How to use AI App Design

1. Write the brief of your App

1. Open AI App Design (Settings → Apps, or in the menu for team members allowed to design Apps) and click Build a new App.
2. Give it a name, describe the idea in your own words (who uses it, what goes wrong today, what should change) and, if it is for a client, choose the client.
3. Click Start the brief. The AI drafts the 11 steps of the brief from your idea and lists what it still needs to know. Go through the steps one by one, change what is not right, and use Polish with AI on any step.
4. In Review and send, read the brief as the decision maker will, and send it. The project the App is built in is created, with Marvin and your team in it.
5. When the decision maker approves it, the App is built in the background from exactly that brief; you can follow its progress and leave the page meanwhile. See the article on the brief for every step.

2. The design board

The App's name sits on top; below it, nine tabs. Each has its own Save button, and you are asked before leaving a tab with unsaved changes.

• Prompt: ask for changes in plain words ("add a mileage field", "split the form in two"). Press Enter to send.
• Data: your tables. The Diagram shows them and their links (it arranges itself; Tidy up sorts it again). Pick a table on the left to open its Structure (change names, kinds and rules of the fields in a grid) or its Content (the records your team entered: filter them field by field and change a value with one click).
• Pages design: the screens of your App. Find a page with the search box and pin the ones you work on to the top. Drag fields into the cards and columns of a form, into the columns and filters of a list, or design charts, boards, calendars and dashboard tiles. Choose where the Print buttons appear.
• Pages flow: which page each button opens (Add, Edit, View, Clone, Chart, After saving).
• Documents: design what your team prints (see step 5).
• Notifications: who hears about what, and when (see step 6).
• Assets: your App's files in folders: pictures and SVG drawings for documents, stylesheets and scripts for screens.
• Connect: API keys for other systems, the connections the App calls when records change, the calls made, and the API reference for developers (filter it by table, method or field).
• Settings: name, icon, description and screenshots; the menu; the App's own Settings page; who may do what (Access); publishing, versions and sending the App to another workspace; texts and languages.

3. Try it and publish

Click Preview to open the App as your team will see it. When it looks right, go to Settings → Publish & versions and publish. You see first what will change in the database (new tables, new fields). A team member allowed to design Apps sends a publish request instead; an administrator publishes it. Later changes stay private until they are published again.

4. Give your team and clients access

In Settings → Access, tick for each role what people may do on each screen: Add, See, Edit, Delete. Under Settings → Roles you can also let a role design Apps and manage an App's Settings. To open the App to your clients, switch on Available in the client portal; each client only ever sees their own company's records.

5. Printable documents

1. In the Documents tab, click New document, give it a name and choose the table it prints (for example Orders).
2. Pick the paper (A4, A5, Letter, a label size…) and place what you need: fields of the record, fixed text (write {ref_no} to print a field inside a sentence), pictures, lines, boxes, today's date, the page number, and one table of lines (for example the products of an order) that continues on the next page.
3. Add a background: a scanned letterhead, an SVG drawing, or one from the SVG Editor App.
4. Click Preview PDF, then Save. Choose where it prints from: the record's page, the form, each row of a list, or several rows at once (one PDF).

6. Notifications

1. In the Notifications tab, click New notification.
2. When: a record is created, changes (for example only when its status changes to Shipped), is deleted, a number of days before or after a date, or a button is pressed.
3. Who: people, teams or roles of your team, the record's creator, the record's client or lead (main contact or all contacts), or any email address or phone number.
4. How: email (with a document attached if you like), the NIZU bell, Telegram, WhatsApp.
5. What: a subject and a message; insert fields of the record or settings of the App.
6. Click Preview to see it on a real record and who it reaches, Send a test to me, then Save. Everything sent is listed under What was sent, and on each record's History.

7. The App's own Settings page

Every App has a Settings entry in its menu for its administrators. There they switch each notification on or off, choose who on their team receives it, change its wording and its daily limit. In Settings → Settings page of the board you can add sections of details for them to fill in, such as a company address or the email that receives orders, and use them anywhere as {settings.company_name}.

8. Using the App

Lists, boards and calendars open records in forms; long forms show their sections as tabs. Next to every field that links to another list, the [+] button adds the missing record without leaving the form. Record pages show the related lists, comments and history, and the Print buttons of your documents.

9. Send the App to another workspace

In Settings → Publish & versions → Send to another workspace, choose Deliver it (you keep building it and send new versions, which arrive there as an update with a preview of what changes) or Hand it over (the other workspace becomes its owner, with its records if you tick that). Click Get a transfer code and give it to the other workspace's administrator, who types it under Install an App. You can also download the App as a file instead.

10. Languages

The designer writes the App in English. In Settings → Publish & versions, click Translate the missing languages. Under Texts and languages you can change any text to your own wording.