Drafting with the assistant

The writing assistant gives you a first draft to edit. Describe what you want in a sentence or two, and it writes a newsletter, an announcement, or the text for a section of a website page, using what it knows about your club. You then read it, change what you like, and save it the usual way.

Managers and admins can use it wherever the block editor appears: writing a message (newsletters and announcements) and editing the text sections of a website page.

The Draft with the assistant button only appears where a draft can be written. It is hidden when the assistant isn't set up for your club's site, in the read-only demo, and when Swim Ops has turned the assistant off for your club. It still shows once your club has used today's drafts; asking then tells you the limit resets tomorrow.

• In an empty editor, choose Draft with the assistant at the top.

• Anywhere else, type / on an empty line. Draft with the assistant is the first choice in the menu.

A small window opens. Describe what you'd like, for example: "Remind families that swim team sign-ups close on Friday, with a button to register." Then choose Write a draft. It usually takes a few seconds, and now and then more than a minute.

If the editor already has writing in it, the draft goes in where your cursor is (it takes the place of the empty line you started from), and the assistant reads what you've written so far so the draft fits around it.

The assistant only works from your club's own information:

• your club's name and a few settings, such as how you refer to the people who count as residents;

• How your club sounds: a few words on your tone and anything the assistant should know (members never see this text). It is on the Branding page: open Club → Club info and select Branding under Related. Only admins can open that page, so if you are a manager, ask an admin to fill it in;

• the last three newsletters you sent, so it can match your style;

• upcoming events, this week's pool hours and any closures coming up;

• for a website page: the page's title and address, and the headings of the page's other sections;

• the published pages on your website, so links point to pages that exist;

• the most recent pictures in your media library that have a description. A picture with no description is invisible to the assistant.

It does not see members, households, payments or anything else in your club's records.

The draft appears under a bar that says Drafted by the assistant, not saved. The bar lists anything to check before you save, such as:

• links to pages your site doesn't have: change or remove them;

• web addresses the draft links to, including a picture's caption link: make sure they're right;

• email addresses and phone numbers the draft links to: make sure they're right;

• videos the draft includes: make sure each is the right one;

• picture spots: the assistant never adds pictures from the internet. It uses pictures from your media library, or leaves an empty picture spot with a note of what it should show. Use Choose image on it, or remove it;

• notes in [square brackets]: facts the assistant didn't have, such as a date. Fill them in;

• lines that will show as plain text: something the assistant wrote that the editor doesn't understand. Edit or remove them.

When the assistant rewrites something you already wrote, it keeps the pictures you had placed. It can't add its own link to a picture's caption: a stock photo's credit always comes from your media library.

The assistant can still get a fact wrong. Read the draft as you would anyone else's before it goes to members.

Choose Undo draft on the bar to take the whole draft out again, even if you've already edited other parts of the page or message. If you changed something inside the draft, it asks first ("This will also remove the changes you made inside the draft."), with Remove the draft and Keep it.

Right after the draft arrives, your usual undo (Ctrl+Z, or Cmd+Z on a Mac) also takes the draft back in one step. The bar goes away when the draft is gone and when you save.

The assistant only writes a draft in your editor. Nothing is saved until you save, and nothing reaches members until you send or publish it the usual way, with every check a message or page normally goes through.

• "The assistant has reached today's limit for your club. It resets tomorrow." Each club has a daily limit on drafts. Write this one yourself, or try again tomorrow.

• "The assistant isn't set up for your club yet." The assistant isn't available on your club's site. Ask Swim Ops support if you'd like it.

• "The assistant couldn't write a draft that works here." Try again, or describe what you want in a different way.

• "The assistant didn't answer in time. Try again in a minute." Wait a minute and try again.

• Say who it's for, what's happening, when, and what readers should do: "Tell new families where to park on meet days, and link to the swim team page."

• Ask for the pieces you want: "a callout", "a button to register", "questions and answers as toggles", "a spot for a photo of the swim team".

• Describe each picture when you upload it. The assistant chooses pictures by their descriptions, and a description can't be added to a library picture later.

• Fill in How your club sounds once, and every draft follows it.

The assistant is an AI model (Claude, from Anthropic). What you type and the club information above are sent to it to write the draft. Swim Ops keeps a record that a draft was asked for (who, when and how long), not the words.