Create a workspace

A workspace holds everything for one client or project: documents, media, people and a lake. Only admins create workspaces. In this page you create one, then walk through Workspace settings and set up the parts that matter on day one.

Before you start

• You are signed in as an admin. Editors do not see the buttons used here.
• You know the short name you want. It becomes the name of the Git repository and cannot be changed afterwards.

Create the workspace

1. Choose New workspace in the header, at the top right. The dialog New workspace opens.
2. Type the Name. This is what people see in the editor, for example “Acme”. Up to 200 characters.
3. Type the Short name. The hint says “Used for the Git repository, for example acme.” Use lower case letters, digits and hyphens, start with a letter or digit, and stay within 63 characters. Examples: acme, acme-intranet.
4. Choose Create.

The new workspace opens in the editor. You see the home page with the headline Start your lake and three cards: New document, Import Word, PowerPoint or PDF and Upload files.

If the short name is already taken, the dialog says so. Choose another.

What happened behind the scenes:

• The CMS created an empty bare Git repository for the lake at data/git/<short name>.git (the folder set by ContentRepository:Path).
• If a Git host is configured, the CMS also started to connect the workspace to a private GitHub repository named lake-<short name>. For an organisation the repository is created for you. For a personal account it is not, and the workspace waits for you to create the repository by hand: open Workspace settings and follow the steps in the Lake repository section. See Connect GitHub. A failure to set up the mirror never stops the workspace from being created.

You are not automatically a member of the new workspace, but admins can open every workspace.

Add people

Invite the editors who will work in the workspace. In the header, choose People, then Invite people. The page Users and invites shows every step.

Workspace settings

Choose Workspace settings in the header (admins only). The page has these sections, from top to bottom:

Rename the workspace

Change the Name and choose Save. The button stays disabled until something has changed, and the page says “Saved.” when it is done. The short name never changes, because it names the Git repository.

Add the sites that editors preview on

Editors can open a draft on the real site before they publish. For that, the CMS needs to know where each site’s preview lives. The CMS does nothing else with sites. It only keeps these links.

1. Under Sites, choose Add site.
2. Fill in:
   • Name, such as “Main site”. Up to 100 characters.
   • Preview address: the address of the preview build. It must start with https://. During development http://localhost is also allowed, for example http://localhost:4400.
   • Live address (optional): the public address of the site, for your own reference.
3. Add more sites if you need them. You can have up to 10. The arrow buttons move a site up or down. The bin button removes one.
4. Choose Save.

A document then shows a Preview on <site name> button. With two or more sites it shows Preview on… with a menu. Without a site, there is no preview button. See Previews for how editors use it and Preview drafts for the developer side.

If an address is wrong, the form says “Use https (http is only allowed for localhost)” or “Enter a full web address such as https://preview.example.com”.

AI suggestions

The editor can offer to write a summary, tags, a title or alt text with the Claude API. Two things must be true before the Suggest buttons appear:

1. The CMS has an API key. This is a server setting: ANTHROPIC_API_KEY. See Install the CMS. Without a key, the setup guide in Workspace settings shows the badge Not configured and tells you which setting to change.
2. The workspace has the switch on. It is on by default.

To change the switch:

1. In Workspace settings, scroll to AI and API access, then to the guide 3. AI suggestions in the editor.
2. Use the switch labelled “Let editors ask for suggested summaries, tags, titles and alt text”.

Switching it off hides the Suggest buttons for everyone in this workspace. The text under the switch states the privacy rule: nothing is applied without the editor choosing it, and a document’s text or an image is sent to Anthropic only when an editor chooses Suggest. The same page links to AI usage, where you can see what it costs.

Set a monthly AI budget

1. Under AI budget, type an amount in Monthly AI budget (USD). Leave it empty for no budget.
2. Choose Save budget.

The CMS shows a warning bar from 80% of the budget, and a red one once it is passed. It never blocks anything and never sends a message. The cost is an estimate worked out from the current prices. Details are in AI suggestions.

If something goes wrong

What’s next

• Mirror the lake to GitHub: Connect GitHub.
• Create tokens for developers and tools: Workspace tokens.
• Show editors where to begin: Writing documents.