AI & Productivity Glossary
Understand the key concepts behind AI agents, automation, and modern productivity tools. Learn how GAIA uses these technologies to manage your digital workflow.
AI Concepts
AI Agent
An AI agent is an autonomous software system that perceives its environment, reasons about what to do, and takes actions to achieve specific goals without continuous human direction.
Agentic AI
Agentic AI describes artificial intelligence systems designed to operate autonomously, making decisions and executing multi-step tasks with minimal human oversight.
Proactive AI
Proactive AI is an artificial intelligence system that anticipates user needs, monitors for relevant events, and takes autonomous action before being explicitly asked.
Graph-Based Memory
Graph-based memory is an AI memory architecture that stores information as interconnected nodes and relationships, enabling rich contextual understanding and persistent knowledge across interactions.
Vector Embeddings
Vector embeddings are numerical representations of text, images, or other data that capture semantic meaning, enabling machines to understand similarity and relationships between pieces of information.
Knowledge Graph
A knowledge graph is a structured representation of information that organizes data as entities, their attributes, and the relationships between them, enabling machines to understand and reason about connected information.
Semantic Search
Semantic search is a search technique that understands the meaning and intent behind a query, returning results based on conceptual relevance rather than exact keyword matches.
Large Language Model (LLM)
A Large Language Model (LLM) is an artificial intelligence model trained on vast amounts of text data that can understand, generate, and reason about human language with remarkable fluency.
Context Awareness
Context awareness in AI is the ability to understand the full situation surrounding a task or interaction, including who is involved, what has happened before, related projects, deadlines, and the user's preferences and patterns.
AI Orchestration
AI orchestration is the coordination of multiple AI agents, models, and tools to work together in completing complex, multi-step tasks that no single component could handle alone.
Productivity
AI Assistant
An AI assistant is a software system that uses artificial intelligence to help users accomplish tasks, manage information, and automate workflows, going beyond simple question-and-answer interactions.
Cognitive Load
Cognitive load refers to the total amount of mental effort required to process information, make decisions, and manage tasks at any given time.
Human-in-the-Loop
Human-in-the-loop (HITL) is a design pattern where an AI system includes human oversight and approval at critical decision points, ensuring that sensitive or high-impact actions require human confirmation before execution.
Digital Assistant
A digital assistant is a software-based agent that helps users perform tasks, access information, and manage their digital life through natural language interaction and increasingly autonomous action.
AI Task Prioritization
AI task prioritization is the use of artificial intelligence to automatically rank and order tasks based on deadlines, importance, dependencies, context, and your personal work patterns.
AI Meeting Assistant
An AI meeting assistant is software that uses artificial intelligence to prepare meeting briefs, gather relevant context, suggest agenda items, and automate post-meeting follow-ups like task creation and summary distribution.
Smart Notifications
Smart notifications are AI-filtered alerts that prioritize and batch notifications based on urgency, relevance, and your current context, replacing the constant stream of interruptions with timely, meaningful updates.
AI Personal Productivity
AI personal productivity refers to the use of artificial intelligence tools and systems to manage individual work output, including task management, email handling, calendar optimization, and workflow automation.
Inbox Zero
Inbox Zero is an email management approach where the goal is to keep your inbox empty or near-empty at all times by processing every message through a system of actions: reply, delegate, defer, archive, or delete.
Deep Work
Deep work is a state of focused, uninterrupted concentration on cognitively demanding tasks that produces high-quality results, as defined by computer science professor Cal Newport.
Time Blocking
Time blocking is a scheduling method where you divide your day into dedicated blocks of time, each assigned to a specific task or type of work, turning your calendar into a concrete plan for the day.
Digital Executive Assistant
A digital executive assistant is an AI-powered system that performs the functions of a human executive assistant: managing your inbox, scheduling meetings, preparing briefings, coordinating follow-ups, and handling administrative work.
Automation
Workflow Automation
Workflow automation is the use of technology to execute repeatable business processes and tasks automatically, reducing manual effort and human error.
Task Automation
Task automation is the use of technology, particularly AI, to automatically create, manage, prioritize, and execute repetitive tasks that would otherwise require manual effort.
Email Automation
Email automation uses AI to intelligently manage your inbox by triaging messages, categorizing them, drafting contextual replies, extracting action items, and reducing the time spent on email.
Calendar Automation
Calendar automation uses AI to intelligently manage your schedule by finding optimal meeting times, preparing briefings, blocking focus time, and coordinating calendar events with your tasks and communications.
AI Email Assistant
An AI email assistant is software that uses artificial intelligence to read, categorize, prioritize, and respond to emails on your behalf, reducing the time and effort you spend managing your inbox.
AI Calendar Management
AI calendar management is the use of artificial intelligence to schedule, organize, and optimize your calendar by finding ideal meeting times, protecting focus blocks, preparing meeting briefs, and coordinating events with your tasks and communications.
Workflow Orchestration
Workflow orchestration is the automated coordination of multiple tasks, tools, and processes into a structured sequence, managing dependencies, error handling, and data flow across each step.
No-Code Automation
No-code automation is the creation of automated workflows and processes using visual tools or natural language interfaces instead of writing code, making automation accessible to non-technical users.
Infrastructure
Model Context Protocol (MCP)
Model Context Protocol (MCP) is an open standard that enables AI models to securely connect with external tools, data sources, and services through a unified interface.
LangGraph
LangGraph is a framework for building stateful, multi-agent AI applications that supports complex workflows with cycles, branching, conditional logic, and persistent state management.
Self-Hosting
Self-hosting is the practice of running software on your own servers or infrastructure instead of using a cloud-hosted service, giving you complete control over your data, configuration, and availability.
Open Source AI
Open source AI refers to artificial intelligence software whose source code is publicly available, allowing anyone to inspect, modify, distribute, and contribute to the project.
Integrations
OAuth
OAuth (Open Authorization) is an open standard for token-based authorization that allows third-party applications to access a user's resources without exposing their password.
Webhook
A webhook is an HTTP callback mechanism that allows one application to send real-time data to another application when a specific event occurs, enabling instant communication between systems.
API Integration
API integration is the process of connecting different software applications through their Application Programming Interfaces, enabling them to share data and functionality seamlessly.
