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Using the Companion (Menu-Bar Tray)

Click the Locai icon in your menu bar (macOS) or system tray (Linux) to open the dropdown:

Locai Link companion tray dropdown showing the status header, Models submenu, Open Control Plane, Open a Workspace, Download models, Preferences, and Quit

Status header​

  • Locai Link · ONLINE. Agent is reachable, everything nominal.
  • Locai Link · OFFLINE. Agent isn't responding to local health checks. See Troubleshooting.
  • Locai Link · Checking… Brief state right after opening the menu; resolves within a second.
  • Updating… An automatic update is in progress; model controls are temporarily hidden until it completes. Normal operation resumes automatically.

Hovering the tray icon itself (the icon in the menu bar, not the dropdown row) shows a tooltip: Locai Link · Serving N models when models are actively serving, or just Locai Link when idle.

Pre-release builds include the release channel in the header and tooltip, for example Locai Link · Alpha · ONLINE.

Models submenu​

Hover the "Models" row to expand a submenu listing every model deployed on this device:

The companion's Models submenu expanded, showing a deployed model with its serving port
  • Downloading rows appear first, with a progress percentage (Downloading llama-3.1-8b — 42%).
  • Deployed rows appear below, each as a toggleable checkbox. A checkmark means the model is actively serving requests. Click to start or stop serving:
    • No checkmark, click, and the model starts serving.
    • Checkmark, click, and the model stops serving.

Toggling is idempotent. Double-clicking or rapid-clicking is safe (an in-flight guard blocks conflicting requests until the previous one completes).

When there are no models installed and none are serving, the submenu shows (no models serving).

Open Control Plane​

Opens https://control.locai.co.uk in your default browser. Use this to deploy new models to this device, view device metrics, or manage other devices in your fleet.

Open a Workspace​

Opens workspace.locai.co.uk in your default browser, taking you straight to Locai Workspace to chat with your models or analyse documents, all running locally on your Locai devices.

Download models…​

Opens the model download list, where you can pull extra models onto this device without opening Control. See Deploying new models.

Preferences…​

Opens the detailed Preferences window.

Quit​

Quits Locai Link. To bring it back, launch Locai Link from Applications (macOS) or your app launcher (Linux), or run locai start from a terminal. On next login it restarts automatically if Start Locai Link at login is enabled.

Before setup is finished​

If you close the first-run setup window before onboarding completes, the menu-bar icon isn't a dead end: its menu offers Continue Setup… (reopen the wizard right where you were) and Uninstall Locai Link… (remove the install cleanly; see Uninstalling).