# First steps

From signing in for the first time to your first own page: what you do with Flowplan in the first ten minutes.

## Sign in or sign up

You sign in with your e-mail and password, with a passkey (fingerprint, face or device PIN) or – if your organisation has set it up – with **Sign in with SSO** through your organisation's login (OpenID Connect, such as Keycloak, Authentik, Zitadel or Entra ID). You create an account with **Create account**, provided the instance allows sign-ups or you have been invited. Afterwards you set up passkeys under **Settings → General → Your profile**. Everything else is described under [Sign-in](/sign-in).

When you sign in for the first time, Flowplan creates a private workspace with example pages. With single sign-on, your name, e-mail address and – if available – your profile picture come from the login provider.

> [!TIP]
> If the instance offers a **demo**, you can try Flowplan without an account. The demo gets its own example workspace and is deleted completely when you end it, sign out or after 45 minutes without activity.

## The interface

- **Sidebar** on the left: workspace switcher, search, home, inbox, your spaces with the page tree, and below them templates, media, trash and settings.
- **Home**: recently edited pages, quick starts for a new idea or project, and all pages of your workspace.
- **Header** of a page: path, share, comments, favourite and the **Page actions** menu (`…`).

On a phone the sidebar folds away; the menu icon at the top left opens it.

## Your first page

1. Click **+** next to a space in the sidebar or choose **New page** on the home screen.
2. Choose the type: **Document**, **Database**, **Whiteboard** or **Journal**.
3. Enter a title and start writing. Everything is saved automatically, even without a connection.

In a document, `/` opens the block menu: type `/h2`, `/todo` or `/table` and press Enter to insert. How the editor works in detail is explained under [Documents and the editor](/documents).

## Find instead of search

<kbd>⌘</kbd> <kbd>K</kbd> (Windows/Linux: <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> <kbd>K</kbd>) opens the quick search across titles, text, database records, comments and even the content of uploaded PDFs and Office files. More under [Search, inbox and push](/search-and-notifications).

## Where to go next

- [Pages and spaces](/pages-and-spaces): page tree, favourites, moving and trash.
- [Databases](/databases): tables, boards, calendars and more from the same records.
- [Collaboration and comments](/collaboration): write together, comment, mention.