The website editor: the basics

The website editor is where you change your Nowistay website. You click a block in the preview, change its texts and photos in the side panel, and every change saves on its own. Nothing reaches your visitors until you publish, and any change can be undone.

Open the editor

1. In the left-hand menu of Nowistay, click Website.
2. In Your websites, click the name of your website.

The editor fills the whole screen. To leave it, click the arrow at the top left: you are back on your websites list.

The editor opens once the website is in your subscription. Before that, the page shows your private preview with the offer to add the website to your subscription (see Website subscription, AI credits and limits). If your subscription has a payment problem, you see Your subscription is not active. Settle it to edit your website.

The first time you open the editor in a browser, a message reminds you that This preview is private: search engines can’t see it, only people with the link can open it.

The editor has three parts: the bar at the top, the preview of your site in the middle, and the side panel on the right, with the Ask the AI box at its bottom (see Edit your website with AI).

The bar, from left to right

On the bar	What it does
Arrow	Back to your websites list
Coloured dot	Shows the state of the preview (hover it to read it)
Live	Shown once the website is published: click it to open your live site
Page tabs	Open a page of your site in the preview
+	Add a page of your own
Computer and phone icons	Show the preview at Computer or Phone size
Blog	Opens your blog’s articles (see Write a blog with AI)
Curved arrow	Undo the last change
…	The menu with every other tool
Publish	Opens the publishing panel

The coloured dot means:

• green, Preview up to date: the preview shows all your changes;
• blue, Preview updating: wait a moment;
• orange, Some changes aren’t in the preview yet: update it: see “When to click Update” below;
• orange, The last preview update failed: refresh it from the menu.

Page tabs and the Properties menu

The tabs follow the order of your site: Home, Properties, About, your own pages, Blog (only once your site has an article), Thank you (the page guests see after booking) and Page not found (shown when someone types a wrong address). When there are many tabs, scroll the row sideways.

Properties opens a small menu:

• All properties opens the page that lists all your properties, with the search by dates;
• below it, each property opens its own page. With 8 properties or more, type a name in Find a property.

When a property page is open, the tab shows its name.

Inside the preview, a click selects a block: it never follows a link. To move to another page, use the tabs.

The … menu

The menu groups every other tool:

• At the top, a grey line shows your AI credits left and the date they reset.
• Style changes the base style, fonts, colours and shapes (Change the look of your website). Versions lists every saved version (see below).
• Open in a new tab opens your private preview in a new tab, to browse it like a visitor. If the preview is behind, Nowistay updates it first (Updating the preview…). Refresh the preview updates the preview with all your saved changes.
• Publish… opens the publishing panel (Publish your website). Once the site is published, View the live site opens it. Statistics and Enquiries show your visits and the messages from your contact form (Website statistics, Bookings and messages from your website).
• Site settings, Legal pages and Domain name hold your site’s name, contact details, properties and languages (Website settings), your legal texts (Legal pages of your website) and your own domain (Your website address and your own domain name).
• Subscription and deletion removes the website from your subscription or deletes it. Unpublish takes a published site offline.
• Help opens the Nowistay support chat.

The preview

The preview is your website with your latest changes, at a private address that search engines don’t see. Move the mouse over it: each block gets a dashed outline. Click a block: it gets a solid blue outline and its fields open in the side panel.

The side panel

What the panel shows depends on what you selected:

• No block selected: the list of the page’s blocks. Click a row and the preview scrolls to that block. At the bottom, Add a section adds a block (see Website blocks: every block explained). On your own pages, Page settings sits at the top (see Website pages).
• A block selected: its fields (titles, texts, photos, button). Below them: Move up, Move down, Remove this section and Add a block after. All blocks on this page takes you back to the list.
• A property page: the panel Property: followed by the property’s name, with its tagline, summary, description and photos.

If your site has 2 or 3 languages, a switch (EN, FR…) at the top of a block or property page chooses the language you edit. Each language is edited separately.

Select a block, then edit a text

On a computer, you can type straight into the preview:

1. Click a block in the preview: it is selected and its fields open in the panel.
2. Click a text inside that block: a blue frame shows that you can type.
3. Type your text.
4. For a title or a short text, press Enter or click elsewhere to save. For a long text with paragraphs, Enter starts a new paragraph: click outside the text to save it. Escape cancels.

These are two separate clicks, not a double-click: the first selects the block, the second edits the text. Bold, italic and links are kept. A text you empty completely is not saved: the previous one comes back.

Some long texts can’t be edited in the preview (when they contain an image or a quote, for example): edit them in the side panel. More in Edit texts, links and photos.

Example: you rent a farmhouse in Provence under the name Mas des Oliviers. The home page title says “A farmhouse among the olive trees” and you want “Your farmhouse in the Luberon, 10 minutes from Gordes”. Click the main banner, click its title, type the new one and press Enter. The new title shows at once and is already saved.

Saving is automatic

There is no Save button for blocks:

• a text saves when you leave the field (or press Enter in the preview);
• a choice saves at once: a photo added or removed, a box ticked, an item removed, a block moved.

A green Saved tick appears next to the block’s name for a moment, and each save becomes a new version (see “Versions” below).

A few actions have their own button because they create something: a new block (Add), a new page (Add the page), the settings of one of your pages (Save). A new item in a list (a question, a highlight) waits until its fields are filled: Fill in the new item to save it.

When to click Update

Text changes show in the preview at once, and so do the changes you make in Style. Other changes need the preview to be refreshed:

• photos added, removed or reordered;
• blocks added, moved or removed;
• items added to or removed from a list (questions, highlights…);
• a different layout, a box ticked, a button that now leads somewhere else;
• a table in a text.

When that happens, the dot turns orange and the bottom of the preview shows Some changes aren’t in the preview yet with an Update button. Click Update: one refresh brings in all the waiting changes, so you can make several changes and update once at the end. Your changes are already saved: Update only refreshes what you see.

The preview also refreshes by itself after an AI request that changed the layout, and when you add a page.

If a refresh fails, the preview shows The preview could not be updated with the reason and, when a property is the cause, a link to it. Fix what it says, then click Update again.

Undo

The curved arrow in the bar, Undo the last change, cancels your latest change. When that change came from the AI, the tooltip names your request, for example “Undo “Make the home page title warmer””. A message confirms Change undone.

To go back further than the last change, use Versions.

Versions

Every saved change, every AI request that changed something and every restore creates a version. Nothing is overwritten.

1. Open the … menu and click Versions.
2. The list starts with the newest. Each card shows Version and its number, who made it (First version, AI, Your edit, Restore or Nowistay), the date and time and, for the AI, your request. The version you are working on is marked Current.
3. Click Restore on the version you want.
4. Confirm. The message explains: This version becomes your new draft. Nothing is lost: your current draft stays in the list. A message then confirms Version restored.

Good to know:

• Nowistay keeps your 30 most recent versions, plus the ones still in use, such as the version that is online.
• Restoring changes your draft only. Your live site changes when you publish again.
• A version that uses photos deleted since can’t be restored: This version uses photos that were deleted since. It can’t be restored.

Example: on Monday you asked the AI to rewrite the home page of your two gîtes in the Dordogne. On Wednesday you prefer the old texts. Open Versions, find the version just before the AI one that shows your request, and click Restore. The AI’s version stays in the list in case you change your mind again.

Tips shown in the editor

When no block is selected, a Getting started card at the top of the panel sums up the essentials: select a block in the preview to edit its texts and photos, ask the AI about the selected block or about the whole site, and remember that every change can be undone. Click Got it to hide the card. It shows again if you open the editor in another browser.

While the AI is working

During an AI request, and while a property or a language is being added to your site, the fields are read-only and show The AI is working on your website. Editing resumes when it has finished. Undo, restoring a version, adding a page and typing in the preview wait too. Anything you typed just before is saved as soon as the work is done.

Editing on a phone

The editor works on a phone, with a simpler layout:

• The top bar keeps the arrow, the dot, the name, Blog, Undo and the … menu. To publish, open … and click Publish….
• A second row has a Page list with every page and property page, and + Add a page at the end.
• At the bottom, two buttons: Edit this block and Ask the AI. Each opens a sheet over the lower half of the screen, and the preview above it stays usable. Close a sheet with the cross.
• Tap a block in the preview: it is selected and the Edit this block sheet opens with its fields.
• On a phone you don’t type in the preview: edit the texts in the sheet.
• To add a block or open the settings of one of your pages, tap any block, then All blocks on this page at the top of the sheet.

On a computer, the phone icon in the bar shows your site at phone width: a quick way to check what guests on a phone will see.

Your changes and the live site

Everything you do in the editor changes your draft, which only you can see. Visitors see your changes once you publish them: click Publish, then Publish the changes. See Publish your website and put changes online.