Build your website
with one prompt.

This page is the workflow for "Build me a website on https://www.answer.cloud/build-site/.". Build and publish a NEW standalone Astro website at its reserved answer.cloud address. Continue until the public site and its AI chat work, then return the verified live URL. No plugin installation, user sign-in, password, or credit card is required for the first build. Answer Cloud creates the account and emails its setup link.

1. Collect only the missing brief

Ask together for the user's email, organization name, and a short factual description. Reuse details already supplied. The visitor's main next step is optional; choose a reasonable default from the brief. Do not require a domain, plan, repository, design system, or hosting choice. Do not invent contacts, testimonials, prices, or business claims. Keep the account email private unless the user separately asks to publish it.

For a draft-only request, collect only the organization/site name and brief. Skip email, account setup, connection, bootstrap, and publication; build locally.

2. Start the build without sign-in

Generate a cryptographically random request_key of 32 to 128 URL-safe characters (letters, numbers, underscores, or hyphens) ONCE, for example 64 hexadecimal characters from 32 random bytes. It is a private resume secret: save it privately and reuse it on every retry. POST https://app.answer.cloud/build-site with Content-Type: application/json:

{
  "email": "the user's email",
  "organization_name": "the user's organization",
  "description": "the user's factual website brief",
  "goal": "optional visitor action",
  "request_key": "the private random resume secret"
}

Encode JSON safely; never interpolate the user's strings into shell commands. The response contains organization_id, organization_name, site_slug, site_url, environment (production), prompt, mcp_url, build_token, build_expires_at, and account_setup. Save it privately for this build. The private account setup link is sent only by email and is never returned to the agent.

This response already reserves the site. Never call prepare_site or create_site for this guest build. Preserve the returned slug, organization, and production choice. The build is isolated even when the email already has an account; it grants no access to that account's existing workspaces. Retries with the same request_key reuse the reservation and do not send another email. On rate limits, explain the error and pause; do not generate fresh keys to evade limits. If the build expires or is claimed, preserve the source and use normal account access for later changes rather than creating a replacement site silently.

3. Connect to MCP in this conversation

Use the returned mcp_url and build_token. Native MCP setup is optional: when you cannot attach a temporary connection in this conversation, use your existing network or terminal tools to call the MCP over HTTP. Do not require the user to install a plugin, restart, sign in, or paste a token for this first build.

POST JSON-RPC 2.0 messages to mcp_url with these headers:

Content-Type: application/json
Accept: application/json, text/event-stream
Authorization: Bearer <build_token from the bootstrap response>
MCP-Protocol-Version: 2025-11-25

First initialize:

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"initialize","params":{"protocolVersion":"2025-11-25","capabilities":{},"clientInfo":{"name":"answercloud-site-builder","version":"1.0"}}}

Send notifications/initialized without an id, then discover the current schemas:

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":2,"method":"tools/list","params":{}}

Invoke tools with tools/call, for example:

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":3,"method":"tools/call","params":{"name":"start_deploy","arguments":{"site_slug":"<reserved site_slug>","environment":"production"}}}

Every POST includes the credential; the server is stateless. Check HTTP status and any top-level JSON-RPC error first. For tools/call responses, read result.structuredContent and check result.isError before continuing. The build credential expires after 24 hours and permits at most three deploys to this one site. It exposes only first-site deployment, widget, and verification tools. Account, billing, new-site, domain, GitHub, release, and CMS administration tools are unavailable. Claiming the account through email revokes this credential.

Keep the token and resume secret out of prompts, public source, generated pages, screenshots, logs, and version control. Use process memory or a temporary private file with permissions 0600. Do not configure it globally or overwrite an existing personal connection. Remove temporary credentials when finished. Browser OAuth is for later account management, not this guest launch.

4. Build, publish, and verify

Read the full Astro workflow: https://app.answer.cloud/build-site/guide/answer-cloud-site/SKILL.md

Read its relative reference links as needed. This page's guest instructions override its returning-account connection steps: standalone kind, reserved slug, and production are already selected. Apply the returned personalized prompt to the brief. Author an Astro source project using the official template at https://github.com/answer-cloud/answer_cloud_template and build its static output locally. Answer Cloud adds the AEO layer and AI chat.

Call start_deploy with the reserved slug and environment: production. Upload the compiled artifact to the returned signed URL, then call finalize_deploy. Poll get_deploy at its retry cadence until live or failed. Finalize an artifact already uploaded. If its URL was lost or expired, or finalization returns no_artifact, start a replacement deployment for the SAME reserved site within the remaining quota. Poll processing deployments; do not start competing uploads or reset the bootstrap to evade quota.

Check warnings, live HTML, retrieval, and the AI chat widget. Use configure_widget for its generated theme. Skip optional tools not exposed to the guest credential. Correct actionable failures within the remaining quota and retain the Astro source if blocked. Never claim completion before verifying the public site and chat.

5. Finish

Return the working site_url and explain that Answer Cloud emailed the user a link to finish account setup. They do not need to complete setup before the first build. Never request or display their private email link.

This workflow needs an agent that can fetch this page, build project files, and make authenticated HTTP requests. A URL cannot add those capabilities to a chat client that lacks them. If your client cannot complete these steps, explain its specific limitation and preserve the brief for Claude Code or Codex.