Getting to know The Shell Almighty,
and some really good friends
December the 11th in year 2014
So, I've started Dev Bootcamp this Monday. I've been waiting for this for quite a while, and now I'm here. Yeah baby! It's Thursday today, and I'm mostly done with my challenges for the week, so I can write about it a bit. I like things to be organised, so I'll start at the beginning.
For the first challenge I needed to do a really cool online course to help me get more familiar with the super powerful mega awesome PowerShell. I mean Terminal. I mean Prompt. I mean Command Line. Well, one of those. I was actually kind of familiar with it, because I've gotten through the same course a couple of months before, but it's always good to refresh your memory. It really helped to go through it again, as most of the challenges that followed were related to the Shell, and I needed to know the commands.
Ah, the commands. Where have you been all my life?
I'm only a beginner, but they make me feel so powerful. Like, "Dude, I actually know what to write in here." powerful. You know that sort of power, right? I know, it's awesome! I made a quick list of them, so I have a place to check them out if I find myself in need.
Next it was time to prep my computer for the challenges that lay ahead. Fortunately I had some equipment already set up, but I still had to install Chocolatey, Rspec, Node and SQLite in addition to Sublime, Ruby and Git. I had some issues with SQLite on Windows computer, but Linux went smooth.
Once I was all set up, I was ready to take on a real challenge: Version control. I know what you're thinking. WTF!? Right? I was thinking the same thing, but it turns out this Version control thingy is pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty cool thingy. To my even bigger surprise, I had this awesome tool already installed on my computer. I know, crazy. But I'm not ready to get into my ignorance right now. It so happens that months ago when I was struggling learning Ruby on Rails on my own, I followed a course that said I'll need it. So I installed it. And then forget about it. You know. As you do, … with things that you count on, to shape your future.
Ok, so even if I already had it installed, I knew basically nothing about it, except that it's called "git". And there's a web page that out there called GitHub.com, and that supposedly they are best friends. And that was it.
Battling my challenges I learned what the difference between them is and their basic use. Git is what you have installed on your own local machine. It is like a dude who you give some documents and he looks over every single thing that’s going on with them. You tell him to take care of them, and he does. He really does. He'll keep note of all the changes that were ever made, and let you go back to big bang of your document, as long as you commit to him. And you keep doing that for every change. He'll also make you a mirrored version of your document called branch. Hell, you can have as many branches as you want, and do with them whatever you want, while your master document is safely standing in front of the mirror.
Git takes his job very seriously. He really does. He'll guard your documents and all its information with his life. Only thing you need to do is to know how to talk to him. And this is where the Shell comes in. Yeap! No GUI goofing! You’re dealing with the big boys now!
Now, what about that best friend of his, what's the name Git something? Yes, GitHub.com. It's a web page, as you can probably figure out from his name. Well, Git and GitHub.com really are best buddies. What Git is doing for you on your computer, GitHub.com is doing on the internet. It allows you to talk to other peoples Git-s and their documents. You can check them out, make your own branch of them, and even make changes and suggest them to the owner. If he likes them, he can merge his document with your changes. Just one dude you only know by his GitHub.com username can incorporate your knowledge in his document. How cool is that!!! Well I'll tell ya! It's pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty cool!