When a build does not give you a site

Build now is the default

A new project starts on Build. Describe the business and Grafter makes the best useful first version straight away, using its judgement for the routine details you did not need to spell out.

Plan is still available when you specifically want a short discovery pass before any files change. A planning or question turn costs the same as a build, so it is a deliberate choice rather than the default.

If an old browser choice still opens Plan, switch it back to Build once. That choice is remembered on that device.

1. Write one specific sentence: the trade, the town, and what you sell.
2. Send it. That turn writes the whole site, and on a new account it is free.

Tip. Use Plan only when a wrong assumption would materially change the work. For ordinary first versions, building gives you something real to react to.

Note. The choice is remembered on the machine you make it on. Build is the default on a new device; a deliberate Plan choice still holds for the next project you start there.

The mockups asked for a top-up before anything was drawn

Before a first build you may be offered a set of drawn mockups to pick a layout from. Those pictures are a separate purchase from the build and are not covered by the free build. On an account with no credits the set is refused before anything is drawn, and nothing is charged for it — the panel says so.

That refusal reads as the build being refused. It is not. The free build is still sitting there, and the description you typed is still held.

1. Press Build without a mockup. While the pictures are still being drawn the same button reads Skip and build now.
2. Or top up and press Show the mockups, which appears under the refusal with its price on it, then pick one. The build then follows the picture you chose.

Note. A mockup is a reference the build looks at, not a file that ends up in your site. Skipping it costs you nothing except the choice, and the panel prints the price before you press anything.

Plan means two different things in two places

There are two controls with Plan on them and they do different jobs. Working out which one you touched is usually the whole answer to why a turn did not build.

Both of them cost a full turn's credits, the same as building does.

Which control is which

Build or Plan, beside the description box

Plan may ask you questions first, then builds. Build writes files immediately.

Build, Plan mode, Bug fix mode, in the editor's spanner

Plan mode never writes a file. Bug fix mode repairs one fault and leaves the rest alone.

What each one costs

A full turn either way. Asking and planning are charged like building.

Note. The two do not behave the same way once a turn is sent. One puts itself back to Build and one stays where you left it, which is the difference the sections below turn on.

Plan beside the description box

This is on the screen where a project starts. Plan here means the turn may ask you a couple of questions and sketch before it writes files. It often builds anyway. Build here means it writes the site straight away, which is what you want for a first go.

Note. This control puts itself back to Build once a turn has asked its questions, so the message carrying your answers builds rather than asking again. A project that already has files in it starts on Build as well.

Plan mode in the spanner menu

This one is inside the editor, in the small menu beside the message box. Plan mode writes nothing at all, ever. It reads the project, says what it would do and in what order, and waits. Bug fix mode sits in the same menu and narrows a turn to repairing one fault.

Neither is meant for a project that does not exist yet. A plan of a site nobody has built is a paragraph you cannot act on until you pay for a second turn.

Note. This one does not put itself back. Plan mode stays on for every turn after it until you set the mode to Build or reload the editor, and a small digit beside the spanner is the only warning you get.

It wrote a paragraph about what it would do

Two different things produce this, and they are charged differently.

The first is Plan mode, left switched on. Every turn from then on describes the work instead of doing it, and each one is charged, because a plan is what was asked for and a plan is what arrived. Open the spanner beside the message box and set the mode back to Build. Reloading the editor also clears it, because the mode belongs to the screen rather than to your project.

The second is a formatting slip on our side. The reply comes back with the contents of your files printed in the conversation rather than written into the project. You are told so in as many words — nothing was saved — and that turn is not charged for. Send the same message again.

Tip. Any digit on the spanner means a mode other than Build is switched on. It is worth one glance before a turn you care about.

It ran out of time and the preview is blank

Every turn has a wall clock on it. We stop the build about twenty seconds before the platform would stop it for us, and that margin is deliberate: stopping first is what lets the credits settle instead of being held with nothing to settle them against.

Files are saved one at a time as they are written, so everything that landed before the clock ran out is yours and is on disk. The preview is blank when the two files that mount a site were not among them. Nothing renders without those, whatever else is in the project, which is why the error says there is no entry point and names the files it wants.

From there the build normally carries itself on and finishes what is missing. While it is finishing a first build that was free, those continuations are part of the same free build rather than new charges.

1. If it carried on by itself, leave it. It picks up from where it stopped rather than starting again.
2. If it did not, send this and nothing else: Carry on from where you stopped and finish the build.
3. If it has run out of time several times over, stop asking for the whole site. Ask for one section or one screen at a time and each one gets built properly.

Tip. The next thing you type after a build ran out of time is treated as a continuation, whatever it says. Ask for the buttons to be blue on a half-written site and it will finish the site, in blue. That is on purpose — the site you asked for does not exist yet. Once one turn completes, it stops and edits behave normally again.

Note. A turn that ran out of time before writing anything at all is not charged for, and the message says so. That one is a build that is stuck rather than one that is nearly there, so carrying on would spend a second turn hitting the same wall. Ask for something smaller instead.

One press ran for a quarter of an hour and cost far more than a turn

This is the carrying-on above, several times over. Each stretch after the first is a separate turn with its own charge, unless it is finishing the one free build. So one press can run four charged turns in total, and three of them were never pressed for.

Two limits stop it there. Three continuations after the first turn is the most it will ever take. And a new stretch only opens if less than fifteen minutes have passed since you pressed, which means one press can go on for a little under twenty minutes before the last stretch closes.

The moment extra money is committed is written into the conversation. A line appears reading Still going, naming which stretch this is and how many are allowed. That is the sentence to look for when the bill does not match the press.

The credits figure on the screen is the whole build rather than the last stretch. That is not a fault: a number that reset at every seam would report a quarter of what a long build actually cost.

1. Press Stop at any point. It ends the turn that is running and closes the gap before the next one, so nothing restarts a moment later.
2. To keep it from happening again, ask for one screen or one section per turn rather than a whole large site in one message.

Note. Stopping does not un-write anything. Every file that has landed stays, and the next turn can finish the rest.

Files tick past and it still says Building your site

The list of files and the preview are deliberately out of step. Halfway through a turn the project genuinely does not work — a page already imports a section that has not been written yet — so a preview that rebuilt on every file would show you compile errors that are not real, several times a turn. It moves once, when the turn is finished.

On a long build that is finishing itself in stretches, it does not move at all until the last stretch closes. Every file is already saved while you wait, so there is nothing to lose by leaving it.

Tip. If you took the game that is offered while you wait, the finished site does not push it off the screen. The button in the game's own bar reading Your site's ready — see it is what switches over to it.

Note. The card that replaces the box you typed into is the only place that counts the files as they land and estimates how long is left. Opening the project takes that panel away, and what replaces it is a short notice saying a turn is running. The build itself is unaffected either way, and the finished site arrives without a reload.

It says unexpected end of input and a file stops mid-component

A turn has a ceiling on how much it can write as well as on how long it can take. Reach the writing ceiling with a file still open and half of that file is saved as though it were whole. It still looks like a file, so the preview tries to compile it and reports an end of input it was not expecting.

Some models tell you outright that the last file may be cut off. The one that writes most first drafts does not, and nothing on our side checks for it — so the compile error is the only sign you get. That is a gap on our side rather than anything you did wrong.

1. Read the file name off the error and ask for that one file again, in full, by name.
2. Or press Ask Grafter to fix it on the error card, which sends the error text back as a repair turn.
3. Do not re-describe the whole site. That spends a fresh turn rewriting files you have already paid for once.

Note. Asking for a smaller piece per turn is what stops this happening again. A whole site in one message is the request most likely to reach a ceiling.

Common questions

Has the free build definitely gone if I never got a site?

If a turn ran on your account it counted, even when what it produced was a question form rather than a website. Write to us from the contact page and say what happened — we can sort it by hand rather than leaving you to buy your way out of a default we set.

Is anything lost when a build stops halfway?

No. Files are saved one at a time as they are written, so everything that landed is on your project. A continuation finishes what is missing rather than starting the site again.

Why was I charged for a turn that wrote no files?

A turn that ran to the end is charged whether it produced files or prose, because a plan and a set of questions are both real work. A turn that failed and produced nothing is not charged, and a turn that ran out of time before writing anything is refunded and tells you so.

Does closing the tab stop a build?

No. It carries on and keeps saving files whether the tab is open or not. Stop is what ends a build. When you come back, the editor holds the message box shut until the turn finishes, then pulls in what was written.

Which mode should I use for a first build?

Build, in both places the word appears. Plan mode and Bug fix mode are for a project that already exists and has credits behind it.