Bob

Bob reads your mail, works out who introduced you to whom, and helps you thank them.

It is a Claude Code plugin. Bob has no server, no account, and no database — your network lives in two CSV files in a folder you choose. It reads your mail with a read-only Google credential you create yourself and keep on your own machine. There is no shared application in the middle, so Bob's author has no way to reach your mail.

What it does, in full: https://rkroft.github.io/bob/

/plugin marketplace add rkroft/bob
/plugin install bob@bob

Then ask Claude to set up Bob. It sets up your folder, reads your mail and draws your network in one go, and asks only what it can't work out. The slash commands below are there if you want them; you don't need them.

What it does

Finds the introductions in your mail. Not contacts, not threads — introductions. The three-body shape where someone put you and a stranger in the same message and stepped back. /bob-scan reads your mailbox and writes intros.csv.

Shows you who your connectors are. /bob-graph renders a local HTML page of your network. Most people find that a handful of people account for most of it, and that they had never counted.

Helps you thank them. /bob-thanks drafts a note to the people who introduced you, with the specifics of what each intro became. Drafts only — nothing sends itself.

Optionally mirrors to Airtable. /bob-table copies the CSVs into a base you own, through your own Airtable connector. Strictly additive; the CSVs stay the source of truth.

What it can't do

• Read LinkedIn. No connections API has existed for third parties since 2015, and scraping risks your account. LinkedIn is a CSV you export.
• See intros that didn't happen over email. A text message, a hallway, a Slack DM — Bob cannot see any of it. "Not found" means not found, never "didn't happen."
• Send anything. Bob drafts. You send.

Where your data goes

intros.csv, people.csv and network.html are written to the folder you name at setup, and stay there.

The reading is the part worth being precise about. Bob reads your mail with a read-only Google credential that you create, on your own Google account, and that never leaves your machine. Read-only is a scope, not a promise: sending and deleting were never granted. There is no Bob server, no Bob account, and no shared application in the middle.

Drafting is the exception, and it works differently. Drafts go through the Claude connector already on your account, so they pass through Anthropic's servers. That connector can also send, label and trash mail. Bob only ever writes drafts — there it is a rule Bob keeps rather than a limit the connector enforces, and it is more honest to say so than to imply otherwise.

/bob-table is the one command that moves anything off your machine, and it says so before it runs.

The FAQ covers all of this properly.

Running it

Python 3.9+.

python tools/bob.py scan --mbox path/to/mail.mbox --principal you@example.com
python tools/bob.py graph --principal you@example.com

--mbox takes a Google Takeout export and needs no credential and no install — the offline way to read the code and try Bob before granting it anything. The --gmail path reads your live mailbox instead, and needs the credential tools/auth.py walks you through plus the packages below.

pip install -r requirements.txt   # for the --gmail path
python -m pytest                  # ~800 tests

Every person in this repo's tests and examples is invented. That is a rule, not an accident.

Status

Early. The plugin front door works and the pipeline runs end to end; the follow-up loop and the impact view are still being built. Issues and observations welcome.

MIT licensed.