[In the initial setup tutorial](user-setup.md), you created a Github repository called `zmk-config`. This repository is a discrete filesystem which works
with the main `zmk` firmware repository to build your desired firmware. The main advantage of a discrete configuration folder is ensuring that the
working components of ZMK are kept separate from your personal keyboard settings, reducing the amount of file manipulation in the configuration process.
This makes flashing ZMK to your keyboard much easier, especially because you don't need to keep an up-to-date copy of zmk on your computer at all times.
After making any changes you want, you should commit the changes and then push them to GitHub. That will trigger a new
GitHub Actions job to build your firmware which you can download once it completes.
:::note
If you need to, a review of [Learn The Basics Of Git In Under 10 Minutes](https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/learn-the-basics-of-git-in-under-10-minutes-da548267cc91/) will help you get these steps right.
[As outlined here](development/build-flash.md), firmware comes in the form of .uf2 files, which can be built locally using the command `west build`. Normally,
`west build` will default to using the in-tree .keymap and .conf files found in your local copy of the `zmk` repository. However, you can append the command, `-DZMK_CONFIG="C:/the/absolute/path/config"` to `west build` in order to use the contents of your `zmk-config` folder instead of the
You can build additional keyboards with GitHub actions by appending them to `build.yml` in your `zmk-config` folder. For instance assume that we have set up a Corne shield with nice!nano during [initial setup](user-setup.md) and we want to add a Lily58 shield with nice!nano v2. The following is an example `build.yaml` file that would accomplish that:
```
include:
- board: nice_nano
shield: corne_left
- board: nice_nano
shield: corne_right
- board: nice_nano_v2
shield: lily58_left
- board: nice_nano_v2
shield: lily58_right
```
In addition to updating `build.yaml`, Lily58's shield files should also be added into the `config` sub-folder inside `zmk-config` together with your Corne files, e.g.: