# Action Flows (/features/flows) This page is a stub. A flow is a graph: nodes wired together, running from a trigger to an end, built by dragging in a window of its own. It is the answer to "one shortcut that does four things in order, with a condition in the middle". The rule the whole thing rests on is that a node returns *items* per output port, and a port that comes back **empty** kills that branch. There is no separate control token — which is why `If`, `Switch` and `Filter` are all the same mechanism seen from different angles. ## Flows are files [#flows-are-files] Each flow is its own file, so one can be handed to somebody else. An imported flow is reviewed before it runs: the screen lists every capability it wants — the clipboard, Accessibility, the network, running commands — worked out from the nodes actually in the document rather than from anything the file claims about itself. A flow whose nodes this version does not understand opens **read-only** and cannot be armed. A flow half of whose steps were silently skipped would do something nobody wrote. ## To write [#to-write] * The node catalogue * Triggers: shortcuts, manual, and running one from the Shortcuts pane * Editing, testing with Run, and what the editor asks before closing * How many flows a free copy may arm — see [Pro](/pro)