Getting started
Getting started is the first part of the Focal help center: three articles that take a new reader from knowing nothing about Focal to doing real work in it. Concepts explains the words Focal uses, Navigation shows where each part of the app is, and Quick start walks through a first path from signing in to sharing work. We recommend reading them in that order. Each one links into the feature articles for everything it only touches on.
Focal is where a creative team keeps its assets, plans and tracks its work on boards, and shares what it produces. All of that happens inside a space, and every space belongs to your organization. After you sign in, Focal opens on its home page, which greets you with “Welcome back” and your name, lists the spaces you belong to, and offers the public spaces of your organization you can join. Navigation and Quick start both begin from that page.
Who the Getting started articles are for
The Getting started articles are written for anyone new to Focal. Which of them matter most depends on how you arrive:
- A new team member, just invited to a space, who wants to find the team’s boards and assets. Concepts and Navigation are enough to start: they explain what a board, a task and an asset are, and where each one opens from the sidebar.
- A space owner setting up a space for a team, a brand or a client. Quick start is written for this reader. It invites the team, uploads the first assets, defines attributes, creates a board, shares a collection and connects Slack, in that order. Several of its steps happen in Space Settings, which only space owners and organization admins see.
- A guest from outside the team, such as an agency partner or a freelancer invited to review work. A guest sees only the boards shared with them, so the parts of Concepts about boards and tasks, and the table in Navigation of what each role sees in the sidebar, are the ones that apply.
If you already know what you are looking for, go straight to its pillar: Assets, Boards, Workflows, AI & Agents, Reports, Integrations or Settings.
Note: If you signed your organization up for Focal yourself and it is on a trial, the asset library also offers a Get started checklist of short videos. Its items are:
- Take the tour
- Invite your team
- Set up your library
- Search your assets
- Learn about attributes
- Learn about naming conventions
Each item is ticked off once you do what it shows, and the tour once you watch it through.
Articles in Getting started
The Getting started pillar has three articles, meant to be read in this order:
- Concepts: the nouns. Every word Focal uses, defined once, from organizations and spaces through assets, boards and tasks, columns and views, attributes, shared collections, workflows and the Focal Agent, reports and integrations, to teams and roles, ending with how they all fit together.
- Navigation: where things are. The home page and the space switcher, the sidebar and each of its entries, notifications, the Uploads & Downloads panel, Space Settings and your own user settings, and which sidebar entries each role sees.
- Quick start: a first path through the app for a space owner, in seven steps: sign in and open your space, invite your team, upload your first assets, define your attributes, create a board and add tasks, share a collection, and connect Slack.