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Unit 1: Overview and Setup

This introductory unit answers the following questions

  • What is the goal of the course, what are we covering?
  • Why is it important to learn the missing skills, what do you get out of it?
  • What are the important applications for the course?

And introduces the following concepts

  • Secure Shell Protocol (SSH) and (for Windows users) Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL), and how to set them up
  • How to navigate the unix file system using file manager/finder/etc.
  • What are files, what are directories, opening files, making new files
  • common file types (.txt, .py, .sh, .pdf, .png/jpg)

This unit is intended to be a gentle introduction to UNIX, demonstrating how to navigate common applications, view your files in a graphical application, and how your files are structured.

There is an optional reading that goes into how information is stored on your computer, how certain files formats encode their data, what file metadata is. Non future content depends on this reading, and it is intended for students interested in learning more.