Built-in tools

Every bolt ships the same system tools. A turn receives the ones its mode, grants, and host bindings allow, and none of them can be shadowed by a workspace tool.

The toolset

• describe_workspace — describes the running release: collections, relations, permissions, write contracts, apps, automations, teams, envoys, integrations, tools, and skills
• read_collection — reads records, applying the subject’s policy grants row by row
• write_collection — writes records, only where the policy grants mutate.new / mutate.existing / delete (with field masks and approvals)
• list_skills — lists workspace, platform, and personal skills in one list, each with its section titles, and read_skill reads one body or one section
• subagent — one tool for child tasks, with actions spawn, read, message, await, stop, and resume. Only the root delegates; read and message reach any conversation of the same person, and a settled child reports back to wake its parent
• wait — collects background jobs and child tasks, returning early when the person writes
• todo — maintains the turn’s checklist
• compact — checkpoints the context when the model window is nearly full
• search_task_history — searches earlier tasks the subject may read
• read_messages — reads the envoy inbox when the turn has one bound
• use_image — inspects an image supplied to the turn
• update_plan — plan mode’s tool for replacing or patching the plan

Availability varies: read_messages needs an envoy inbox, write_collection needs a write grant, compact mode receives none of these, and a child task receives neither subagent nor update_plan.

Reserved

These names cannot be reused by custom tools — dispatch matches the platform’s names first, so an authored tool with a reserved name never runs.