Vrge

Connecting Sources

Sources are the tools Vrge watches in the background. When you connect one, Vrge reads from it quietly and turns what it finds into proposals for you to review. Every source is read-only— Vrge cannot send, delete, move, or modify anything in your connected accounts.

You don't need to connect everything. Most people start with email — it's where client activity lives. You can add more sources later from Settings → Sources.

Connecting Gmail (personal @gmail.com)

Gmail protects your mailbox with two-factor authentication, so Vrge needs what Google calls an App Password— a one-time 16-character password you create just for Vrge. Your regular Gmail password will not work. Here's the full flow:

  1. 1.Turn on 2-Step Verification. Go to myaccount.google.com/security and look for 2-Step Verification. If it says “Off”, click it and follow the prompts (you'll be asked to confirm your phone number). If it already says “On”, you're all set — skip to step 2.
  2. 2.Create an App Password. Go to myaccount.google.com/apppasswords. In the App name box, type Vrge. Click Create.
  3. 3.Copy the password. Google shows a 16-character password in a yellow box like abcd efgh ijkl mnop. The spaces don't matter. Copy it now — Google won't show it to you again.
  4. 4.Open Vrge. Go to Settings → Sources → Connect IMAP.
  5. 5.Fill in the form. Pick Gmail from the provider dropdown. Type your full Gmail address in the username field. Paste the App Password from step 3 into the password field.
  6. 6.Click Connect. Vrge tests the connection. If it works, you'll see a green “Connected” badge and the observer starts scanning within a minute.

Connecting Google Workspace (custom domain like @yourcompany.com)

If your company runs its own Google Workspace — meaning everyone has an email like you@yourcompany.com instead of @gmail.com — the setup is the same six steps above. Workspace accounts support App Passwords exactly like personal Gmail.

One note for your IT admin

A Workspace admin can disable App Passwords for the whole organization in Admin Console → Security → Authentication → 2-Step Verification. The setting is called “Allow users to turn on App Passwords”. Most orgs leave it on by default. If you follow the steps above and myaccount.google.com/apppasswords shows a “not available” message instead of the App Password generator, your admin has turned it off. Forward them this paragraph — it's a one-setting change.

Everything else works identically: same connect dialog in Vrge, same provider preset (Gmail), same App Password flow. Your custom domain address goes in the username field.

Connecting other email providers

Vrge supports every major mailbox through the same App Password flow. The dropdown in the Connect IMAP dialog has presets with the correct settings already filled in — you just pick your provider, generate an App Password on their website, and paste it.

  • iCloud Mail— generate an App-Specific Password at appleid.apple.com under Sign-In and Security. Requires 2-factor auth on your Apple ID.
  • Outlook / Microsoft 365 — generate an App Password at account.microsoft.com/security. Requires 2-step verification to be on.
  • Fastmail— Settings → Privacy & Security → Integrations → New app password. Pick “IMAP + SMTP” access.
  • Yahoo Mail — login.yahoo.com/account/security → Generate app password.
  • Zoho Mail — accounts.zoho.com → Security → App Passwords.
  • ProtonMail— requires Proton Bridge (a free local app from Proton) which exposes your mailbox as IMAP on your own computer. Pick ProtonMail (via Proton Bridge) from the Vrge provider dropdown.
  • Anything else (self-hosted, corporate mail, etc.) — pick Otherfrom the dropdown and type in your server's IMAP address and port. Your mail provider's support pages usually have these under “mail client setup.”

What Vrge does (and doesn't do) with your mail

Does

  • Open a secure (TLS-encrypted) connection directly to your mail server — no Vrge cloud relay in the middle.
  • Read the subject, sender, and body of messages in your inbox to find new-client inquiries, project updates, and vendor receipts.
  • Store a local list of message IDs it has seen so it never proposes the same email twice.

Does not

  • Mark messages as read. Your unread count stays the same as before you connected.
  • Send, reply, forward, delete, move, or modify any message.
  • Ship your email content to any cloud AI provider by default. When you use a cloud AI (Anthropic, OpenAI, Google), Vrge redacts names, emails, addresses, and dollar amounts before the call. You can opt in to full-content mode per-source if you prefer, with a preview of what gets sent.

Disconnecting at any time

Go to Settings → Sources, find your mailbox, and click Disconnect. Vrge immediately deletes the stored App Password. For a complete lockout, also revoke the App Password at your provider (Google, Apple, Microsoft, etc.) — even someone with a copy of your Vrge data would then be unable to read your mail.

Other sources

Email is the most important source, but Vrge can watch four others. All are optional and all are read-only.

  • Calendar— Google Calendar, Outlook, CalDAV, or an .ics feed. Turns meetings into project activity, time entries, and deadlines.
  • Files— Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, or a folder on your computer. Surfaces deliverables and proposals Vrge spots by filename.
  • Banking— Plaid, Stripe, PayPal, or a CSV statement export. Matches incoming deposits to open invoices and flags business expenses.
  • Accounting— QuickBooks, Xero, FreshBooks, or Wave. Two-way sync for invoices (the only source that can write back — and only when you opt in per-feature).

Kill switch

If something ever feels wrong, go to Settings → Sources → Stop everything. One click disables every source, stops the observer, and cancels any AI calls in progress. No “are you sure” dialog.