Refugees Code Prework

Introduction

Welcome to Refugees Code! From now on we'll try to guide you through the fundamentals of web development with the main and only purpose that you can land a job in the IT industry. We'll do our best to help you get a job, but it will also require a lot of work from your side. Bear in mind that we are here to help you, but it depends on your work and motivation.

With the intention that you don't begin the course with no knowledge at all, we've prepared this short introduction to the technologies you'll be using throughout the classes. If through the course of these slides, exercises and explanations you don't understand something, PLEASE 🙏🏼 ask your teacher or mentor, they will be glad to help you on our Slack Channel.

• You can find all the teachers and mentors, together with your classmates at the class channel in Slack, #class-<starting_month>-<starting_year> (eg:#class-nov-2022).
• If you don't know how to use Slack, here is a short introduction:
  • Introduction to Slack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2JuAa6-ors
• We recommend you downloading the Slack application for your laptop OS. Here's how:
  • Ubuntu
  • Windows

We expect you to follow the lessons with care. Try to be creative doing the work you are assigned to ensure that you fully understand what you just read. We expect you to be curious and a little daring. Nobody will get hurt if you try something to see what happens. You will gain many new insights if you do.

Don't be scared to ask questions. We encourage you to be creative trying to find answers to problems. We are also here to dispel any doubts you may get stuck with. Get used to the idea of asking questions when you are stumped.

Every module will have a page looking similar to this one:

1. There will be a short Introduction summarizing the scope of the module.
2. It will be followed by a Goals section listing more precisely the skills and concepts we expect to have covered at the end of it.
3. A Basic Tools section will enumerate the different technologies / applications / tools that will be needed for the success of the module.
4. Then, there will be some content sections, particular to the module you are in. You must read and watch its resources and respond to questions related to what it has been explained.
5. To keep you in shape, there will be some Exercises proposed for you to accomplish, that your teacher will ask you to do.
6. Finally, there will be a Further Reading section, where you will find some more advanced contents that can be interesting for you to read, but are not mandatory.

We will ask you to review exercises from time to time with your teacher. We do this to get a clearer picture of how well you are grasping the basic concepts. Likewise, we want to be able to react quickly to help you if it seems like you are struggling. Do not be afraid of showing your work, you’re not being graded on it. The more we know about your progress the better.

We also encourage collaboration to a certain extent. Feel free to chat with your fellow classmates and share ideas about how to do things. In programming there is rarely only a single solution to a problem, so it can be very beneficial to talk about the possible solutions to a problem, such as you will do in a job environment. However, please do the assignments by yourself and avoid copying. That way we can know more accurately how well you understand something.

The modules you are going to cover in this course are:

• Prework
• Git
• HTML
• CSS
• SASS
• Basic JavaScript
• Midcourse Project
• Advanced JavaScript
• VueJS
• Final Project

Finally, for the online meeting we will be using Jitsi, an open source platform for meetings.

Goals

By the end of this prework introduction, you should:

• Understand and accept our Code of Conduct
• Learn basics of how the web works and a bit of its fascinating history
• Understand what is a front-end developer and what are the responsibilities of the role
• Assimilate what a filesystem is
• Get to know your operating system: Ubuntu
• Learn the basic commands of a Command Line Interface
• Learn how to use a modern text editor like Visual Studio Code
• Understand how to work with a version management system as Git

Sound quite challenging, doesn't it? Don't be daunted by it, you'll always have the support of the teachers and the full team of Refugees Code. Let's go!

Basic tools

To carry out the Prework you won't need anything special, just ensure that you have a modern browser installed. We especially recommend downloading the Firefox Developer Edition browser. This special edition of the Firefox browser incorporates tools specifically designed for developers, as well as incorporating the latest web standards and experimental features.

Ensure that your computer is using Ubuntu as an operating system and has installed a text editor as Visual Studio Code. We will read about them later, but will be part of this course and required in the upcoming modules.