> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.ironoctopus.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Where your code lives

> Who owns your code, where Iron Octopus keeps it, how branches and releases work, and how to take it with you.

You own your code: everything Iron Octopus builds for you belongs to you. Iron Octopus keeps it in a repository it manages for each project, so you don't need a GitHub account or a developer to start, and you can take the code to your own GitHub whenever you like.

## Where it's kept

When you create a [project](https://docs.ironoctopus.ai/building-blocks/projects.md), Iron Octopus creates a private repository for it. These repositories are hosted on GitHub, on Iron Octopus's account, and managed entirely by Iron Octopus. You don't log in to them or manage access to them. Project settings › **Repositories** shows the project's repository.

## How branches work

| Branch | What's on it | Who changes it |
| - | - | - |
| Main | Your released code: every feature that's been released, and nothing else. | Only a release merges into it. |
| Feature branch | One feature's work in progress. Each feature gets its own, named after the feature, such as `work/cancel-a-booking-…`. | Iron Octopus, while it builds the feature's work items. |

Work never reaches the main branch until you release it. [Releasing](https://docs.ironoctopus.ai/build/release-a-feature.md) creates a pull request from the feature branch and merges it into main. If two features change the same code, the second release stops on the conflict instead of overwriting the first.

## Take your code with you

You can copy your code to a GitHub repository you own at any time:

* **Export** a feature's code, with its history, to a branch in your repository. See [export the code](https://docs.ironoctopus.ai/build/feature-history.md#export-the-code).
* **Import** a branch from your repository into Iron Octopus, for example to bring in an existing app. See [import a branch](https://docs.ironoctopus.ai/build/feature-history.md#import-a-branch).

Both need GitHub connected to your workspace. See [connect GitHub](https://docs.ironoctopus.ai/code/connect-github.md).

## If you leave

When your subscription ends, you have 30 days to export your code. Iron Octopus will help you move the repositories to an account you control if you ask. After that, your code and content are deleted from Iron Octopus's systems within a further 30 days, and from backups within 90 days. See [security](https://docs.ironoctopus.ai/security/overview.md).

## What Iron Octopus doesn't do with your code

* It doesn't use it to train AI models, and it doesn't let its AI providers train on it.
* It doesn't deploy it. Releasing adds a feature to the main branch. Deploying your app is up to you.
* It doesn't push to your own repositories unless you export to them.


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