Saving, undo and recovery
Everything you change in Qanvas, and everything the AI changes, goes into one unsaved draft. Nothing is written to your project on disk until you save.
Saving
Select Save in the header, or press Ctrl+S / ⌘S.
- A dot beside Save means you have unsaved changes.
- While saving, the button shows a spinner, then a check mark once everything is saved.
- A save writes the whole project at once: pages, blocks, header, footer, settings, themes, brief and specifications.
If Save is disabled while you have changes, hover it to see why, for example when a page has an invalid path or the project is read-only.
If you try to close or reload the browser tab with unsaved changes, your browser asks you to confirm first.
Undo and redo
Undo and Redo are at the end of the ribbon in Design.
| Action | Windows and Linux | macOS |
|---|---|---|
| Undo | Ctrl+Z | ⌘Z |
| Redo | Ctrl+Shift+Z | ⌘⇧Z |
Their tooltips name the step they will undo or redo. You and the AI share one history, and one Undo reverts a whole AI change, however many blocks it touched. Undo and redo are locked while the AI is working.
Recovering unsaved work
Qanvas keeps a copy of your unsaved draft in your browser while you work. If the tab is closed, reloaded or crashes before you save, reopening the project restores your draft.
The copy is discarded when you save, or when you return your work to its saved state. If the project on disk has changed since the copy was made, for example after a Git pull, Qanvas ignores the old copy rather than overwrite the newer files.
Save conflicts
If the project's files are changed outside Qanvas after you opened it, the next save stops and shows Save conflict:
- Overwrite disk saves your draft over the version on disk.
- Discard & Reload abandons your unsaved changes and loads the version on disk.
- Cancel keeps your draft so you can look at it first.
Saves are atomic: a save either completes fully or changes nothing.
Keyboard shortcuts
| Shortcut | Action |
|---|---|
Ctrl+S / ⌘S | Save |
Ctrl+Z / ⌘Z | Undo |
Ctrl+Shift+Z / ⌘⇧Z | Redo |
Ctrl+, / ⌘, | Open Settings |
Space | Roll a new colour harmony (Design, when not typing) |
↑ / ↓ | Move the focused block up or down in the block list |
Esc | Leave the Inspector, exit full page preview, or cancel a section edit |
Ctrl+Enter / ⌘Enter | Finish editing a specification section |
Enter | Send a chat message |