Sessions need a laptop or desktop.
If you’re on your phone now, that’s fine. Enrol now and we’ll email you a link so you can pick up when you’re at a computer.
Git and GitHub · Foundations
Publish a project on GitHub with a history you can defend.
What you’ll end up with
One finished public repository. A small project with an ignore file that keeps credentials out, a history where every commit says why, one merge resolved by hand, one pull request opened and merged, a readme, and a release tag.
11
hours in all — about 7½ guided, 3½ on your own
6
sessions. Each designed to be completed in one sitting
Free
No payment and no card required.
Finishing gives you a completion record showing the work you built, and all three levels earn the Alongrail Certificate in Git and GitHub. See what you’ll build →
You don’t need prior experience with Git. There’s no payment and no card required.
From two raw files to a finished repository
0175 min
Get Git running, and record something
Git installed, your name and your default branch set once for every repository you will ever make, the project folder under version control, and one commit whose contents you chose.
02135 min
What belongs in a repository, and what never does
The staging area used on purpose, an ignore file with a reason on every line, the bench notes taken back out of Git's keeping, the price list and the site recorded, and the courier account still nowhere near the history.
03135 min
A branch, a conflict, and a merge you understand
A second line of work made and worked on, a conflict produced on purpose, read, abandoned once to prove you can, then resolved by hand, and a history whose shape you can explain to somebody else.
04100 min
Put it on GitHub
An empty repository made on the website, your six commits pushed to it, the sign-in done once, and a clear head about exactly who can see what you have just published.
05110 min
The way a team changes a file
A change made on a branch and sent, a pull request opened, read and merged on the website, the branch tidied away at both ends, and the merged work back on your own machine.
06105 min
History you can defend, and a release
The history searched three ways, the three undos and the one question that tells them apart, a readme a stranger can use, and a tagged release on the repository anybody can open.
What you need before you start
A laptop or desktop
Sessions need a laptop or desktop. If you’re on your phone now, that’s fine. Enrol now and we’ll email you a link so you can pick up when you’re at a computer. Windows 10 or Windows 11, or a Mac.
Chrome or Edge
Alongrail runs in the browser, beside Git.
The course files
Everything you work with is in the download.
What’s free
The whole course: every session, both parts, the files, and your record. Alongrail charges nothing for it. No payment, and no card at any point.
The software
None. Git is free and open source, and a GitHub account is free. There is no card, no trial clock and no paid tier anywhere in this level.
The data you’ll work with
Every file is invented — the companies, the people and everything in them are made up for the course.
Before you start
The course covers Git, on your own computer.
- Windows 10 or Windows 11, or a Mac
- A browser, to run Alongrail while Git runs in its own window, and to open GitHub
- Any plain text editor you already have and know how to save a file in. You will not be asked to install one, and you will never be asked to write code
- A free GitHub account, made before session one at the GitHub website — an email address and a password, no card and no work email
- The project bundle bracken-fell-project.zip, downloaded from the course page and unzipped into a folder of its own that you chose and can find again
- The on-your-own bundle harlow-reed-project.zip, downloaded from the course page and unzipped into a second folder of its own, so that two sets of files with identical names can never be confused for each other
- One thing to know before you start: what you publish to GitHub in session four is visible to anyone who has the link. GitHub's own words are that public repositories are accessible to everyone on the internet. Both workshops in this course are invented, their prices are generated, and the account details the project ships are a made-up string for a service that does not exist — which is exactly why it is safe to publish. Nothing real of yours goes in here
- Not a rebase course. Rebasing, interactive rebase, cherry-pick, stash, reset and the reflog are the level after this one, where the track puts them and where every syllabus surveyed puts them.
- No graphical client. Every one of them hides the staging area, which is the idea this level exists to teach.
- Not an Actions, Codespaces or Copilot course. Those are separate products with separate credentials and they are not Git.
- You never fork anybody's project here. Forking needs a stranger's repository and teaches a social protocol built over a skill you are still learning; it opens the level after this one.
- Everything you publish is public. That is the trade for a free tool with a real audience, and it is why this course ships two invented workshops and nothing else.
Alongrail teaches the software and gives you a record of what you built, with a link to the work itself. What happens with it afterwards is yours. We don’t place people and we take no part in anyone’s recruitment process.
Enrol free and start now.
Sign in, confirm the one thing the course needs, and session 1 opens. No payment, and no card at any point.
If something goes wrong on the way, press “Something’s wrong” in the panel, or write to hello@alongrail.com — we reply within one working day.
Frequently asked questions
What you build
Start with a folder of loose files belonging to an invented workshop and finish with that project on GitHub at a link you can send anyone, with a history a stranger can read, a conflict you made and resolved yourself, credentials that never reached the internet, and a tagged release.
A public GitHub repository holding a small project — a price list, a one-page site, and an ignore file that keeps the workshop's credentials and scratch files out — with a history whose every commit says why it happened, one merge you resolved by hand, one pull request you opened and merged, a readme that tells a stranger how to use the thing, and a release tag. The repository's address is what your completion record points at.
How a session works
- Open Git
- Share your screen
- One instruction
- You do it
- It confirms it
- Next
You open Git and share your screen. Alongrail reads what’s there and gives you one instruction. You do it. It confirms the step landed, then gives you the next one. If something doesn’t match what you see, one button gets you back on track.
Guided
In the Fields list, tick Region. The chart fills in.
One field on the axis, one measure as the value.
then
On your owna different company’s data
Same job, a different company's files. Alongrail stays quiet until you ask.
Guided, then on your own.
The second part of every session uses a different company’s data, with the same kind of mess in different places. Alongrail stays quiet until you ask. It’s the work your record points to.
About 11 hours in all·about 7½ guided·about 3½ on your own
What you earn — the record, the certificate and a sample
Completion record
- Name
- Your name
- Course
- Git and GitHub Foundations — a project of yours, on GitHub, with a history you can defend
- Completed
- The date you finish
- Project
- The repository you built on your own →
- Skills demonstrated
- Version control from the command line · Deliberate staging, and commit messages a stranger can navigate by · Keeping credentials and scratch files out of a repository · Branching, merging, and resolving a conflict by hand · Publishing to a remote, and understanding what publishing means · Working through a pull request · Reading a history three ways · Undoing safely, and knowing which undo applies · Tagging a release
What was built
A public GitHub repository holding a small project — a price list, a one-page site, and an ignore file that keeps the workshop's credentials and scratch files out — with a history whose every commit says why it happened, one merge you resolved by hand, one pull request you opened and merged, a readme that tells a stranger how to use the thing, and a release tag. The repository's address is what your completion record points at.
The 6 sessions, and when each was completed on their own
Each session was completed twice: once with step-by-step guidance on one company’s data, then on a second company’s data from a brief, with guidance only when asked. Every check passed on both. Alongrail records the sessions, the checks and the dates; the dashboard itself is the learner’s own, hosted where they chose.
A completion record for Git Foundations, now. It names the course, the date you finished, the skills you demonstrated, and links the repository you built on your own. It’s private until you publish it, and you can unpublish it at any time.
The record is a description of work you did, not a claim about you. Anyone who opens it can see the work for themselves.
The Alongrail Certificate in Git and GitHub when all three levels are complete. Foundations is the first of three. Practitioner and Professional are in development, with no dates. See the track →
How this relates to a certification — the course covers the core version control and repository skills assessed in GitHub's Foundations credential. It is not preparation for that credential — three of its seven areas are products this course never opens — and its fee is separate and paid to the vendor.
Your screen stays yours
It looks when you ask. Never otherwise. Images of your screen are not stored. What Alongrail sees →
Nothing you build is public until you publish it. Your record is private until you say so, and you can unpublish it at any time.
What’s Git?
Git is the software this course is built in. It runs on your own computer.
You won’t learn it by watching hours of tutorials. You’ll learn it by building something real with it.
Who you’re building it for
Bracken & Fell is a two-bench bookbinding workshop in Leeds. It binds notebooks and journals, makes boxes and portfolios, and repairs books other people have given up on.
Everything the workshop knows about its own prices lives in a folder on one computer. There is a price list, a one-page website nobody has touched in a year, a file of bench notes, an old backup of the website that a text editor wrote by itself, and a file holding the account details for the courier the workshop books through.
Six months ago somebody changed a price on the printed card and not in the folder, and a customer was quoted two different numbers for the same box. Last month the folder was copied to a second computer and now nobody is sure which copy is current.
The workshop wants three things: one copy of the truth, a record of who changed what and why, and a version of the price list that can be sent to a customer without sending the courier account with it.
Your job is to build the repository that answers it.
Do I need to know Git already?
No. The course assumes you’ve never opened it.
What if I get stuck?
Press the button in the panel and say what you see. Alongrail works out where you actually are and picks the instruction back up.
Why 11 hours, when other courses are 40?
Because the time is spent doing the work rather than watching it. About 7½ hours is guided; the rest is you building the same thing again on your own.
What does Alongrail see on my screen?
Only the window you choose to share, and only when you ask it to look. Images of your screen are not stored by Alongrail. What Alongrail sees →
Can I use a Mac?
Yes. Git runs on Windows and macOS.
What if I miss a week?
Nothing closes. The dates are there to help you keep moving, not to catch you out.
Does this prepare me for a certification exam?
Covers the core version control and repository skills assessed in GitHub's Foundations credential. It is not preparation for that credential — three of its seven areas are products this course never opens — and its fee is separate and paid to the vendor. Alongrail is not an exam provider.
What’s the “on your own” part?
The second half of every session: the same work on a different company’s data, with Alongrail quiet unless you ask. Both parts are needed for your completion record.
Is it really free?
Yes. No payment, and no card at any point.
Who can see what I build?
Nobody, until you say so. Your record is private until you publish it, and you can unpublish it at any time. What you build stays in your own files or account; where a step publishes something to the software’s own site, the step says so and says who can see it.
Where this course sits
Git and GitHub Foundations is Foundations in Git. The track has three levels; each one you complete earns its own record, and all of them together earn the Alongrail Certificate in Git and GitHub. All the courses →