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Test Chat on the canvas

On the Flow page, click Test chat. The chat opens beside the canvas, and as the agent replies:
  • the step the conversation is on glows, the same way a Pathways test call highlights its active node;
  • every step the conversation passed through is tinted green, including the conditions and functions between two messages;
  • the lines along the way turn green and animate;
  • the canvas follows the conversation to each new step.
Under every reply, a small link names the step it came from — ↳ S14 · Preview card (English). Click it to open that step. New chat starts a fresh conversation and clears the highlight; closing the panel clears it too. On every other page of the agent, Test Chat stays open on the right, without the highlight.
The highlight follows the steps that sent a message. Between two of them, the path through conditions and functions is drawn as the shortest way through the flow — if two routes lead to the same step, it may show the other one.

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What is real in a test

Test Chat runs the same agent as a live WhatsApp chat — the version you have open — with these differences: The test contact has no CRM data, so contact attributes are empty in a test — this is where fallbacks on Contact attribute sources show their worth. Copy test link in Test Chat gives a public page anyone can chat with, without a dashboard login. Replies are charged to your account. Reset link revokes the old one at once. When the version you have open is not the published one, the copied link pins that version.

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Publish checks

The issues badge on the canvas shows the same problems as the publish check, before you publish. Not publishable lists errors; Check warnings lists things worth a look. Errors — publish is blocked until they are fixed:
  • The flow has no steps, or the Start step is not connected.
  • A step points at a step that no longer exists, or at Start or a global intent.
  • A Send text or Ask & save step has no message (or no guidance in AI writes it).
  • A Send buttons step has no message, no buttons, more than 10 buttons, a button with no text, two buttons with the same text, or a button longer than 24 characters.
  • A branch the AI decides has no When.
  • A Send template step has no template, or a variable’s source is incomplete (a fixed value that is empty, a contact source with no attribute, a function source with no function or no field).
  • A Send media step’s link is incomplete, or a fixed link is not https://.
  • A Custom function step has no function, or calls a function the agent does not have.
  • An Update contact step sets nothing, or a row has no attribute or an incomplete source.
  • A Condition branch has no condition, or a rule is missing its attribute, function or field.
  • A Global intent has no trigger, or is not connected.
  • A Schedule call step has no voice agent, or its calling hours end before they start.
  • A Send contact card step has no name, or has neither a phone number nor an email.
Warnings — publish goes ahead:
  • A branch on the main path is not connected (nothing more is planned there).
  • A step cannot be reached from Start or a global intent.
  • An Ask & save step has a retry message but accepts any text, so the message is never sent.

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When the agent goes off-flow

The agent is told to answer side questions briefly and return to its step, so some drift is by design. When it skips or repeats a step:
  1. Check the step link under each reply — it shows exactly which step each message came from.
  2. Make the step’s guidance and branch conditions more specific; vague branches are the usual cause.
  3. Move rules that apply everywhere from step guidance into Instructions, and rules it must never break into Guardrails.
  4. Prefer a Rule condition over a prompt one whenever code can check it.