Course Materials

We’ve collected and listed the materials you will need to succeed in this series. We will walk you through installing and using any software listed here.

Software and Tools

GitHub: GitHub is a version control platform that enables collaboration and facilitates the simplification of static site generation through their GitHub Pages service.

GitHub Desktop: The GitHub Desktop client simplifies version control and makes it easier to move between a remote and local repository.

A Text Editor: The instructor will use VS Code in all demonstrations so if you do not have a preferred text editor, we recommend downloading the software. Please confirm that your computer meets the system requirements. Feel free to wait to download the software until one of our sessions.

Google Sheets: We will avoid Excel and build metadata spreadsheets in Google Sheets.

CollectionBuilder: CollectionBuilder is an open source framework for creating digital collection and exhibit websites that are driven by metadata and powered by modern static web technology.

A Development Environment: Developing locally is more efficient and will help you learn more about your computer. While this course can be completed without a local development environment, we will follow CollectionBuilder’s guidelines to enable local development. We have also isolated the key components for this workshop series:

• Install Ruby: Note that there are different installation steps depending on your operating system, select Mac, Windows, or Linux based on your computer.
• After you successfully install Ruby, you can install Jekyll. If needed, you can also consult Jekyll’s documentation.
• Check and configure git:
  • The command line can tell you if you have git, before you try to download it.
  • Be sure to follow the path for your computer/operating system.
  • Ignore the install GitHub Desktop part of the documentation if you already completed that step during an earlier session.

Research Materials

You will need to bring research materials to this course to successfully build a prototype of your project. These materials do not need to be perfect or complete by the start of our sessions. Our goal is create a proof-of-concept, not a highly polished and completed project.

Research objects: These can be image files, PDFs, mp3s, etc. You can have as few as 5-10 objects to build a successful prototype.

Metadata: Metadata is data about data. You will need information about your research objects such as title, author/creator, object description, location of origin, and potentially more depending on your project vision.

Textual content: You will want to contextualize your objects with more than just the metadata you have collected.

Other multimedia: While video, audio, timelines, maps, and more may not be your research objects, that can help contextualize and/or complement your research objects.