What You Need Before You Start

Every setup in this course, on every operating system, comes down to the same four pieces. Nothing else is required to start.

1. 1

   A terminal

   A window where you type commands instead of clicking. It ships with your computer — you do not install it.

   macOS: Terminal. Windows: PowerShell or Windows Terminal. Linux: you already know.

2. 2

   An editor

   Where you read and write code. VS Code is the safe default because almost every AI tool plugs into it.

   Download from code.visualstudio.com. Accept every default in the installer.

3. 3

   Node.js

   The runtime that lets your computer execute JavaScript outside a browser. Most modern web tooling needs it.

   Download the LTS version from nodejs.org. LTS means long-term support, i.e. the boring stable one.

4. 4

   Git and a GitHub account

   Git records versions of your work so any change can be undone. GitHub stores those versions online.

   macOS may offer to install Git the first time you type git; on Windows, download it from git-scm.com. Sign up for GitHub at github.com.

The terminal feels intimidating because it gives no hints. In practice you will use about five commands over and over. Open your terminal and try each one.

$ pwd$ ls$ cd Documents$ mkdir my-first-app$ cd my-first-app

In order: pwd prints where you currently are. ls lists what is here. cd moves you into a folder (cd .. moves back out). mkdir makes a new folder. That is most of it.

Every install should be verified rather than assumed. Each of these prints a version number if the tool is present.

$ node --version$ npm --version$ git --version

You want three version numbers. If any command reports command not found, that tool did not install — reopen your terminal first, then reinstall it if the message persists.

You do not need to understand Git deeply to benefit from it. You need to understand one idea: Git takes a snapshot of your project whenever you ask, and you can return to any snapshot later. That is what makes it safe to let an AI change twenty files at once.

Tell Git who you are, once per computer:

$ git config --global user.name "Your Name"$ git config --global user.email "[email protected]"

Then, inside a project folder, the loop you will repeat forever:

$ git init$ git add .$ git commit -m "Describe what changed"

init starts tracking this folder. add stages your current changes. commit saves the snapshot with a message.

Most readers are not starting from zero. If you already have two of the four, the honest move is to verify what you have rather than reinstall it out of caution.