How to edit and publish a template

You have a template that works well, but you want to sharpen a prompt or add a section. To do that, you open the template and simply change it. There is nothing to create first. Sally saves every change automatically, but only puts it live when you click Publish. Until then your meetings keep using the published version, including the summaries written in the meantime.

This article goes through the whole cycle once: change, publish and, if needed, reset. At the end you also know where to find earlier versions, how to restore one of them, and where to change the name and description of a template.

Quick navigation

1. What versions are for
2. Editing a template
3. Publishing your changes
4. Resetting your changes
5. Version history and earlier versions
6. Title, description and category

1. What versions are for

Templates run in the background. While you are editing a template, Sally may be summarizing a meeting that just ended. If your half-finished changes went live immediately, that summary would come out wrong.

With a shared template there is more at stake than your own meetings. A template that a whole team or the organization works with must not go live half-finished while your colleagues are having their meetings summarized with it.

Versions prevent exactly that. There is always one published version. As soon as you change something, Sally creates a working copy in the background that collects every change, yours and your colleagues'. None of it reaches a meeting until someone publishes.

Sections from the library are the exception

A section you inserted from the section library takes its content from the library entry. When someone changes that entry, the change reaches every template that uses it right away, published versions included, without a new version.

2. Editing a template

1. Open Settings at the bottom of the left sidebar.

Figure 1: Open Settings

2. In the sidebar on the left, under Configuration, pick Meeting templates.

Figure 2: The overview with every template in your account

3. Click the card of the template you want to change.

Figure 3: Clicking the card opens the template

4. Next to the name it says Published, and the line below tells you which version is live right now. Change whatever you want directly: add a section, adjust a section through its pencil icon, reorder sections or delete them. What each setting does is covered in Sections and section library.

Figure 4: A published template without any changes yet

5. With the first change, Sally creates the working copy. Next to the name it now says Unpublished changes. The line below shows the live version, who changed the template last, and whether Sally is saving (Saving…) or done (Saved).

Figure 5: Your changes are saved but not live yet

Saving happens automatically

There is no Save button. Sally stores every change after a short moment. If the header says Not saved, change something and Sally tries again. If you leave the page while a change is still being saved, Sally asks first, so nothing gets lost.

Test first, then publish

In the Preview tab you try your changes on a recording before they go live. The preview always shows the current state with every unpublished change. How it works is covered in Preview and test.

3. Publishing your changes

When you are happy with your changes and want to use the new version from now on, you publish them. That takes two clicks.

1. Click Publish in the top right.

Figure 6: Publish turns your changes into the new live version

2. Sally asks once, because from this moment on your meetings use the new version. Confirm with Publish.

Figure 7: One confirmation, and the version is live

After that, the name shows Published again, and the line below names the new version number. Sally counts up on its own, for example from 1.1 to 1.2. Your next change creates a new working copy.

When Publish is greyed out

The button stays greyed out while there are no unpublished changes, the template has no section, a section is incomplete (title or prompt missing), or the last change is still being saved. Hover over the button and Sally tells you the reason.

Summaries that already exist keep the version they were made with. In such a recording the template field now shows New version, and you can bring the summary up to the current version whenever you like.

4. Resetting your changes

If your changes don't work out after all, you bring back the published version.

1. Click Reset in the top right and confirm with Reset in the dialog.

Figure 8: Reset discards every unpublished change

Sally discards every unpublished change, and the state of the live version applies again. If colleagues changed the same template, their changes are gone as well. The dialog names them in that case, so you know before you confirm.

Reset can't be undone

Discarded changes don't come back. If you want to keep part of them, change the sections back one by one instead.

5. Version history and earlier versions

Every published version is kept. So you can check what a template looked like months ago and bring back an earlier version.

1. Click the status next to the name, that is Published or Unpublished changes. You also reach the history through the three dots on the right, under Manage versions.
2. The list shows every version with its state, the date and the person who published it. The live version is marked Current, your working copy Draft. Clicking a version opens it for viewing. Earlier versions are read-only, and the note at the top takes you back to the version you are editing.
3. To bring back an earlier version, click the three dots next to it and pick Restore. Confirm in the dialog.

Figure 9: Restore brings back the content of an earlier version

Restoring replaces the unpublished changes with the content of the version you picked. Nothing goes live yet: the template then shows Unpublished changes, and you decide with Publish whether the earlier version should apply again.

6. Title, description and category

Title, description and category belong to the template itself, not to a single version. Changes to them apply right away and don't need publishing.

1. Click Settings in the top right.

Figure 10: Settings is how you reach the details of the template

2. In the Edit template panel you change title, description, category and visibility. Click Save template in the bottom right.

Figure 11: The settings around the template

Visibility is also how you switch later whether the template stays personal, belongs to a team, or is open to everyone in the organization. What the levels mean is covered in Share a template.

The same panel holds Output for every section. That is where you decide whether Sally includes small talk and private topics. Unlike title and description, this value belongs to the version, so it only applies once you publish. How it works with the sections is covered under Small talk and private topics. At the bottom, under Version & change log, you see the version number and can note what changed in this version.