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Code Manager

Last updated 2026-07-04

Code Manager is the tool tab right next to AI Suggestions inside Focus Mode — not the top-level Codebook screen. It's scoped to the codes actually in play around the document you have open, and it's where you search, rename, merge, delete, and drag codes into a cleaner hierarchy without ever leaving your transcript.

Not the same as the Codebook screen. The top-level Codebook tab in the left sidebar shows your entire codebook. Code Manager, inside Focus Mode, shows a working view scoped to the current context — in our example project it listed 19 codes with real usage, out of a larger full codebook. Both read and write the same underlying codes; Code Manager is just the faster place to reorganize while you're mid-coding.

Opening Code Manager

Inside Focus Mode, the right-hand sidebar has two tabs: AI Suggestions and Code Manager. Click the second one.

Each row has four controls: a drag handle (⋮⋮), a pencil for rename, a ⇒ arrow for merge, and a ✕ for delete — visible at all times, not hidden behind hover.

With a codebook that grows past a handful of codes, scrolling gets slow. The search box at the top filters the tree live as you type.

Renaming a code

Click the pencil icon on any row. The name becomes an editable text field with a Save button next to it.

Click Save, not just Enter. Clicking away or pressing Enter can leave the field in an uncommitted state — Save is the reliable way to lock in a rename.

Merging two codes

When two codes end up covering the same concept — one added manually, one AI-generated — merge them. Click the ⇒ icon on the code you want to absorb (the one that will disappear).

Merging is irreversible. Double-check which code is the source (disappearing) and which is the target (surviving) before confirming — the app also asks you to confirm once more before it commits.

Drag and drop: reorder or nest

Beyond the explicit merge button, you can restructure the whole tree by dragging a code's handle. Where you drop it changes what happens:

  • Drop in the top or bottom edge of a row — reorders it as a sibling, before or after that code, at the same level.
  • Drop in the middle of a row (“onto” it) — opens a chooser: nest as a child, or merge the two.
  • Drop in the empty space below the tree — moves the code out to the top level, out of any parent.
paideias.org
Recorded, not staged
Watch the actual drag happen
A real drag of “Interview Metadata” onto “Ability,” captured from the live app — the drop-zone highlight, the Nest as child / Merge chooser, and the tree updating are exactly what you’ll see when you try it yourself.
Nesting is purely organizational. The AI treats every code — parent or child — as an independent unit when coding. Reorganizing the tree changes how codes group visually and in exports; it never changes which passages are coded with which code.

Dragging a code straight from the document

You don't need to open Code Manager and find the row first. Every coded passage has a small floating badge above it — the same tag that shows the code's name — and that badge is draggable. Pick it up from wherever you're reading and drop it directly onto Code Manager's tree, exactly like dragging a row inside Code Manager itself.

  • Grabbing the badge automatically switches the sidebar to the Code Manager tab, so the drop targets are visible the moment you start dragging.
  • The same rules apply: edges reorder, dropping onto a code opens the nest/merge chooser, and the empty space below the tree moves it to the top level.
  • This drags the code itself — its whole position in the hierarchy — not just the one passage you dragged it from.
paideias.org
Recorded, not staged
Grab the badge, not the row
Dragging the “Ability” badge from above a coded passage automatically flips the sidebar from AI Suggestions to Code Manager, then behaves exactly like dragging that code's own row — dropped onto “Interview Metadata” here and nested as a child in one motion.

Deleting a code

Click the ✕ icon on a row to delete that code outright. You'll be asked to confirm — deleting removes the code from every passage it was applied to and removes it from the codebook entirely. If the code has children, they move up to become top-level codes rather than being deleted with it.

Deletion removes coding data, merging preserves it. If a code is genuinely redundant with another, prefer merge over delete-and-recreate — merge keeps every passage's coding intact under the surviving code.

Best practices

  • Search before creating. A quick search in Code Manager (or the live duplicate check in manual coding's new-code field) catches near-duplicates before they multiply.
  • Merge early, not late. The longer two overlapping codes coexist, the more passages end up split across them — merge as soon as you notice the overlap.
  • Keep nesting shallow. Two to three levels stays easy to scan; deeper hierarchies get hard to navigate in both Code Manager and exports.
  • Rename instead of recreate. If a code's meaning shifts slightly as your analysis matures, rename it in place — its coding history and position stay intact.
You're ready to analyze. With your codebook organized and your documents coded — by AI, manually, or both — move on to Retrieval to explore coded data, Inter-coder Agreement to measure reliability, or Export to download your results.
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