# How it works

> How a site gets built on AtarCMS: what the owner prepares, the one prompt for a coding agent, what comes out, and the tools the agent works with.

- Published: Oct 16, 2026
- Language: en

## Lead line

You describe the site; a coding agent installs AtarCMS, builds it from your answers and checks its own work. Here is the path for both of you.

## Text

### The owner's path

#### 1. Prepare a few answers

The agent interviews you, and answers you prepare up front turn several rounds into one. Useful to have:

- what the site is about, who visits it, and its name;
- the languages, and which one is the main one;
- the pages and sections you imagine (unsure is fine: the agent proposes);
- a site you like as a style sample, or a purchased template with its files and its licence;
- contacts and social links, the texts, photos and logo you already have, and anything that must *not* appear.

The domain, a mailbox for the forms' mail and analytics numbers are needed only on launch day.

#### 2. Paste one prompt

Open your coding agent (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor or any agent that can run commands) in an empty folder on your computer, or with SSH access to your server, and paste:

```
Clone https://github.com/yanfishel/atarcms.git with --depth 1 into a temporary folder
(install git first if it is missing), read .agents/skills/building-atarcms-sites/references/install.md
there and install AtarCMS: into ./my-site on this computer, or into /var/www/<site> on a server;
then open the site's folder and continue with its skill.
```

The agent asks before it installs system packages or changes a server, and you type the secrets yourself: passwords never pass through the chat.

#### 3. Review, step by step

The agent writes your answers into `site-brief.md` for you to confirm, then works in phases: the content model, the design analysis, the theme, the content, the checks. It commits after every phase, so you can go back to any step, and it shows you the site on your own computer before anything goes live.

#### 4. What you get

- A working site with its own theme, in your languages (right-to-left included), with news, pages, a contact form, search and a media library.
- An admin your editors use without training, with revisions, autosave, preview and scheduled publication.
- Accessibility built in: a toolbar for visitors and an accessibility statement page.
- A git repository of the whole site and a launch checklist: HTTPS, mail, backups, Google sign-in.

### The agent's path

#### The skill

The site skeleton ships an agent skill in `.agents/skills/building-atarcms-sites/`, in the open Agent Skills format: Claude Code finds it through `.claude/skills/`, other agents through `AGENTS.md`. It holds the phases, the hard rules (never edit `vendor/`, ask before deleting content, keep the working theme until the new one passes its check) and references for installing, the content model, design sources, the theme guide, verification and going live.

#### The handbook and the console

`HANDBOOK.md` explains how the site works under the surface: the theme and its helpers, the content model, the admin, languages, media, search and production. The console checks the work: `bin/atar doctor` checks the installation, `bin/atar theme:check` renders every page type of the theme before it goes live.

#### The admin guide

Once the site runs, a browser agent signed in as an editor reads `/admin/ai-guide`: one known address that describes the admin's screens, every content type of this site with its fields and limits, and how saving, autosave, translations and media work, filtered by that user's permissions.

More on what agents get from a finished site: [AI-ready](https://atarcms.com/ai-ready).