Edit Your Charity's Website

FFC built your site — here's how to make changes yourself, no coding required

You founded a charity, FFC built you a website, and now you just want to keep it up to date. You don't need to be technical and you don't need to learn to code. You describe the change you want in plain English, an AI assistant makes it, you read it and approve, and your site updates on its own.

No coding~20 minutes to your first editWorks from your phone

You can ignore the technical stuff.If you only want to edit your one charity site, you never need VS Code, Google Antigravity, Playwright, or anything you install and run on your computer. Those are for full-time developers. Everything on this page happens in a friendly chat window. The longer developer setup pages are optional — come back to them only if you ever want to go deeper.

The whole thing in four steps

This is the entire process — the rest of the page just walks you through it

1

Get access

Text FFC to be added to your repo as a writer, then accept the GitHub invite.

2

Install your AI assistant

Download Claude Desktop, sign in, and connect it to GitHub once.

3

Describe your change

Type what you want in plain English, e.g. “update our phone number.”

4

Approve — it’s live

Read what the assistant changed, click approve, and your site updates in minutes.

On this page

1.How this works2.Before you start3.Make your first edit4.See your change and publish it5.Common edits cookbook6.Plain-language glossary7.Good habits and getting help

1. How this works

Your website lives in a repository— a folder of files that FFC set up for your charity from our standard template. You don't edit those files by hand. You tell an AI assistant what you want changed, in ordinary words, and it makes the edit for you. Then it shows you exactly what it did and waits for your approval before anything goes live.

You describe

“Change our phone number to 555-1234.” That's the whole skill you need.

The assistant does it

It finds the right spot, makes the change, and runs the safety checks for you.

You approve

Read what changed, click approve, and your site updates a few minutes later.

You are always in control.Nothing reaches your live website until you've seen the change and said yes.

2. Before you start

A one-time setup — about 15 minutes, done once

What FFC already did for you:we created a repository (the folder that holds your website) from our standard template and put your charity's site in it. You'll edit your own copy — you never touch the template, and you only ever deal with this one repository.
  1. 1

    Make a free GitHub account

    GitHub is the service that stores your website's files. If you don't have an account yet, create a free one at github.com/signup. Use an email you check — your repository invitation comes here. Make a note of your GitHub username; you'll share it in the next step.

  2. 2

    Request access to your repository

    FFC has to grant you access before you can edit anything. Text Clarke Moyer at (520) 222-8104 (or message github.com/clarkemoyer) and ask to be added to your charity's repository as a writer (write access). Include your charity's name, your GitHub usernamefrom step 1, and that you're the site owner who'll be editing the site.

    Copy & send:“Hi Clarke — this is <your name> from <charity name>. Please add my GitHub username <username> as a writer on our website repository so I can edit our site. Thank you!”
  3. 3

    Accept the invitation to your repository

    Once FFC adds you, you become a collaboratoron your charity's repository — just your one repo, nothing else. You'll get an email titled something like “[your charity] invited you to collaborate” and a notification on GitHub. Open it and click Accept invitation. That's what gives you (and your assistant) permission to make changes.

    Didn't get an invite within a day, or the link expired? Text Clarke again at (520) 222-8104 and ask to re-send the writer invitation to your GitHub username.
  4. 4

    Install your AI assistant

    We recommend Claude Desktop on your computer and Claude Mobileon your phone — it's the gentlest starting point. Download it from claude.ai/download and sign in. Already pay for ChatGPT or another AI? You can use that instead — see the full list of options.

  5. 5

    Connect your assistant to GitHub (once)

    Your assistant needs a one-time connection to GitHub so it can see your repository. The Claude Desktop guide walks you through it — or just paste this and let the assistant set itself up:

    Paste this into your AI assistant

    “I want to edit my charity's website, which lives in a GitHub repository I was just added to. Set yourself up to work with GitHub: connect to it and walk me through any sign-in. When you're ready, confirm you can see my repository <paste your repository address here, e.g. github.com/FreeForCharity/ your-charity> and tell me what website is inside it.”

You're set up whenyour assistant can tell you what's in your repository. From here on, you just describe changes — the rest of this page shows how.

3. Make your first edit

Let's change one small thing, start to finish

The best first edit is something small and safe — like fixing a typo or updating your phone number. Paste the prompt below into your assistant, filling in the blanks. It will make the change on a safe scratch copy and show you the result; behind the scenes it handles all the technical steps so you don't have to.

Paste this — fill in the blanks

“In my charity's website repository <your repository address>, please <describe the change, e.g. update the phone number on the home page to (555) 123-4567>. Follow the conventions in the repository's AGENTS.md file, and use FreeForCharity/FFC-IN-ffcadmin.orgas an example of a finished FFC site if you need one. Make the change on a new branch (don't publish to the live site yet), then show me exactly what you changed in plain language before we go further.”

Then: read what it changed

Your assistant will summarize the edit and can show you a before-and-after. If something looks off, just say so in plain English (“actually, make it bold too”) and it will adjust.

Then: approve it

When you're happy, tell the assistant to open it for review and approve it. On GitHub this appears as a pull request — but you can think of it simply as a “here's the change, okay to publish?” page. You read it and click approve.

Paste this to publish

“That looks good. Open this change for review (a pull request) with a clear title, then once the automatic checks pass, go ahead and publish it. Tell me when it's live.”

That's the whole loop. Describe → read → approve. You did not open a code editor, type a command, or learn what a “branch” is — the assistant took care of all of it.

4. See your change and publish it

“Did it work, and when will people see it?”

Automatic checks run first

When your change is ready to publish, a few automatic checks run for a minute or two to make sure the site still builds correctly. You'll see them turn into a green check when all is well — that means your change is safe to go live.

Want to preview before it's live?

Just ask your assistant to show you what the change will look like before you approve — it can describe the result or walk you through it. (Your site publishes straight from approval, so the surest “preview” is to have the assistant show you the before-and-after first.)

After you approve

Once you approve and the checks are green, your change publishes automatically and your live site updates in a few minutes. Refresh your website in your browser to see it. (If it doesn't show right away, wait a couple of minutes and refresh again — browsers sometimes hold an old copy.)

If a check fails

Don't worry — nothing went live. Your assistant can read the failure and fix it. Just say:

Paste this if a check is red

“One of the checks failed. Please read the error, fix the problem, and let me know what it was in plain language.”

5. Common edits cookbook

Ready-to-paste prompts for the changes you'll make most

Once you've done your first edit, the cookbook is your quick reference for everyday updates — contact info, hours, photos, the donate button, and recurring posts like a blog, a newsletter, or board-meeting minutes. Each one is a friendly prompt you copy, fill in, and hand to your assistant.

Open the Common Edits Cookbook

6. Plain-language glossary

The few GitHub words you might see — in one friendly sentence each

Repository (“repo”)
The folder that holds your website’s files. FFC created one just for your charity — think of it as your site’s home.
Branch
A safe scratch copy of your site where a change is drafted before it goes live. Your assistant makes one for you; you don’t have to think about it.
Pull request (“PR”)
The “here’s what I changed — okay to publish?” page. It shows the change side-by-side so you can read it and approve.
Merge
Clicking “yes, publish this.” Once merged, your change goes out to your live site.
Checks
Quick automatic tests that confirm your site still builds correctly. A green check means it’s safe.
Good news: your assistant handles every one of these for you. You really only need the first one — repository — to get started.

7. Good habits and getting help

  • ✓Always read the change before approving.You're the human in the loop — a quick read is all it takes.
  • ✓Make one change at a timewhen you're learning. It keeps each approval simple.
  • ✕Never paste passwords or secret keys into the chat, your site, or GitHub. Your assistant never needs them in a message.
  • ✓Stuck?Ask your assistant to explain in simpler terms, or email your FFC contact — we're happy to help.

Where to next