Class 01: Our computers are trainwrecks, welcome to life
In-class summary
We started off with the easy stuff: reviewing the syllabus.
Then we started downloading software, and found out downloading and running software is complicated! The main focus was installing Python with Python Wrangler.
Most of our setup happened on the command line, which was generally new territory. We learned how to run commands on the terminal, what to do when the command line asks for your password, and talked a little bit about package managers (which Homebrew is an example of). We tried to google our way to some solutions, but only learned one thing: never use sudo!
For the command line, Windows people used Cmder while OS X people used Terminal (which we discovered could be hiding bash or zsh). The difference between bash and zsh caused some trouble, especially when pyenv asked us to edit the shell startup files. These startup files are used to set up the PATH variable, so when we type a command the computer knows how to look for it.
Running commands can end up causing trouble sometimes, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Based on what we’re doing (Python? command line? SQL?) we might end up with different prompts that can run completely different commands! We didn’t talk about it during class, but I promise it’s going to be a common problem we run into when working with SQL.
Another thing we didn’t get to was how to run Python scripts from the command line. In your pre-work all you did was type in little boxes! Don’t worry, though, I made a quick video for you.
Homework
For your homework, you’re going to be working on the skills you learned from the Python tutorial, and turning your Terminus abilities into real-life command line powers.
There will also be a quiz about some of the terms we learned and used during class. The material above should get you to the finish line on that one.