Introduction to Version Control

Session 01

Starts at:

October 18 2024 (10:15 am)

Slides Chapter Exercises

This session

In this session, you will complete the following tasks:

  1. Complete the pre-course survey.
  2. Read the chapter “Introduction” of the Version Control Book.
  3. Check whether you have achieved the learning objectives.
  4. After the session: complete the homework.

Homework

Check if you have Git and / or a command line installed. For detailed instructions for Windows and macOS users, see the chapter “Installation” of the Version Control Book.

Learning objectives

At the end of this session, you should be able to answer the following questions and / or achieve the following learning objectives:

💡 You know what version control is.
💡 You can argue why version control is useful (for research).
💡 You can name benefits of Git compared to other approaches to version control.
💡 You can explain the difference between Git and GitHub.

Slides

To print the slides to PDF, do the following:

  1. Toggle into Print View using the E key (or using the Navigation Menu).
  2. Open the in-browser print dialog (CTRL/CMD+P).
  3. Change the Destination setting to Save as PDF.
  4. Change the Layout to Landscape.
  5. Change the Margins to None.
  6. Enable the Background graphics option.
  7. Click Save.

Note: This feature has been confirmed to work in Google Chrome, Chromium as well as in Firefox.

Here’s what the Chrome print dialog would look like with these settings enabled:

Screenshot of Chrome print dialog with the first slide/page of 43 shown on the left, and print options on the right. The Destination print option has Save as PDF selected.

These instructions were copied from the Quarto documentation (MIT License) and slightly modified.

Email

Dear course participant,

You are receiving this email because you have signed up for the course “Track, organize and share your work: An introduction to Git for research”, taking place this Winter semester 2024/25 (October to January), Fridays, 10:15 - 11:45 (90 Minutes), at University of Hamburg & Erasmus University Rotterdam. We are excited that you have signed up for this course and can’t wait to delve into the world of version control with you! Our first session takes place next Friday, October 18, 2024, from 10:15 to 11:45 online via Zoom (see access details below).

Compared to previous versions of this course, which were held in person at the University of Hamburg, this semester’s course is special. Supported by funding from the International Office at the University of Hamburg, this course will take place fully online, with participants from both the University of Hamburg and our partner institution, Erasmus University Rotterdam. Students from both universities, Hamburg and Rotterdam, will come together in this online course, thereby not only having the opportunity to learn about effective version control and collaboration with Git but also getting to know each other and strengthening the intercultural and academic exchange between the partner institutions. In order to tailor the course to your prior experience and needs, we have prepared a survey with a few questions. Please complete the survey before our first session, ideally by Thursday evening (October 17, 2024). This will give us enough time to review your responses before our first session on Friday. In total, the survey should take about 20 minutes (not much longer).

The survey can be accessed here: https://version-control-intro.formr.org

A few technical remarks about the survey: The survey will ask you for two codewords: a personal codeword and a course codeword.

The personal codeword is used to associate your responses with a unique identifier. This will allow us to identify and relate your responses across all surveys used in the course while ensuring anonymity. By providing a personal codeword, you will allow us to draw more detailed insights from your responses that will help us improve the course for you. The survey will contain an explanation at the beginning on how to generate your personal codeword. For students at University of Hamburg: The surveys are part of your mandatory course work. We will later use your personal codeword to confirm the completion of all mandatory surveys. More details about this procedure will be shared in our first course session.

The course codeword is used to tag your responses as coming from a course participant at University of Hamburg & Erasmus University Rotterdam. We might also use the survey to collect responses from participants in other course settings. The course codeword therefore allows us to distinguish responses from different course settings.

The course codeword is: -------- (course password will be announced during the course).

Please note that you might be asked for the codewords repeatedly. This is not an error in the survey but the result of combining separate smaller surveys into a longer one. If this happens, please just enter the personal and course codeword again.

Further information about the course can be found on our course website: https://lennartwittkuhn.com/version-control-course-uhh-eur-ws24.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact us directly via email.

We are looking forward to seeing you for the first session on Monday!

Best wishes,

Lennart Wittkuhn (Instructor) & Ana Martinovici (Teaching Collaborator)