--- title: "Tour the workbench" description: "Find Home, project tabs, chat, preview, code, model, Advisor, accounts, settings, the status bar and Ray." url: https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/start/tour markdown_url: https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/start/tour.md app_version: "1.20.1" section: start product: Fabricator last_updated: 2026-10-14T22:09:52-07:00 source: start/tour.mdx --- # Tour the workbench > Find Home, project tabs, chat, preview, code, model, Advisor, accounts, settings, the status bar and Ray. Fabricator has two main places: Home, where you choose a project, and the project workbench, where you build, inspect, preview, and deploy one app. ## Home ![Home, with the New project, Open folder and Clone from GitHub actions above a list of three recent projects.](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/screenshots/home.webp) Home is titled **Your projects**. Use it to start or open work: - **New project** creates a Rayfin app and starts the deploy flow. - **Open folder** opens an existing local project. - **Clone from GitHub** brings a repository into Fabricator. - **Recent projects** lists projects you have opened before. A project can show **Open now** or **Missing**. - **Change folder** changes where new local projects are saved. If **Team workspaces** is turned on in **Settings → Experiments**, Home also shows the team workspace section. ## Project app bar ![The Fabricator workbench. On the left, the chat shows a finished Copilot turn that built an expense tracker; on the right, the live preview shows the deployed app with a monthly total and a spending chart.](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/screenshots/workbench.webp) When a project is open, the app bar starts with the project switcher. Choose the project name to open a menu of your recent projects, then choose one to switch to it. Choose **All projects** to see every project on Home while the current project keeps running, and choose the `Back to ` button to return to it. The center of the app bar has project tabs: - **Build**: chat and live preview. - **Code**: files, history, and skills. - **Blueprint**: how the app is put together: its architecture, data model and semantic models. - **Advisor**: app health checks and fixes. The right side can include deployment controls: - The deployment control, marked with a cloud icon, shows the active deployment's name or **Not deployed**. - **Deploy** creates the first deployment. - **Redeploy** publishes to the active deployment again. - **Share** opens sharing for the active deployment. The app bar also has **Settings** and the account menu, set apart from the project's controls. ## Build view **Build** is where you spend most of your time. Chat is on the left. The preview is on the right. During a turn, the chat work log shows what Copilot is doing. The preview can show a live local app while Copilot edits, then return to the deployed app after the turn. The preview toolbar includes **Reload**, a URL button, **Fabric**, **Design**, and **Focus**. **Design** lets you click your app, queue visual changes, and send them to Copilot. See [Live preview](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/build/preview) and [Design mode](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/build/design). ## Code, Blueprint, and Advisor **Code** has three sub-tabs: **Files**, **History**, and **Skills**. **Files** opens a read-only code viewer. **History** shows a timeline of changes. **Skills** manages reusable Copilot instructions. See [Code and history](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/build/code-and-history) and [Skills](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/build/skills). **Blueprint** shows what the app is made of, what it connects to and which identity each connection uses, along with its Rayfin data model and semantic models. See [Blueprint](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/build/data-model). **Advisor** checks app health. The tab can show a badge for open high or medium issues. See [Check app health with the Advisor](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/ship/advisor). ## Account menu and Settings ![The account menu opened from the avatar in the top-right corner, showing the signed-in Fabric account with Refresh Fabric authentication and Sign out.](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/screenshots/account-menu.webp) When you are signed in to Fabric, the account menu shows your account initials, and opening it shows your account and its organization. It has **Manage accounts…**, which opens **Accounts** for every account Fabricator uses, plus **Refresh Fabric authentication** and **Sign out**. When you are not signed in, it shows **Sign in to Fabric**, with **Manage accounts…** behind the arrow next to it. See [Manage your accounts](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/start/accounts). Open **Settings** from the gear button. Settings groups its options into **General** (**Accounts**, **Setup**, and **Workspace folder**), **Appearance** (**Theme** and **Text size**), **Diagnostics** (including **Usage stats**), experiments such as **Team workspaces**, and **About** (the versions Fabricator runs on, and links to these docs). ## Status bar The footer shows project and app status: - Git status for local projects, or team workspace and branch for team apps. - The project's Rayfin version, when a newer Rayfin release is available. See [Keep Rayfin up to date](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/ship/rayfin-versions). - The active Fabric workspace, when known. - **Manual deploy** or **Auto deploy** for local projects, while the **Deploy manually** experiment is on. See [Deploy manually](https://spatney.github.io/rayfin-fabricator/docs/ship/deploy#deploy-manually). - Interface zoom. - Fabricator app version, such as `v1.7.2`. - **Help**, which opens the Help assistant. It answers questions about what went wrong, and writes up a bug report when the problem is Fabricator's fault. ## Ray Ray is Fabricator's stingray. He keeps you company while an app installs its packages: when you create a project, clone one, or open one whose packages are missing. He shares facts about Rayfin and tips for Fabricator, and greets you in Help. The first time Fabricator starts on a computer, he's on the loading screen too, telling you in his own words how it's going. After that, he welcomes you back each time Fabricator opens, and he talks you through every deploy. While Ray is on screen, you can: - Select him to pet him. - Drag him somewhere else. - Select a speech bubble to hear the next fact. - Point at him and select the **×** next to him to send him away. Until you restart Fabricator, he only appears in Help. If your computer is set to reduce motion, Ray stays in one place and his speech appears without animation.