Lanlan.docs

How the Tell Lanlan screen works

The screen where you build — a conversation with Lanlan on one side, your site on the other.

Tell Lanlan is the first item in your dashboard's sidebar, at app.lanlan.site/build. It's where most of the work happens: you say what you want, Lanlan does it, and you see the result straight away.

The two halves

On the left is your conversation with Lanlan. On the right is a preview of your site, drawn as a small browser window.

  • Drag the line between them to give either side more room. Double-click the line to put it back.
  • The preview reloads by itself after Lanlan changes something, and moves to the page Lanlan last worked on.
  • Click around inside the preview to visit other pages, as a visitor would.
  • The desktop, tablet and phone icons at the top of the preview show how the site looks on each.
  • The Board tab, beside Browser, collects the concept pictures, mockups and images Lanlan has made for this site.
  • Publish sits in the preview's own bar, beside the status, whenever there's a draft waiting. Publish your changes.

In the bar along the top of the screen you'll also find:

  • Edit ↗ — opens the site in a new tab where you can click words and pictures to change them. Change words and pictures yourself.
  • Preview ↗ — opens your draft full size, on sites that wait for you to publish. Only people working on the site can see it.
  • View site ↗ — your public site, once it's published.

What you can ask

Talk to Lanlan the way you'd talk to a designer who also knows the technical side. It can:

  • Build and change pages — new pages, new sections, shorter text, different colours and fonts.
  • Design with you — show concept pictures of a direction, or run a design session.
  • Find and make pictures — create images, search free stock photos, or use photos you attach.
  • Look things up — search the web for facts your site needs, and read a page you link to. When it uses what it found, it tells you where it came from.
  • Set things up — forms, a blog or portfolio, redirects, password-protected pages, search engine titles and descriptions.
  • Answer questions — about your visitors, your form messages, or how Lanlan works.

It can also publish, restore an older version, or rename your site's address when you ask. A few things need you to confirm first, such as deleting a site.

Attaching files

Press + next to the message box, drag files anywhere onto the screen, or paste a picture.

  • Pictures (JPEG, PNG, GIF, WebP) — Lanlan can see them.
  • Documents — Lanlan reads text files and the text inside PDF, Word (.docx), Excel (.xlsx) and PowerPoint (.pptx) files. Word, Excel, PowerPoint and text files can be up to 10 MB; PDFs follow the media limit below.
  • Video, audio and fonts — Lanlan can't watch or listen to them, but it can put them on your site. Tell it what's in them if that matters.

Media files and PDFs can be up to 50 MB each on a free site and 500 MB on a Pro site. iPhone HEIC photos aren't supported yet: export them as JPEG first. Old .doc, .xls and .ppt files can't be read; save them in the newer format.

Everything you attach is stored with your site, so Lanlan can use it on your pages.

While Lanlan works

You'll see what it's doing, step by step, and how long it's been going. Big requests can take a few minutes.

  • Stop ends the request after the current step. What's done so far is kept, and Continue picks it up again.
  • Lanlan works on one request at a time. If you send another while it's busy, your message goes back in the box to send again when it's done.
  • On a very long build, Lanlan pauses to check in. Everything so far is saved; tell it to keep going.

Your conversation

Each site has one conversation, and it's yours. If you invite someone to help, they have their own conversation with Lanlan about the same site. Scroll up to see earlier messages. Lanlan remembers what you've agreed earlier, even from a long way back.

Lanlan is AI, and it can make mistakes. Check the preview before you publish.

On a phone

On a narrow screen the conversation becomes a panel at the bottom of the screen, over your site. Drag it up to read and type, and down to look at the site. The Publish button moves to the top bar.

How much you can use it

Free accounts include an allowance of Lanlan's help. When it runs out, Lanlan asks you to make a site Pro to keep building. If you use a lot on Pro, Lanlan may switch to a lighter mode; your Billing page shows a note when that happens. Pro sites are never cut off.

What to try next

If you get stuck

Ask Lanlan. In Tell Lanlan, "I can't figure out how to…" almost always gets you unstuck. For anything Lanlan can't help with, email support.