Install and set up
From installation to an agent answering from curated context, in about half an hour:
- Install and set up — this page
- Your first entity — curate an object
- Preview and verify — see exactly what an agent will see
- Connect an agent — Agentforce or MCP, end to end
If you’d rather understand the model first, read Concepts.
Before you start
| Requirement | Notes |
|---|---|
| Salesforce org | Any edition that supports managed packages and Apex |
| System Administrator access | Needed to install and to assign permissions |
| Agentforce (optional) | Only needed for the Agentforce path — the extension package provides a default setup |
1. Install the package
Install ContextWorks from the install URL you were given. Choose Install for Admins Only — you’ll grant access deliberately in step 3.
Install does two things and no more: it adds the application, and it assigns ContextWorks Admin to you, so you can open the app without going to Setup first.
It writes no configuration. Nothing is curated until you ask for it in the next step — which is deliberate: an install handler runs before anyone holds this package’s permission set, so anything it wrote would be written with your org’s field-level security switched off. Configuration you install yourself is written under your own permissions.
2. Open the Studio tab and choose a starting point
App Launcher → ContextWorks
On an empty org the app opens with a short welcome:
| Choice | What happens |
|---|---|
| Install sample configuration | Creates entities for Account, Opportunity, Contact, Lead and others, each with a starting set of fields and metrics, plus the General domain shared with every internal user. A working example to edit or delete. |
| Start empty | Nothing is written. Build your first entity from scratch — see Your first entity. |
Either way the choice is remembered, so the welcome doesn’t return.
IMPORTANT
An agent reads nothing until this step is done. Until an admin installs the sample configuration or builds an entity, the catalog is empty and agent calls return “no context is available”. If you are wiring an agent into a fresh org, do this first.
Changed your mind later? Admin → Danger → Reset to Defaults writes the same starting content, and Clear Configuration removes everything. Both are admin-only and ask you to type the action to confirm.
3. Assign the permission sets
Setup → Permission Sets → Manage Assignments
- ContextWorks Admin — you already have it from install. Assign it to anyone else who should configure what agents see: typically admins, RevOps, and other operations users.
- ContextWorks User — everyone who will use agents: users interacting with an Agentforce agent, users connecting an MCP client, and any service-agent integration user. It grants only the class access those surfaces require — no data access — so assigning it broadly is safe. Flow and Apex integrations don’t need it.
Assigning ContextWorks User is the whole of setup for a reader — provided there is something to read. The sample configuration creates the General domain, rosters the default entities into it, and shares it with every internal user, so a new user can call an agent immediately. Limiting someone to a narrower domain later is one grant. → Domain access
NOTE
Neither set touches data access. What a caller receives is always governed by their own object, field, and record permissions. See Security.
Two Setup checks are worth doing once, because ContextWorks cannot make them for you: Entity Domain should be Private, and Grant Access Using Hierarchies should be clear. → Sharing setup
4. Find your way around
The app has one home tab, Studio, with a rail of pages in three groups:
| Group | Pages | What it’s for |
|---|---|---|
| Build | Entities, Domains, Metrics, Formulas, Enrichments | Deciding what agents see |
| Deploy | Agentforce, MCP, Custom | Wiring agents up |
| Observe | Usage, Quality, Performance, Issues, Logs | Watching it in production |
The Entities page opens first. If you installed the sample configuration, its entities appear as cards — each with its object, API name, and counts of fields, related lists, metrics, and enrichment. If you started empty, the page invites you to add your first.
5. Confirm it works
If you started empty, build your first entity before this step.
- Click any entity card — say Account 360 — to open the builder.
- Click Preview in the header.
- Leave the record blank. Preview picks a recent record of that object.
You should see rendered markdown: curated fields grouped under headers, summary metrics, and related lists as tables.
If you see a payload, everything else is configuration. If you see an error, check that ContextWorks Admin is assigned and that you have read access to the object.
What’s next
- Your first entity — curate an object before agents touch it.
- In a hurry? Skip to Connect an agent — the sample entities work as they are.