./t.roy --introduce

Meet t.ROY

The guide that knows where you are in the journey, and what it is not allowed to know. Ask it right here on this website. It is on every Forge screen, it becomes your own named coach in The Refinery, and it answers case managers in the staff workspace.

start the forge what it is not allowed to know

Coaching, not legal advice.

About the name

Little t.ROY. Big Troy.

Say it "t.roy." Next to Troy, say "little t.roy." The small t is on purpose. It is named for Troy Richard Carr, the founder who built Steel Man. Around here the founder is big Troy, and the guide in your corner is little t.ROY. Big Troy built it strong. It is antifragile, like the man it is named for: push on it and it holds. Go ahead. Try it.

To reach the person, use the contact page, or ask t.ROY to pass him a note. To read about him, see About.

01 / SURFACES

WHERE t.ROY WORKS

One assistant, in every part of Steel Man. What it can do and what it keeps depend on where you are and who you are.

ON THIS WEBSITE

Ask t.ROY from any page of this site. It looks up employers marked "Hires people with records" and pulls up your state's rules with their sources. It can answer from our guides and open the right page for you. Want Troy himself? It passes him your name, how to reach you and what you need, only after you tap yes. It cannot see your Forge or Refinery account.

THE FORGE, BEFORE YOU HAVE AN ACCOUNT

t.ROY is on every Forge screen before you have an account. Open it and ask. It also offers a nudge on the three hardest Forge screens.

THE REFINERY, AS YOUR OWN COACH

Inside the Refinery the same assistant becomes your own named coach. At every point the Refinery shows the single most useful next step. Rules decide what the step is. The AI only explains why, and if the AI is down you still get the explanation.

IT CAN DO THINGS FOR YOU

In the Forge and the Refinery, ask it to find jobs, save one, set a follow-up date, take you to the right screen and point at the button. In there, it cannot delete or send anything.

CURRENT FACTS, WITH SOURCES

For questions about current law or programs, the Refinery coach can search the web and cite its sources. When search is unavailable, it says so.

A PRACTICE PARTNER FOR THE HARD CONVERSATION

In the disclosure planner, practice the conversation with a practice partner you choose, as gentle or as tough as you want.

THE STAFF WORKSPACE

In Crucible, the organization workspace, t.ROY answers case managers about their caseload. Answers to staff are generated whole and checked against the organization's actual figures before they appear. Available to programs by arrangement.

02 / CONTEXT

WHAT IT KNOWS

A guide is only useful if it knows where you are standing. Here is what t.ROY is given, and what it keeps.

WHERE YOU ARE IN THE JOURNEY

Your coach knows where you are in the journey, your saved jobs and applications, your goals and the barriers you named, and the page you are on.

WHEN A FOLLOW-UP IS DUE

Your dashboard and your coach tell you when a follow-up is due. It is waiting for you each time you open the Refinery.

WHAT YOU TALKED ABOUT LAST TIME

Signed in, your coach keeps your conversation so it can pick up where you left off. That is on by default. You can turn it off in Settings.

IN THE FORGE, BEFORE AN ACCOUNT, NOTHING

In the Forge, before you have an account, t.ROY remembers nothing between visits. We keep a fingerprint of the question, not the question. We also keep your IP address with a daily usage count, so the free tool cannot be abused. The chat on this website keeps more. See the next item.

ON THIS WEBSITE, YOUR CHAT FOR 30 DAYS

The chat on this website knows the page you are on. On a state page it has that state's rules, and on a guide it has that guide. It saves each message and each reply for 30 days, then deletes them automatically. Troy can read a saved chat. The rest of what it keeps is on the privacy page.

03 / BOUNDARIES

WHAT IT IS NOT ALLOWED TO KNOW OR DO

The limits are part of the design. Each one below describes how the system is built today.

YOUR RECORD, ONLY WITH YOUR YES

In the disclosure planner, we ask before any detail about your record is sent to the AI. Say no and you still get a useful template, written without the AI seeing anything about your record. The Forge is different: what you choose to write there is part of your answers, and your answers are sent to our AI providers to write your report. The chat on this website has no yes step: what you type there goes to our AI providers and is saved for 30 days. You can ask about your state's rules and who is hiring without telling it anything about your record.

IT DOES NOT REPEAT YOUR RECORD BACK TO YOU

t.ROY and the coach are both instructed never to define a person by their record, and not to repeat record details back. They say "the situation you described."

WHAT THE DISCLOSURE PLANNER KEEPS

We save the plan: the timing advice, the legal context, the script and the tips, so you can come back to it. The answers you type while building the plan shape it and are then let go. They are not saved. Your record details stay in your own profile, which only you can read.

PRACTICE STAYS OUT OF MEMORY

Practice is not saved unless you choose to save it. If you do, the transcript is text only and encrypted. Disclosure rehearsal is kept out of your coach's memory.

NO PROGRAM READS YOUR COACH

No program can read your conversations with your coach. No program can see or require your disclosure plan or your practice. If you choose to share your progress, your program can see how far along you are, including that a plan exists and how many times you practiced. Never your resume, your plan or your practice. Progress sharing is off until you turn it on.

IT CANNOT DELETE, AND IT ASKS BEFORE IT SENDS

In the Forge and the Refinery, t.ROY cannot delete or send anything, and it can take you only to a fixed list of screens. On this website it cannot delete anything either. It passes your name, how to reach you and what you need to Troy only after you tap yes. It cannot apply to a job or contact an employer for you.

The principle

The work stays yours.

People coming home have been asked for everything and told little about where it goes. So this page says what t.ROY knows, what it keeps, and where it stops.

A guide that does the work for you leaves you with nothing to stand on in the interview. t.ROY is there to help you do the work, and to stay out of the parts that are only yours.

04 / SETTINGS

MAKE IT YOURS

People read, listen and work differently. These settings are in the Refinery today.

NAME YOUR COACH

The Refinery opens with a short tour, and you name your own coach.

PLAIN LANGUAGE, READ ALOUD, LARGER TEXT

Turn on plain language, have replies read aloud, and make text larger. You can also reduce motion and give the layout more room.

SPANISH COACHING

Your coach and t.ROY can reply in Spanish. Your resume stays in the language of the job posting.

SPEAK INSTEAD OF TYPE

In the Forge and the Refinery, on browsers that support it, you can speak instead of typing. Your voice goes to your browser's own speech service, not to us. Talking out loud to the chat on this website works differently: your voice goes from your browser straight to OpenAI, and the audio never reaches us.

MEMORY ON OR OFF

Coach memory is on by default, so your coach can pick up where you left off. You can turn it off in Settings.

05 / GROUND RULES

THE GROUND RULES

How t.ROY is meant to be used, and who stays in charge.

A COACH, NOT A LAWYER

Coaching, not legal advice. t.ROY is instructed never to give legal advice, to say so when a question crosses that line, and to point you toward a local legal-aid office or reentry attorney.

YOU HAVE THE LAST WORD

t.ROY is a coach, and a coach can be wrong. You decide what to use. Answers to staff are generated whole and checked against the organization's actual figures before they appear.

YOUR NEXT STEP NEVER WAITS ON THE AI

Rules decide your next step, not the AI. If the AI is unavailable, your next step and the reason for it still show. Our document tools switch to a backup AI provider if the first one fails.

WHERE YOUR WORDS GO

What you type to t.ROY is sent to an AI provider to write the reply. On this website that is Anthropic (Claude), with OpenAI as a backup. What a provider receives is kept under its own terms, not ours. On this website we also keep the chat for 30 days, then delete it. The privacy page has the details.

YOU CAN ERASE IT

In the Refinery, you can turn coach memory off, and Delete my data erases it along with the rest of your work. Deleting asks for your password again, and it cannot be undone. A chat on this website is deleted automatically after 30 days.

06 / For organizations

For staff, the numbers come first.

Answers to staff are generated whole and checked against the organization's actual figures before they appear. One organization-wide setting defines "quiet after N days," and every screen and the assistant read the same number.

No program can read a participant's conversations with their coach. The staff workspace is available to programs by arrangement.

for organizations

Start where you are.

The Forge is free with an account. t.ROY is on the first screen. The Refinery is a free account, and your coach is waiting inside.

start the forge open the refinery

Coaching, not legal advice.