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In-Class exercise: Github, Markdown, JSON

The intended audience for this class is graduates of Hacking History or other courses making use of GitHub & teaching basic web development skills. However, I recognize that not all students will have acquired all the necessary skills before class. So, let's start with a crash course in three areas:

  • using git and GitHub
  • JSON data structures
  • Markdown test format

TL;DR

In this in-class exercise, each of you will do the following:

  • create a github account and login
  • using the built-in editor on the github website, add a new json file to the directory json-files (see below for deta
  • using the built-in editor on the github website, add a new markdown file to the directory markdown-files
  • optionally upload a picture of yourself to the directory docs/images

Details below.

Understanding Git and GitHub

All modern code development uses Version Control software; all but a tiny percentage use Git for version control; a vast majority of free and open source projects are housed on Github. If you've taken HIS393, then you already have an account; if you're new, please sign up for an account right away.

Once you have an account, you may want to read the quickstart documentation on github to get an introduction to some basic concepts. However, you can do this exercise in class without much deep understanding of how things work. Simply follow the instructions below.

Your Data: JSON

We will start by building a simple [JSON data structure]{(https://www.nylas.com/blog/the-complete-guide-to-working-with-json/) to represent each member of the class. I've already added one for myself, and you're welcome to look at matt.json in the json-files directory. Alternatively, you can simply copy the JSON below and amend it as appropriate:

{
"name": "Your Name",
"email": "[email protected]",
"github": "yourgithubid",
"techskills": 3,
"periods": ["ancient", "medieval", "early modern", "modern", "contemporary"],
"regions": ["Asia", "Europe", "Africa", "North America", "South/Central America", "Oceania"],
"styles": ["political", "diplomatic", "cultural", "social", "intellectual", "economic"],
"picture": "../images/your-image.jpg",
"blurb": "../markdown-files/your-markdown-file.md"
}

Explanation: each line in this file contains some informtion about you which will be used later in a visual display.

  • name and email are self-explanatory.
  • github is your github ID
  • for techskills, rate yourself between 1 star (no skills at all) and 5 stars (ready for an industry job).
  • for periods, regions, and styles, delete all the entries that you don't already have some interest/experience in. If you think I've missed something (e.g., maybe you thnk women's or science or race should be a top-level category in styles), then simply add the missing element in to the appropriate list. Be sure to separate elements by commas, and surround individual names in double quotes, and also make sure your new element is inside the [] brackets.
  • picture should be the path to your picture -- either a relative URL (starting with either ./images or just images) to an image in the images directory, or a full URL to a picture on the web
  • blurb is the relative path to your markdown file, which should be named either yourfirstname.md or yourfirstname-yourlastname.md.

You create the file by navigating to the json-files/ directory and clicking the Add File button near the top right, then choosing Create new file from the drop-down menu. We'll go over the full creation method in class.

Your Description: Markdown

The next and potentially final step is to introduce yourself and your intellectual interests more fully by writing a brief (1-paragraph) self-description. We'll write in the markdown, which gives a imple format for bold, italics links, and other formatting elements. You shouldn't need more than the basics for this assignment. You are welcome to look at matt.md in the markdown-files directory for an example.

When you're done, I'll show you a bit more about how this repository works (those of you who have taken HIS393 won't be especially surprised).