Skip to content

High-Level Guide: Making Small Changes to a GitHub Pages Website

This guide provides some very high-level instructions of how to make changes to github.io webpages using only the browser. The CAKEbox is using this technology, but also CAKE itself or SHAREing.

Most people will prefer to use git access directly, but sometimes a quick change through the web is what you want.

First Time Setup

  1. Create a GitHub account.
  2. Log in to GitHub.
  3. In the Find a repository… field (top left), type the repository name (for GitHub Pages, this is the URL without https://, e.g., cake-dri.github.io).
  4. This repository will now appear on your left sidebar whenever you log in.

Editing a File

  1. Select the repository/project you want to edit.
  2. Navigate to the file you want to change.
  3. Click the pen icon in the top right (“Edit this file”).
  4. Make your changes in the browser editor.
  5. If prompted, create a new branch or fork. Give it a meaningful name — this is where your changes will live.
  6. Click Commit changes to save them to your branch/fork. These changes will not yet appear on the live website.

You can experiment freely; every commit updates your branch/fork. When ready, you can submit your changes to the main site.

Publishing Changes to the Website

To update the live site, create a pull request:

  1. Click Pull requests at the top of the repository page.
  2. Select New pull request.
  3. Set the repository's main branch as the base.
  4. Select your branch/fork for the comparison.
  5. Click Create pull request.
  6. Give your pull request a clear title and click Create pull request again to submit it.

The repository owner can now review and merge your changes to the live site.

Further reading

Most pages on github.io use Markdown syntax - although you can also use HTML. A good resource to learn more about Markdown is https://www.markdownguide.org/getting-started.