Last updated October 24, 2026
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Boards Guide
Create a board, choose its layout, populate the canvas and nest layers inside it. Boards explains the concepts behind each step.
Create a board
Open the board listing and click Create Board. The sheet asks for:
The new board goes in the folder you started from.
Set the layout
The first time you open a new board, Configure Layout appears instead of the canvas. Its defaults are already picked, so Apply Layout Settings is usually enough. To customize it:
Step 1 — layout type. Dashboard for a grid, Page for a scrollable column.
Step 2 — dimensions. Dashboard offers Full width, 2XL, XL, LG, or Custom with a width and height. Page offers Narrow, Standard, Wide, Full width, or Custom with a width.
Step 3 — section template. The template sets the board's internal structure: single diagram, title with content, header/content/footer, columns, and more.
You choose the layout once: nothing in the portal changes it afterwards. Decide between dashboard and page before you populate the board. To switch later, create a new board and rebuild it.
Populate the canvas
The tool rail on the left of the canvas adds elements by click or by drag. Click a tool, such as Node, Container or Text, to add one at the centre of the view, or drag it to where it belongs. The narrow arrow beside a tool opens its archetypes, with a Search archetype box, and the arrow beside Decorate opens the decoration kinds. An entry there adds the same way, and the new element arrives selected.
To add at a particular spot, right-click empty canvas to open the element menu. Below the copy and paste actions are three lists: Apps, Nodes and Containers. Point to one to open it; its search box narrows the list by name, description or tag.
The Nodes list holds Basic Node and every node archetype in your library. The Containers list holds Basic Container and every container archetype. Use an archetype whenever one fits, since it brings its styling, containment rules, fields and standards. See Archetypes.
Choose an app type under Apps, in the element menu or in the rail's Apps palette, and name it. ProvenMap adds the node, its child app board and the repo binding in one step. Where the board can't hold an app, Apps is greyed out and says why when you point to it.
Drag from one node's handle to another's to connect them. Click an element to edit its name, description, documentation, tags and the fields its archetype expects. Canvas Editing covers selection, shortcuts, copy and paste across boards and the style painter; press ? for shortcuts.
Nodes and edges can also come from a governing source: a plugin push, or ProvenMap working from a bound document in chat. In chat, ProvenMap can draft a board from a Confluence or Notion page connected in Settings → Connectors. It then offers to keep the page on the board as a reference source. See Provider Sources.
An empty board also offers Import diagram: a Mermaid diagram, a graph JSON file or a board you exported earlier, with each element given an archetype from your catalogue. See Import and export.
Nest a layer
Any node can hold a child layer, a full board inside it.
Right-click a node, choose Create Subsystem Layer and name the layer. Click the node's drill-down indicator to open it. Use the breadcrumb to open an ancestor and Map to open the board map.
Three ways a board appears
Make it an app
Right-click a system node and choose Make this an app, or choose it from the board bar inside a layer. The command binds a repo as the governing source and turns the layer into an app board with a hub, six facets and, once routes are extracted, Pages. A node without a layer gets one in the same step.
Where binding isn't allowed, the menu item is greyed out and says why. App boards can't nest, so that includes any node with an app above or below it.
The command asks for the app type, the branch and whether the app is new or already exists, then registers a code-plugin source named after the board. Connecting Sources covers connecting the plugin.
Managing boards from the listing
From a board card's ⋯ menu:
The board bar's ⋯ menu also has Share to Slack…, which posts the board to a public channel. See Automations.
Group boards into folders from the workspace sidebar. Workspaces & Organizations covers the tree and its filters.
You can't delete the Root Board or change its type.
What's next
Canvas Editing
Shortcuts, selection modes, clipboard, and the style painter.
App Boards & Hubs
Bind a repo and your board gets a hub of its own.
Archetypes
The element library you populate the canvas from.
Connecting Sources
Bind real material to a board: a repo, a wiki, or a tracker.
Publishing Boards
Share a finished board with people who'll never open the portal.