# Welcome to Strive

Strive brings an interface, the information behind it, and the processes that keep it useful into one workspace. You can start with an app template, build an app of your own, or ask the Assistant to help you assemble one.

## How the pieces fit

| Piece | What you use it for | Example |
| --- | --- | --- |
| App | A place to perform a task | Review invoices, follow news, or inspect documents |
| Workflow | The steps that do the work | Read a file, extract values, and prepare a result |
| Connection | Access to a service or storage location | Google Drive, a database, or managed storage |
| Data source | A collection of records produced or read by a process | Extracted invoice fields from an ingest step |
| Record | One item of information, with its origin | A row, document segment, or search result |
| Assistant | Help across the workspace or on the current page | Create an app, explain a failed run, or find a file |

An app can contain several workflows and read several sources. A connection can be reused by more than one workflow. Running a workflow and opening an app are separate actions: opening an app can show existing results without processing everything again.

## Choose your starting point

Use the [first-app guide](/docs/getting-started/first-app) to get a working example. Read [navigation](/docs/getting-started/navigation) to find your way around. If you already know the task you want to accomplish, start a conversation in the [Assistant](/docs/assistant/overview).

## Your workspace and other people's apps

Your organisation supplies the workspace, connections, and available capabilities. Apps have an owner and can have their own sharing settings. Being able to open a shared app does not necessarily let you edit it, manage its connections, inspect its owner-only reviews, or open the rest of its owner's workspace.

Some controls depend on your role and the app's type. A template app can expose parameters; an app that does not declare parameters has no Parameters section. This manual explains each control where it applies.

## A useful first session

Create a small app, run it on a few representative inputs, inspect the output and its source, and then decide who should use it. Test both an ordinary input and an empty or incomplete input before relying on an automated process.