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Council

Config & Environment Reference

DO NOT EDIT — this file is auto-generated from the Council CLI’s Zod config schema by pnpm --filter @council-ai/site docs:generate:config. Run that command to regenerate it, and pnpm --filter @council-ai/site docs:check:config to verify it is in sync.

Every Council configuration key and environment variable, generated from the CLI’s own Zod config schema so this reference can never drift from the code.

Configuration keys

Section titled “Configuration keys”

Settings live in ~/.council/config.yaml. All keys are optional and fall back to the defaults below. Use the dot-path with council config set <key> <value>.

defaults

Section titled “defaults”

Global defaults applied to every panel unless overridden per-panel or per-command.

Key Type Default Description
defaults.model string claude-sonnet-4.5 Provider-agnostic model identifier used when a panel does not specify one.
defaults.engine copilot | mock | openai | anthropic copilot Engine used when the –engine flag is not passed on the command line.
defaults.maxRounds integer (1–20) 4 Maximum number of debate rounds per panel.
defaults.maxExperts integer (2–8) 3 Maximum number of experts per panel.
defaults.maxWordsPerResponse integer (50–2000) 250 Soft per-expert response cap, measured in words.

telemetry

Section titled “telemetry”

Opt-in, anonymous usage telemetry.

Key Type Default Description
telemetry.enabled boolean false Enable anonymous usage telemetry (command names only, never panel content).

providers

Section titled “providers”

Per-provider settings for engines that authenticate with a standalone API key. Only the NAME of the environment variable holding the key is stored here, never the key value itself.

Key Type Default Description
providers.openai.apiKeyEnvVar string — Name of the environment variable holding the OpenAI API key, never the key value itself.
providers.anthropic.apiKeyEnvVar string — Name of the environment variable holding the Anthropic API key, never the key value itself.

expert

Section titled “expert”

Expert-library settings governing document ingestion and memory decay.

Key Type Default Description
expert.recencyHalfLifeDays integer (1–365) 90 Number of days until an expert’s memory weights decay by half.
expert.supportedFormats string[] [".md",".txt",".html",".pdf",".csv",".tsv",".rtf",".docx",".pptx",".xlsx",".xls",".odt",".ods",".odp"] File extensions eligible for expert document ingestion.

documents

Section titled “documents”

Document-extraction settings, including the optional AI-extraction fallback and the file-size ceiling.

Key Type Default Description
documents.aiExtraction off | ask | auto off AI-based text-extraction fallback for unknown or unsupported file formats.
documents.aiExtractionAllowedExtensions string[] [] Whitelist of extensions eligible for AI extraction; an empty list means every extension is eligible.
documents.maxFileSizeMB number (1–500) 50 Maximum file size accepted by the document extractor, measured in megabytes.

chat

Section titled “chat”

Chat-mode context management and summarization.

Key Type Default Description
chat.recentTurnCount integer (5–50) 10 Number of recent chat turns kept verbatim before summarization.
chat.summaryMaxWords integer (100–2000) 500 Maximum length, in words, of the rolling chat-history summary.
chat.longConversationWarning integer (50–10000) 500 Warn the user once a chat exceeds this many turns.

conclude

Section titled “conclude”

Synthesis settings for the council conclude command.

Key Type Default Description
conclude.maxTranscriptChars integer (1000–1000000) 50000 Character budget for transcript content in the synthesis prompt; older turns are dropped beyond it.

qualityGate

Section titled “qualityGate”

Anti-sycophancy quality gate governing whether expert responses that fail the heuristic quality check are flagged or regenerated before they enter the transcript.

Key Type Default Description
qualityGate.mode off | warn | regenerate warn Quality-gate behavior: off disables it, warn flags failing responses without regenerating, regenerate re-prompts them up to maxRegenerations (each re-prompt incurs an extra premium request).
qualityGate.maxRegenerations integer (0–3) 1 Maximum regeneration attempts per response when mode is regenerate.

paths

Section titled “paths”

User-facing data directory locations.

Key Type Default Description
paths.dataHome string ~/Council Directory holding user-facing expert and panel YAML files.

Environment variables

Section titled “Environment variables”

Environment variables override configuration at runtime and tune rendering and integration behavior.

Variable Purpose Default
COUNCIL_HOME Override the runtime directory that stores Council’s database, logs, and config.yaml. Used by –ephemeral mode and tests to isolate state. ~/.council/
COUNCIL_DATA_HOME Override the data directory for expert and panel YAML files. Takes precedence over paths.dataHome. ~/Council/
NO_COLOR Disable ANSI color output when set to any non-empty value (follows the NO_COLOR standard). (unset)
COUNCIL_ASCII Force an ASCII-only charset (set to 1), disabling Unicode box-drawing characters and emoji. (unset)
COPILOT_CLI_PATH Override the auto-detected path to the GitHub Copilot CLI loader. auto-detected
TERM Standard terminal type; the value dumb switches Council to ASCII-only, no-color output. auto-detected
CI When set to true or 1, forces non-interactive rendering with no prompts or spinners. (unset)
ACCESSIBILITY When set to 1, forces non-interactive, screen-reader-friendly rendering. (unset)
VISUAL Editor launched by council config edit and other edit commands; checked before EDITOR. (unset)
EDITOR Fallback editor launched by edit commands when VISUAL is unset. (unset)
Section titled “Related”