as what Cranes has to read, so this step lets you bring in things you’ve already said elsewhere. Choose one source:
- ChatGPT, Claude, or Grok: copy a prompt into that app and paste its answer back. See Bring history from another AI.
- Another AI: the same, for any assistant that can see your past chats.
- Notion: connect, then pick the pages to share. See Bring in pages from Notion.
- Files: notes, documents, or exports. See Bring in files.
You can also choose Skip for now. Nothing breaks if you do; your first chapter will appear once there’s enough in your threads to point back to. You can bring history any time later from the account menu.
3. Reading
Cranes keeps everything you brought as entries and starts reading. You don’t have to sort or approve anything. You can leave and come back; reading carries on without you.
4. Take it with you
The last step shows how to connect the AI you already use, so your thinking can come along into those conversations. Connecting now is optional. The full steps are in Connect your AI.
Choose See your thinking to finish. You’ll land on your front page, where you can watch chapters appear as Cranes reads.