Congratulations on your acceptance into Code Platoon - we are excited to have you! This pre-work program will prepare you for the challenge of our immersive bootcamp and ultimately for a professional role as a DevOps engineer. This document will outline all the things you need to do in order to be prepared on the first day. Please read through it carefully and let us know if you have any questions.
Code Platoon’s mission is to train military veterans and their spouses into professional DevOps engineers. The traditional approach to becoming a DevOps engineer usually begins with graduating from a 4 year university program in computer science, and then working as a backend engineer for a few years. We’re trying to teach you the necessary skills in 4 months. In order to accomplish this, our course focuses on project-based learning, applied skills, and the the practical tools of the trade.
The software industry generally, and, the DevOps industry, is a world of applied skills. Conceptual knowledge is critical, but ultimately the industry evaluates you by what you can do. In technical interviews for DevOps roles you will have to demonstrate applied knowledge -- technical interview are auditions. What the DevOps industry cares about is, “Can you deploy this codebase?”
Our course will teach you the core skills necessary to accomplish this task, and, we will teach some of the fundamental technologies and concepts which will become the foundation of your career as you continue to learn and grow.
In order to accomplish this, we ask and require of you to be proactive, to ask questions, to aim for mastery, to work as a team with your fellow students and instructors, and, be focused.
The success of Code Platoon is directly correlated with our alumni’s success. We do not wish to see any student fail. As such, we expect you to complete a set of pre-work to prove to us you are ready to participate in the full time program.
We expect you to be both responsive and organized in communicating with your instructors and to complete a course of pre-work material on your own to prove to us you possess a solid foundation of knowledge and self-reliance we can build upon in the full time course.
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Be responsive on Slack and via email. Slack is our preferred form of communication so download it on your computer and/or on your phone. Use it to communicate with each other separately, not just for "public" announcements.
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Dedicate at least 10-15 hours a week for the next 4 weeks to accomplishing the pre-work material.
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There will be mandatory weekly meetings where you will check in with your instructors
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Separately, we will have optional weekly office hours where you can come to ask any questions you may have
For pre-work, you will be expected to watch the online tutorials we suggest, attend weekly group video conferences, and solve programming challenges on CoderByte. Additionally, over the full course of the pre-work you will be expected to complete the AWS SkillBuilder Cloud Practitioner course in preparation for the certification exam. At the end of the prework, you will have a live technical assessment with one of our instructors.
The pre-work includes some programming assignments you can complete in CoderByte. CoderByte is a service that tests your Python coding knowledge. Please note that CoderByte will default your programming language to JavaScript but you can choose Python3 via a dropdown.
If you are able to write Python code and run it locally on your machine, continue to do so. If you aren't sure how to get Python set up on your local machine, you can use Replit.com. Replit is a service that allows you to write and execute code in the browser. First, visit the site and create a new account, which is free. This is a great resource to help you practice your coding skills. You can (and should) copy and paste the challenges from CoderByte into Repl.it so you can see your code running in real time and experiment, and when you feel ready you can submit the code on CoderByte. Here is a Replit tutorial.
Before you officially start Code Platoon, you need to pass our Technical Assessment. This will occur after Week 4 of the pre-work (or earlier if you think you’re ready). You will schedule to meet with one of our instructors remotely and they will give you a link to answer a set of multiple choice questions. Finally there will be a coding challenge to solve. Both of these assessments will happen in front of the instructor. This is to ensure that you are proficient enough to attend Code Platoon.
You should be able to complete the pre-work in any computer web browser.
This course has two types of learning material. The first is provided by AWS as an official course and certification to prove essential knowledge about the field of cloud computing and is not technically-oriented (i.e. no programming background required). The second will be provided by Code Platoon to add to this understanding with basic programming proficiency that we will expect you to walk in with day 1.
In order to complete the pre-work you will be required to acquire an AWS Cloud Practitioner certification, which is a certification that expects no pre-knowledge but will get you up to speed on AWS as a platform and the basics of cloud computing. You can learn more about the exam and schedule it here.
To help you prepare for the certification exam we strongly recommend you take the official AWS SkillBuilder course AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials. We will be assigning modules (which include videos and short multiple choice quizzes) from this course as part of the pre-work with your ultimate goal being to pass the certification exam.
In conjunction or as an alternative to the AWS SkillBuilder Course, interactive tutorial/game AWS CloudQuest: Cloud Practictioner is also quite good and will have you provision actual AWS Services. We recommend at minimum trying the initial levels of the game to see which approach you prefer.
For tutorial videos and articles, take notes. The physical act of taking notes has been shown to increase retention of information.
For tutorials involving writing code or using the command line, code along, and, take the time to research & understand what you are doing as you go.
Everything covered here is something you will use.
We'll have an intro call during this first week where we will outline what’s expected over the next 4-6 weeks and to show you what resources you have at your disposal. An email will be sent out with the date and time of this Intro call and how to join.
- A great 5 minute high level overview
- A slightly more technical intro covering basic server architecture
- An overview of backend web development
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 1 - Introduction to AWS. This covers the basics of 'the internet' and the use cases for cloud computing.
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 2 - Compute in the Cloud. This covers the client-server model and EC2.
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 3 - Global Infrastrucute and Reliability. This covers the selling point for AWS as a globally distrubuted network.
- What is a REST API?
- Intro to databases
- A slightly more in-depth explanation of a relational database (SQL)
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 4 - Networking
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 5 - Storage & Databases
- Scrimba interactive Python tutorial
- Code Platoon written tutorial - intro
- Code Platoon written tutorial - intermediate
- Object Oriented Programming in Python
- Mandatory CoderByte Assessment
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 6 - Security
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 7 - Monitoring & Analytics
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 8 - Pricing & Support
Note to applicants: From module 6 on the AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials course is not especially aligned with the weekly pre-work, but it's necessary to continue the course in preparation for the certification exam.
- Introduction to The Command Line
- Command Line tutorial
- Download Visual Studio Code
- Intro to VS Code
- Intro to Git & Github
- Git vs Github: What's the Difference?
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 9 - Migration & Innovation
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 10 - The Cloud Journey
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Module 11 - The Cloud Journey
- Complete AWS Cloud Practioner Essentials Final Assessment (practice exam)
- Schedule and take the AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification
- Schedule a time with the instructors to take the final live technical/coding assessment. This must be completed by April 10, 2023
Windows users - install wsl
- Terminal Tutor - learn the command line interactively
- Linux Survival - a beginner-friendly, interactive command line tutorial
- Terminus - a beginner-friendly, interactive command line tutorial game
- Background reading on Terminus
- Read about SSH
- Set up an SSH key with your Github Account
Note to applicants: We only included one resource here but it is a great one! It is unlikely you will have enough time to complete it, but it is a great place to focus your efforts until the course begins.
- [A more advanced shell scripting tutorial](https://missing.csail.mit.edu/2020/shell-tools/_
It’s okay to be nervous and to not understand everything. We’re not here to leave you high and dry when things get tough. These check-ins will be about 1 hour long and will be conducted via Zoom or Google Meet. Bring all of your questions and concerns to these meetings and get support with the pre-work. It is also a way for your instructors to assess your progress, so come prepared to write code and answer questions.
We will be conducting weekly office hours where the instructors will answer any questions you have up until that point and also review a coding challenge to help you understand the thought process of a DevOps engineer.
The best way to reach us is via Slack @chandradeoarya or @AdamCahan. You can also email us at chandra@codeplatoon.org or adam@codeplatoon.org. Please let us know if you have any questions!