# dembrane documentation

dembrane helps groups turn what people *say* into something they can *act on*. People speak
in a workshop, a town hall, a citizen panel or a research interview. dembrane records and
transcribes what was said, and turns hours of dialogue into summaries, reports, a
presentation for the room, and a chat you can ask questions of.

We build on one belief: *people know how.* Communities already hold the knowledge to solve
their own challenges. dembrane does not add intelligence to a group. It surfaces the
intelligence already there, and keeps the humans in the room firmly in charge.

dembrane was formerly called ECHO. The old name still turns up here and there, in file
paths, image names and older material.

> [!NOTE]
> New here? The fastest path is the *[quick start for hosts](./users/host/getting-started.md)*.
> Just here to record on someone's invitation? See *[for participants](./users/participant/index.md)*.

## Find your way in

Pick the guide that matches what you are doing:

- *[I run sessions and make sense of them: Host](./users/host/index.md)*
  Create projects, collect conversations, read transcripts, ask questions, present results
  and write reports.
- *[I run dembrane for a client: Partner](./users/host-partner/index.md)*
  A workspace for a client who owns the data, the free observer role, and data ownership.
- *[I work at dembrane: Staff](./users/staff/index.md)*
  The staff console, customer accounts, tiers and billing, support access and trainings.
- *[Someone invited me to record: Participant](./users/participant/index.md)*
  What to expect, how to record, and what happens to your words.
- *[I build on dembrane: Developer](./users/developer-external/index.md)*
  Webhooks, MCP, export, self-hosting, configuration, licensing and contributing.
- *[I work on the dembrane codebase: Internal developer](./users/developer-internal/index.md)*
  Architecture, the data model, the processing pipeline and how it ships.

## Browse by feature

If you would rather start from a capability than from a role, the
*[feature catalogue](./features/index.md)* documents every part of dembrane on its own page:
what it is, when you would reach for it, and who it is for.

## The whole map

The *[documentation map](./map.md)* lists every page in one place.