# Save, preview and publish

The guide bar sits at the foot of every page of a guide. On the left it says where the guide stands; on the right are **Preview** and **Publish**. While the open editor, the spot form or the itinerary editor, has changes to save, its save button takes the place of **Preview**. A guide that has never been live shows **Publish** only once its **Store page** is published. The one page without the bar is the sales page builder, which publishes its own page (see [Sales pages](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/sales-pages.md)).

A guide has a draft and a live version. What you change in its content (spots, collections and chapters, itineraries, routes and places, properties and photos) is the draft: you see it at once, in the studio and in the preview. Buyers see the content as it was at the last publish.

The rest is live as soon as you save it, with no publish: the guide's name, countries, thumbnail and price on [Name and price](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/name-and-price.md), the headline and store settings on [Sceniq Store](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/store.md), and your profile. Sales pages can take up to 5 minutes to show such a change, and they have their own **Publish page** in the builder.

## The status

A small mark and a line on the left of the bar. The mark is a dotted ring while something waits (with a dot inside while changes are not saved), turns while the studio saves or publishes, gathers its dashes into a check for a moment after a save, closes into a green check for a live guide, shows a red exclamation mark for an error, and is an eye on the example guide.

| The bar says | When |
|---|---|
| To publish your guide, you need a sales page for it. | The guide has never been published and its **Store page** is not published yet, so the bar has no **Publish**. The guide's link opens that page, so a guide published before it could not be bought. The words "sales page" open the Store page in the [sales page builder](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/sales-pages.md): publish it there, and **Publish** appears. While the guide has no sales page at all, they open its Sales pages list with Create sales page, where you make that page first. |
| **Buyers cannot see this guide until you publish it.** | The guide has never been published, and its **Store page** is. You see the guide in the studio and the preview; buyers cannot see or buy it. |
| **Save your changes before you publish.** | A form holds changes that are not saved: an open spot, an open itinerary, or a caption or credit on [Media](https://docs.sceniq.earth/guide/media.md). **Publish** waits until you save them. |
| What to fix, like "Give the itinerary a name." | The open itinerary holds changes it cannot save yet, so its save button is grey: the line names what to fix first. |
| Saving..., or the step it is on | The open editor is saving. The spot form names its step, for example while it uploads photos. It shows for at least 2 seconds, even when the save is done sooner; meanwhile the save button reads Saving... and **Publish** stays grey. A change you make in the form meanwhile ends it. |
| **Your changes are saved.** | You just saved a spot or an itinerary, on a guide that is not live or has changes waiting. It shows for a few seconds after Saving..., while the dashes of the ring run one by one into a check. Then the check flows on out of its tip and round into the dotted ring, and at the same time the bar goes back to its line about the guide. |
| **Publish to show your changes to buyers.** | The guide is live and has saved changes buyers do not see yet. |
| Publishing... | A publish is running. It takes seconds; buyers keep the previous version until the new one is in. |
| **Live.** | The guide is live and buyers see every change. **Copy live link** sits beside it. For 5 minutes after a publish it adds that your changes can take up to 5 minutes to appear: public pages keep a copy that long. |
| **Archived and off sale. People who bought it keep access.** | The guide is archived. |
| A red line | The open editor's last save failed. The line says why, for example that the itinerary changed somewhere else and needs a reload. |

## The buttons

****Preview**** is always there. It opens the **Preview** dialog below: the code that opens the guide on your phone, and its link.

**The editor's save.** The spot form and the itinerary editor do not save by themselves. While one of them has changes to save, its save button takes the place of **Preview**: **Save**. Once the changes are saved, **Preview** is back, since a save is what makes them show in the preview.

- The spot form's button shows on every page of the guide while an open spot holds changes that are not saved, so you can save from wherever you are.
- The itinerary editor's button shows on the itinerary's own page. It stays grey while the itinerary has no name or one of its stops or overnights is not filled in correctly; the status line then says what to fix (see [Itineraries](https://docs.sceniq.earth/guide/itineraries.md)). Leaving the page with changes that are not saved asks you first.
- A save that fails keeps your changes, so the button stays to try again, and the status line says why in red.

What **Publish** does depends on the guide:

- Never published: it is not there until the guide's **Store page** is published; then it opens the Publish dialog, below.
- Archived: it opens the Publish dialog.
- Live with saved changes: it publishes them at once, without a dialog. If something stops the publish, or it fails, the dialog opens and says why.
- Live with nothing new: it stays grey.
- It also stays grey while a form holds changes that are not saved, and while a publish runs.

## The live link

Next to **Live.**, on a wide window, **Copy live link** copies the link of the guide in the Sceniq app, where people who have the guide read it. After a copy it reads **Link copied**. To share the guide with people who do not have it yet, copy a sales page's link from [Sales pages](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/sales-pages.md). The preview's link is in the **Preview** dialog.

## Preview

**Preview** in the bar, or the Preview step on [Onboarding](https://docs.sceniq.earth/get-started/onboarding.md), opens the **Preview** dialog: a code to scan with your phone's camera app. The guide opens in the Sceniq app, in your phone's browser.

- You see the draft, with every edit as soon as it is saved. Buyers see only what you publish.
- If the app asks you to sign in, use the email address the dialog names. Your browser keeps you signed in after that. A code scanner that opens its own window forgets the sign-in after each scan, so use the camera app.
- The preview link sits under the text, with **Copy link** and **Open the guide in the app**.
- **Open in this browser** opens the guide in the app in a new tab of this browser.

Until the guide is first published, the dialog also says whether you have opened it in the app: Opened in the app, with the time, or Not opened in the app yet. The Preview step on Onboarding ticks itself once you have.

## The Publish dialog

The **Publish** dialog opens from the bar for a first publish, for an archived guide and when a publish is stopped, and from the Publish step on [Onboarding](https://docs.sceniq.earth/get-started/onboarding.md). Its first line and its button say what a publish does here:

| The guide | The dialog says | The button |
|---|---|---|
| Never published | Makes the guide buyable and shows it on your creator profile. | **Publish guide** |
| Archived | Puts the guide back on sale at its link. | **Republish guide** |
| Live, with changes | Publishes all of your changes made to the guide. | **Publish changes** |
| Live, nothing new | Your guide is live. Edits stay drafts until you publish them. | none |

For a live guide, a green box shows **Live**, the version, such as **Version 4**, and when that version was published. With changes waiting, **Unpublished changes** follows, with the time of your last edit.

On a guide that is not live, when nothing stops the publish, the dialog says Ready to publish. An archived guide says Archived. Ready to go live again. and shows when it was last published. The button stays grey while the checks load, while a form holds changes that are not saved, and while anything below is listed. **Cancel** closes the dialog without a change; with nothing to publish, **Close** does.

### What stops a publish

The dialog lists only what stops the publish right now: under **Before it can go live** for a guide that was never published, under Archived. Before it can go live again: for an archived guide, and under **Before these changes can go live** for a live guide's changes. These are the same checks every publish runs, so the list and the button always agree.

| The dialog says | What it means | The fix |
|---|---|---|
| **Accept the creator agreement** | The creator agreement changed. Until it is accepted, nothing publishes. | The banner at the top of the studio, where you press **Accept the current agreement**. |
| **Add at least one spot** | The guide has no spot buyers would see. Archived spots do not count. | **Add spots** opens [Spots](https://docs.sceniq.earth/guide/spots.md). |
| **1 spot has no pin**, **3 spots have no pin** | Spots without a place on the map. The line under it names the first few. | **Set pins** opens Spots, showing only the spots without a pin. |
| **1 spot has no photo**, **3 spots have no photo** | Spots that show photos but have none. A spot whose photos are switched off needs none. | **Add photos** opens Spots, showing only the spots without a photo. |
| **Set a price** | The guide has no price. | **Set price** opens [Name and price](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/name-and-price.md) at the price field. |

A fix closes the dialog and takes you where the work is. Anything else that stops a publish shows in the list in Sceniq's own words, and an error that is not about the guide shows in red under the list.

What does not stop a publish:

- The sales page. The bar offers **Publish** only once the guide's **Store page** is published, but the dialog itself, opened from the Publish step on Onboarding, does not check it. A guide published before its Store page has a link that forwards visitors to your creator profile until you publish that page in the [sales page builder](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/sales-pages.md). Buyers buy on the sales page, so publish it first.
- Store review. A published guide is on sale at its link and on your creator profile at once; the [Sceniq Store](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/store.md) is a separate step.

### What a publish does

- A first publish puts the guide on sale at its link and on your creator profile, with its content as it is at that moment.
- Publishing changes turns the draft into the next version for buyers. The bar says Publishing... for the few seconds it takes; buyers keep the previous version until the new one is in.
- Each publish raises the version number the dialog shows.
- An AI agent with a key that may publish can publish a live guide's changes through the [Creator API](https://docs.sceniq.earth/account/ai-agents.md). The first publish stays with you in the studio.

The badge beside the guide's name at the top of its page follows the same states: **Draft**, **Published**, **Archived**, **Unpublished changes** while changes wait, and Publishing... while a publish runs.

## Archived guides

[Archive guide](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/name-and-price.md#archive) on Name and price takes a guide off sale; the bar then says **Archived and off sale. People who bought it keep access.** **Publish** opens the dialog with **Republish guide**, which puts the guide back on sale at its link after the same checks. It does not return to the Sceniq Store by itself: see [Sceniq Store](https://docs.sceniq.earth/listing/store.md).

## The example guide

Every creator also sees a read-only example guide. Its bar says **Example guide.** with whose guide it is, and offers only **Preview**: nothing on it saves or publishes. Its **Preview** opens the example the way buyers see a finished guide.