Overview
The Vigilos AI agent is more than a chatbot. It’s an intelligent agent that learns your data, remembers context across conversations, and gets sharper with every question. It thinks through problems, not just translates words to queries. When you ask a question, the agent maps your intent to your semantic model’s business vocabulary, explores the live database schema, generates an optimized query, and returns results with an interactive visualization and natural language explanation.How the Agent Works
When you ask a question, the agent follows a structured process to deliver accurate results:Understand your question
The agent reads your question and maps it to your semantic model’s business vocabulary - entity names, column descriptions, relationships, and predefined measures. This ensures it interprets “revenue” or “active users” exactly the way your team defines them.
Explore the live schema
The agent fetches the current schema directly from your database to verify that tables and columns are up to date. This prevents errors from stale assumptions if your schema has recently changed.
Generate the query
Based on the complexity of your question, the agent generates either a structured query configuration using the built-in BI engine, or advanced SQL for complex analytical questions. The BI engine compiles configurations into optimized SQL for your specific database (PostgreSQL, ClickHouse, Snowflake, Redshift, or BigQuery).
Execute against your database
The generated query runs directly against your database through the encrypted connection. Vigilos acts as a pass-through - it sends the query and receives the result set.
Visual Builder vs. Advanced Queries
The agent selects the query generation approach based on question complexity:| Approach | Used When | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Visual builder | Simple aggregations with grouping, filtering, and sorting | ”Total revenue by country”, “Top 10 customers by order count” |
| Advanced SQL | Complex analytical queries | ”Month-over-month growth rate”, “Running total of revenue”, “Customers who ordered in January but not February” |
Advanced SQL mode supports the full power of your database engine, including window functions, Common Table Expressions (CTEs), subqueries, UNION, and complex JOIN patterns.
- Dimensions - columns to group by
- Measures - aggregations to compute
- Filters - conditions to narrow results
- Sorts - ordering rules
- Limit - maximum number of rows
- Chart config - chart type and display options
Chart Types
When the agent returns results, it selects an appropriate chart type:| Chart Type | Best For |
|---|---|
| Bar | Comparing categories |
| Horizontal bar | Long category labels |
| Stacked bar | Part-to-whole comparisons across categories |
| Line | Trends over time |
| Area | Volume trends over time |
| Pie | Proportional distribution |
| Funnel | Sequential stage drop-off |
| Metric | Single KPI values |
| Table | Detailed row-level data |
Model Selection
Vigilos supports two modes for the underlying AI model:- Managed mode
- BYOK (Bring Your Own Keys)
Vigilos provides and manages the AI models. You do not need to supply any API keys. This is the default and recommended option for most teams.
Conversation Context
The AI agent maintains full context within a conversation. This means you can:- Ask follow-up questions that reference previous results (“Now break that down by region”)
- Refine queries incrementally (“Exclude returns from that total”)
- Ask the agent to explain its approach (“Why did you use a window function?”)
- Request different chart types (“Show that as a line chart instead”)