Adding documentation

This site is the NUILab’s quick-access documentation. Adding a page is short, and it goes live on its own. Read the first section before you start — it decides whether your content belongs here at all.

Public documentation only

Everything on this site is public. Treat every page as readable by anyone — it is only kept out of search engines, not hidden behind a login. So this site is for public, non-sensitive documentation: onboarding, how-tos, tool guides, policies, and FAQs that are fine to be on the open web. It is built for quick access — easy to read and easy to add to.

Do not put anything sensitive here: passwords, tokens, keys, private infrastructure details, personal data, or anything that should not be on the open web. For members-only documentation, the lab uses a separate, sign-in-protected site at ihelp.nuilab.org. Keep member-only material off this public site. When in doubt, leave it out and ask.

How a page works

Each page is a single Markdown file. You add or edit a file, and it goes live automatically in about a minute — there is no separate publish step. Pages are grouped into four sections:

• Start here — first steps for new lab members.
• Systems & Tools — one page per tool or service.
• Guides — how-to guides for common tasks.
• Policies & FAQ — expectations, norms, and answers.

Add or edit a page

The documentation lives in a Git repository maintained by the lab. If you are a lab member and do not have access yet, ask the team.

1. Add a Markdown file to the section it belongs in, named with a short, lowercase slug (for example, a guide about a tool goes under Systems & Tools).

2. Put this block at the very top of the file:

   ---
   title: "A clear, specific title"
   description: "One sentence shown in lists and previews."
   weight: 20
   updated: 2026-06-26
   ---
   

   weight orders the page within its section (lower numbers come first). Bump updated whenever you change the page.

3. Write the rest in Markdown. Use ## and ### headings to structure it — they become the “On this page” outline automatically. Link to other pages with site-relative links like /systems/chat/.

4. Save, then commit and push. Your page is live in about a minute.

To edit an existing page, open the file named at the bottom of that page (“Source: …”), make your change, bump updated, and push.

Bringing in a document you already have

Have it in Word, a PDF, a slide deck, or on a web page? Convert it to Markdown first, then add the front matter above. Keep only the content: the document’s title becomes the title: line (do not repeat it as a heading in the body), and use ## for the sections inside it.

Keep in mind

• Public only — see the top of this page; members-only material goes to ihelp.nuilab.org.
• No secrets — never paste tokens, passwords, or private URLs.
• Plain, concrete, student-facing language; one topic per page.
• Need a brand-new top-menu section? That is a small change to the site setup — ask whoever maintains the site.