Stage 3 of 6 · Lab, on the lab PC · about 20 minutes

Set up

Three one-time steps: a working git command, your identity attached to it, and a GitHub account. Everything here is typed in a terminal, so we start by opening one.

Open a terminal (just enough for today)

Git is driven by typed commands. On the lab PC (Windows), open PowerShell: Start menu, type powershell, Enter. On macOS it is Terminal; on Linux, any terminal. You type a command at the prompt, press Enter, and read the reply. Four commands cover today's navigation needs:

> cd Documents          # change directory: go into the Documents folder
> mkdir iot-week1       # make a new folder
> cd iot-week1          # go into it
> ls                    # list what is here (works in PowerShell too)

This is a preview, not the terminal week

Week 2 teaches the Linux terminal properly, on the Raspberry Pi, with its own full page. Today you only need cd, mkdir, ls and the git commands; every one is shown where you use it. The Git commands themselves are identical on Windows, macOS, Linux and the Pi, which is precisely why the course teaches them first.

Check or install Git

The lab PCs should already have Git. Verify before installing anything:

> git --version
git version 2.43.0

Any version 2.x is fine for this course. If instead you get "git is not recognized" (Windows) or "command not found", install it:

Windows

Download Git for Windows and run the installer. The default choices are all fine; the one that matters is keeping "Git from the command line" enabled so PowerShell finds it. Close and reopen the terminal afterwards.

macOS / Linux

macOS: run git --version once; if missing, macOS offers to install the command-line tools. Linux: sudo apt install git on Debian/Ubuntu family systems, exactly the apt you will meet in Week 3. All platforms: git-scm.com/downloads.

Tell Git who you are

Every commit is stamped with a name and an email; that stamp is how contributions are traced to people, in this course and everywhere else. Set both once per machine (--global means "for my account on this computer, all repositories"):

> git config --global user.name "Your Name"
> git config --global user.email "you@example.com"

Use your real name; graders and teammates read it in git log.
Use the same email you will register on GitHub with, so GitHub links your commits to your profile. (If you prefer to keep your email private, GitHub offers a noreply address in Settings → Emails; you can switch to it later.)
Quotes matter when there is a space in the value.

Verify anytime; the same command is also the first thing to check when commits come out mislabelled:

> git config --list
user.name=Your Name
user.email=you@example.com
init.defaultbranch=main

Shared lab PCs

The lab PC may remember the previous student's identity. Run git config --list at the start of every lab and re-set the two values if they are not yours; commits with a stranger's name on them cannot be re-attributed after the fact.

One useful default

Older Git versions named the first branch master; the modern convention, and GitHub's default, is main. Make your machine match so tutorials, this hub and your repositories all agree:

> git config --global init.defaultBranch main

Create your GitHub account

Sign up

At github.com/signup, with the same email you configured above. Enable two-factor authentication when prompted; GitHub requires it sooner or later, and sooner is painless.
Choose the username like it will outlive the course

It appears in every repository URL and, plausibly, on your CV. m-tremblay or mariotremblay ages well; xX_darklord420_Xx does not. Changing later is possible but breaks links.
Optional but worthwhile: the Student Developer Pack

As a CEGEP student you qualify for GitHub Education's Student Developer Pack: free private-repository features and a long list of developer tools. Apply with your Vanier email; approval takes a few days and nothing today depends on it.

That is the account. Connecting it to your terminal happens on the Share on GitHub page, at the moment you first push.

Checklist for this stage

A terminal is open and I can cd into a folder I created with mkdir
git --version answers with a 2.x version
git config --list shows my name and email, and init.defaultbranch=main
My GitHub account exists, with a username I would put on a CV, and I can log in

Check yourself

Why does Git demand a name and email before anything else?

They are written into every commit as the author stamp. Without them history is anonymous, and in this course anonymous history means untraceable contributions, which are graded.

What does --global change about a git config command?

The setting applies to your user account on this machine, for every repository, instead of only the repository you are standing in. Identity is naturally global; per-project overrides exist but you will not need them.

You sit down at a lab PC. What is the first Git command worth running, before any work?

git config --list. Shared machines remember the previous student's identity, and commits stamped with the wrong author cannot be relabelled after the fact.

Why should the configured email match the GitHub account's email?

GitHub matches commit emails to accounts. When they agree, your commits show your profile and count as your contributions; when they differ, the work looks like a stranger's.