Programming basics

Optional, and at your own pace. For complete beginners, or anyone rusty. If you write code for a living, skip to Module 1.

You don't need a computer science degree for this course. You need enough to read code, change it, and notice when something's wrong. This module gives you exactly that, and nothing more.

What you'll build

Ridgeline's marketing team pastes 300 product descriptions into a spreadsheet and asks:

"Which ones are too short for the new store theme?"

Nobody wants to read 300 descriptions. By the end of this module you'll have written a small program that answers it in a second, saved it to GitHub, and opened your first pull request: the way developers propose a change.

How it works

It teaches programming, not a language. Every idea is shown in Python and in JavaScript, side by side, so you can see that the idea stays the same and only the spelling changes. Read both; pick one for the exercises. Either is fine.

Steps 1–6 run right here in your browser: no installing. Steps 7 and 8 move to your own computer, so do Get set up steps 1–4 before you reach them.

Take breaks between steps. Each one ends with a small task: do it before moving on, even if it feels easy. Typing it yourself is how it sticks.