Your first workspace

After completing the installation guide, open the local dtxWiki address or the team server prepared by your administrator and sign in. Follow this walkthrough to create your first workspace; no coding knowledge is needed.

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Actual dtxWiki screen with fictional demo data. Item names can differ from the walkthrough. Dashboard of the fictional example workspace before starting the walkthrough.

What you will make

Create a small Product Launch workspace with one reference file and a Launch plan page. At the end, another workspace reader can find the plan and you can ask a question about it.

Before the walkthrough

• New local installation: follow installation to start the app, choose Sign up, and enter your email, an optional display name, and a password of at least eight characters. No default account exists. Successful signup opens the Dashboard and creates your private Personal Workspace.
• Shared server: sign in with your existing email/password at the address supplied by the administrator. If signup is unavailable, ask for an account; creating an account does not join the team workspace automatically.
• Local file processing: keep the app and same-version worker running. The worker handles queued imports; see running the app and worker. AI and SMTP are optional for this exercise.

If you also operate the installation, the server-admin grant is a separate step after creating your account. Ordinary reading and editing do not require it. You can do this exercise in your Personal Workspace, or create the dedicated practice workspace below to keep its example materials together.

1. Select or create a workspace

1. Sign in at your local address (http://127.0.0.1:21080/) or the team server address your administrator provided.
2. Open the workspace name in the top bar. Select a workspace you already belong to, or choose Create workspace.
3. For a new workspace, enter Product Launch, select Project Documentation as its purpose, and choose Create.
4. Confirm that the top bar shows Product Launch before adding content.

A workspace is a shared boundary for content and permissions. If you cannot create or join one, use Find workspaces or ask an owner for access. Joining a team workspace may require approval; it does not happen just because you opened its link.

2. Add a simple reference

For this exercise, create a plain text file named launch-brief.txt using a text editor. Copy the following fictional material into it and save it as UTF-8:

Product Launch — exercise material
Goal: make a small team's approved knowledge easy to find.
Audience: new team members and project coordinators.
Launch owner: Mina.
Open question: who will review the installation checklist?

1. Open Library and choose Upload.
2. Select launch-brief.txt.
3. Wait for the upload to finish, select the item, and check its processing status and extracted view.

Expected result: the reference is stored in Library. When processing succeeds, usable text is available for search and questions. Upload availability depends on the server and workspace policy. If it remains Pending, confirm the worker is running against the same database; Original stored can also mean extraction is unavailable for that item. See Library for its processing states.

3. Write and publish a page

1. Open Context, then New Context page. The top-bar Create → New Context page is another entry point.
2. Enter Launch plan as the title.
3. Write a short paragraph: “Mina owns the Product Launch. The installation checklist still needs a reviewer.”
4. Choose Save draft. Wait for the saved status before leaving the editor.
5. Read your text again, then choose Publish.

Expected result: the Context reader identifies a published page version. Workspace Viewers can read that published version. Publishing a version does not automatically publish it to the public web.

The editor's Save draft keeps work unpublished. Private work in progress and a draft submitted for review have different visibility; see Context pages. In this walkthrough, an Editor or Owner publishes the page directly.

4. Ask a focused question

1. Open Ask and start a new session.
2. Ask “Who owns the Product Launch?” and choose Send.
3. Inspect Cited evidence, then open the linked page to confirm the answer.

With no answer model configured, Ask can show a retrieval summary from your evidence. A configured model may compose a fuller answer. The essential check is the evidence, not the length of the response. See Search and Ask.

5. Invite a reader when you are ready

An Owner can add members and choose their roles. Adding a member shares the workspace within that role's permissions; it is broader than sharing one page. Follow Members and access.

If something differs

What you see	What to do
No edit or upload action	Ask the Owner whether you have Editor access.
Your colleague cannot see the new page	Check that it has a published version and that both accounts selected the same workspace.
Ask finds no evidence	Publish a clear page, check Library processing, and search for Product Launch first.
An unfamiliar server error	Keep the visible error message and contact the administrator; do not reinstall or delete data to fix it.

Continue with Find your way around or Create and edit Context pages.

Implementation reference: workspace controls, editor, Ask.