Build Your Own Email Inbox Triage Agent
Turn your inbox from a firehose into a calm morning dashboard. In about 15 minutes you will build an AI agent that reads your email, flags what matters, hides the noise, and emails you a summary before your day starts.
Get set up
Install your AI platform and sign in. Already have it open? You are a step ahead.
Download and install Cowork from claude.com/product/cowork, then open it and sign in.
Install Codex (Mac: brew install codex, Windows: winget install codex, or npm i -g @openai/codex), or open the Codex desktop app, then sign in with your OpenAI account.
Start a new build
Open a fresh space for your agent to live in.
Go to Artifacts, then click New Artifact.
Open the Codex app and start a New Task, or run codex in a working folder from your terminal.
Connect it to your email
Give it secure access to your Microsoft 365 inbox so it can read and sort your mail. You stay in control and approve the sign-in yourself.
In the chat box, click the +, then Connectors, then Add connector. Choose Microsoft 365 and log in.
Add Microsoft 365 as an MCP connector. In the app, open Plugins (or Connectors), add Microsoft 365, and approve the sign-in. From the CLI, run /plugins to install it, then codex mcp login.
Codex connects through MCP and may set the connector up on your machine, so you might see a terminal step. If your IT blocks that, the Cowork path is the simpler route.
Give it the prompt
Paste this into the chat. Change anything in it to fit how you work, then send it.
Create me an inbox triage artifact dashboard that connects to Microsoft 365, reviews my emails, and allows me to see my important emails at a glance. Flag total, core actionable emails, unread, and filtered noise. Propose a scheduled task to fire off at 7am local time on weekdays about all the emails I have, then email me a concise summary. The dashboard should include a refresh button to show me a live view of my inbox whenever I want. Ask me questions to refine the output before you start building it.
Answer its questions, then let it build
The prompt tells it to interview you first. Answer its questions, then let it work.
Do this
- Tell it which folders to watch, what counts as important, and who your VIPs are.
- Let it build. Look at what it shows you and nudge it if something is off.
- Do not aim for perfect. Get a working first version, then refine.
Cowork builds a live dashboard artifact you can reopen anytime from Artifacts. No code to touch.
Codex writes the code, runs it in its sandbox, and shows you the working result. Review and approve each step as it goes.
Put it to work
Now make it part of your morning.
Do this
- Hit Refresh anytime for a live view of your inbox.
- Approve the scheduled 7am weekday summary so a clean rundown lands in your inbox before the day starts.
- Tune it over the first week: move anything it miscategorized, and tell it the correction so it learns your rules.
Here is what you are building toward:
Sample numbers shown. Your dashboard fills with your own live inbox.
Stuck? Reach out and we can hop on a call.