Build a Charity Site from the Template
From empty repo to deployed site — driven by your AI agent
This guide takes a developer from the FreeForCharity/FFC_Single_Page_Templateto a live, deployed charity site. It's prompt-driven: you hand each step to your AI agent and review the result, using FreeForCharity/FFC-IN-ffcadmin.org as a finished example to match.
On this page
1. Before you start
- A working AI agent connected to GitHub — set this up first on the Developer Environment Setup hub (newcomers: start with Claude Desktop).
- Write access to the FreeForCharity organization (a maintainer can grant it).
- The charity's basic content on hand: name, mission, contact info, logo.
2. Create the repo from the template
The template is a GitHub template repository, so a new site starts as a clean copy with its own history.
“Create a new repository in the FreeForCharity organization from the template FreeForCharity/FFC_Single_Page_Template, named <charity-slug>. Then confirm you can see it and summarize what the template contains.”
3. Point your AI agent at it
Have the agent read the repo's conventions before changing anything.
“Read the AGENTS.md in <charity-slug> and follow its conventions. Use FreeForCharity/FFC-IN-ffcadmin.orgas a reference for how a finished FFC site is structured. Don't change anything yet — tell me your plan first.”
4. Customize the content
Work in small, reviewable changes on a branch — name, mission, sections, branding.
“On a new branch, customize <charity-slug> for <Charity Name>: set the site title and mission to ‘<mission>’, update contact details to <details>, and swap in the logo I'll provide. Use assetPath()for images, keep it accessible (alt text, contrast), and show me what changed before opening anything.”
5. Run the checks
Run the project's checks in the order its AGENTS.md documents, rather than a hard-coded list that can go stale.
“Run the formatting, lint, build, and test checks in the order described in AGENTS.mdfor this repo, and fix anything that fails until they all pass.”
6. Open a PR and deploy
Open a pull request and let CI validate it; once it merges, GitHub Pages publishes the site.
“Open a pull request with a Conventional Commit title, watch the CI checks, and fix any failures. Once everything is green and it merges, confirm the site deployed and give me the live URL.”
7. Hand off to the site owner
Once the site is live, the charity's owner maintains it themselves. Point them to Edit Your Charity's Website and add them as a writer on the repository so they can make everyday changes with AI.