A matter is one piece of work run from start to finish: a litigation case, a company incorporation, a visa application, a property transaction. Opbox turns each one into a governed sequence of steps, so the work always knows what is done, what is next, and what is waiting on a human.
What it does
The matter is the workbench your team and your agents share. Open one and you see the whole job laid out: where it is, what comes next, and everything that has happened so far.
- A matter with a clear status. Every matter knows its own state, drawn from a single source of truth, never inferred from a stray timestamp or a stale board. Draft, active, on hold, cancelled, complete: the matter is always one thing, and that one thing is correct.
- A step pipeline. The work is a sequence of ordered steps, grouped into phases (intake, preparation, filing, completion). Read it as a vertical spine on the matter, or as a kanban of phase columns across your whole caseload. One step is active at a time, so there is never any doubt about what the matter is actually waiting on.
- Typed step kinds. A step is not just a label, it is a typed shape. A document-generation step, a data-gathering step, a sign-off gate, a plain task: each carries the shape it needs so a person or an agent can read it directly and know exactly what to do. The structure is the instruction.
- Progressive data. Information captured earlier in the matter stays with the matter and flows forward. Take a client’s details at intake and they are there when you generate the engagement letter ten steps later. You never re-key what the matter already knows.
- Approval gates. Some steps must not proceed without a human signing off. A gate pauses the matter, shows exactly what is being approved, and records who approved it, when, and on what basis. Sensitive moves wait for a named decision, every time.
- Documents per step. Files, generated documents, submissions, and parties attach to the step they belong to, as typed links. The matter carries its own paper trail in context, not in a separate folder you have to go hunting through.
- Due dates and SLA. Steps carry due dates and service-level timing, so the matter surfaces what is late, what is approaching, and where work has stalled, before a deadline becomes a problem.
- A full activity trail. Every change to a matter is recorded as it happens: who advanced a step, who held the matter, who approved a gate. The trail is immutable and scoped to the matter, so the complete, defensible history of the work is always one click away.
- Board sync. A matter projects out to a board for at-a-glance progress, and the projection stays honest: Opbox is always the source of truth and the board is always a regenerable view of it. If a board ever drifts, you reconcile it back to reality in a single action, and the board can never quietly become a second version of the truth.
How you use it
Day to day, working a matter is a steady, legible rhythm.
- Create from a template. Pick the right template for the job (an incorporation, a Tier-2 visa, a contentious matter) and Opbox builds a fresh matter from it, complete with its phases and ordered steps. The matter pins the exact template version it was created from, so a later change to the template never reshapes a job already in flight.
- Advance it, step by step. Work the active step, then advance the matter. Each advance completes the current step, moves the cursor to the next one, and records the transition. The matter walks itself forward through its phases in one well-defined motion.
- Let the agent help. The agent works the matter alongside you: drafting documents from the data already captured, gathering what is missing, teeing up the next step. It calls the same governed actions you do, under its own bounded permissions, so its help is always within the rules.
- Pause for sign-off where it matters. When a step is a gate, the matter stops and waits. A reviewer sees precisely what is on the table, approves or rejects it, and the matter only moves on a real human decision. An approved gate can even be cleanly reverted if something needs unwinding, restoring the state from before.
- Handle the exceptions. Put a matter on hold when it is blocked, jump to a specific step when the situation demands it, skip a step that does not apply, reopen one that was closed too soon, or cancel a matter that should not continue. The unusual paths are first-class, not workarounds.
- Read the activity rail. The right-hand rail shows everything the matter has lived through: activity, the documents it has produced, the parties and files attached, the approvals taken. The whole story of the work sits beside the work itself.
You can drive all of this by chat, from the matter screens, or on the command line. They are the same actions underneath, so however you prefer to work, the matter behaves identically and is governed identically.
The kernel verbs behind it
Every action on a matter is a named verb that passes through one front door: permission-checked, scope-checked, and audited before it runs. That is what makes a matter governed rather than merely tracked. These are the key verbs.
Working a matter:
matter.create- start a new matter from a template version.matter.get- read a matter: its steps, dependencies, and where the cursor sits right now.matter.list- list and filter matters by type, status, owner, or where they are in their pipeline.matter.advance- the one way to complete a step and move the matter to the next one.matter.attach- attach a file, party, document, or submission to the matter as a typed link.matter.share- give another person access to a matter.
Steering the unusual paths:
matter.hold- pause a blocked matter, with a reason on the record.matter.goto- jump a matter to a specific step when the situation calls for it.matter.cancel- stop a matter that should not continue.
Moving the steps:
step.activate- bring the next step into play (the single-active-step cursor advance).step.list- read the steps across a workspace, filtered by matter or status.step.skip- skip a step that does not apply to this matter.step.reopen- reopen a step that was closed too soon.step.reject- send a step back rather than accept it.
Approval gates:
gate.propose- put a decision forward for human sign-off.gate.apply- approve a gate and let the matter proceed.gate.reject- decline a gate so the matter does not move on.gate.revert- cleanly undo an approved gate, restoring the prior state.
Templates and boards:
board.create- author a new matter template.board.publish- publish a template version that matters can be created from.board.validate- check a template is sound before it can be published.board.regenerate- reconcile every board view back to the matters they represent, with a drift report.
Because they all share the one front door, a matter run by an agent and a matter run by a person obey exactly the same rules, leave exactly the same audit trail, and arrive at exactly the same place. See Security and permissions for how the front door governs every call.