VS Code, one folder per week

One folder per week

The report is README.md inside the week folder. The CSV and any page you edited go in the same folder. Teaching pages (this site) stay on the handbook — do not copy the course into your repo.

Week 1 stays on the public repo you already published.

Install VS Code, Git, and Python 3

All three are free. Do not buy Copilot or enter a credit card.

1. Visual Studio Code. Download from code.visualstudio.com and install. Open it once so it finishes setup. If it later asks to Reopen in Container, choose Don’t Reopen.
2. Git. git-scm.com/downloads. On a Mac, if Terminal asks you to install command-line tools, agree. On Windows, the default options are fine.
3. Python 3. python.org/downloads. On Windows, tick Add python.exe to PATH before you click Install. In VS Code: Terminal → New Terminal. Check with python3 --version (Mac / Linux) or py -3 --version (Windows). You need 3.10 or newer.

Install Typst

Typst is one free compiler. It turns main.typ into a PDF. It is not a website and it is not LaTeX. Check first with typst --version in the VS Code terminal.

1. macOS. If you have Homebrew: brew install typst. If not, download the aarch64-apple-darwin (Apple silicon) or x86_64-apple-darwin (Intel) archive from GitHub releases and put the typst binary somewhere on your PATH (for example /usr/local/bin).
2. Windows. In PowerShell: winget install --id Typst.Typst. Close and reopen the VS Code terminal, then typst --version. If winget is missing, download the Windows zip from the same releases page and add that folder to PATH.
3. Compile. From week04-report/: typst compile main.typ output/main.pdf. Open that PDF. The Results table and figure must come from output/numbers.typ and output/figure.png, which the Python script writes after pip install -r requirements.txt in the local .venv — not on the system Python.

The VS Code extension Tinymist Typst is optional. You do not need it if the terminal command works.

Clone the private repository

1. On GitHub, open kylemath/psych302-305-YOURUSERNAME and accept the invite if you have not. That is not your Week 1 public homepage, and it is not your fork of this handbook.
2. In VS Code: View → Command Palette (Mac: Command-Shift-P, Windows: Control-Shift-P) → Git: Clone. Paste https://github.com/kylemath/psych302-305-YOURUSERNAME. Sign in to GitHub when asked. Choose a folder you can find again (Documents is fine). Open the cloned folder when prompted.
3. The file tree on the left should show a weekNN-…/ folder for each week so far. You may still see leftover folders from Weeks 0–2 (lab-notes/, rt/, data/, report/) — see the weekly recipe below for tidying those up.

The weekly recipe

1. Open this week’s folder (make a new weekNN-… folder the first time that week needs one).
2. Do the laboratory on the handbook page for that week.
3. Write README.md in that folder — prediction first, before you look at a result.
4. Drop any CSV (and any page you edited, with its stylesheet or other dependencies) into the same folder.
5. Commit and Sync. Source Control (branch icon) → a short message → Commit → Sync / Push. Check that every file the page needs (for example a linked .css) is staged, not just the page itself.
6. Hand in on Canvas. Paste the path to that week’s README.md, the lines that week’s assignment asks for, and your AI disclosure. A push that is not pasted on Canvas is not submitted.

Still have loose Week 0–2 files in the repo root (rt.html, lab-notes/, data/)? Move them into week02-rt/ once — after that, everything lives in its own week folder.

Each week’s Canvas assignment states that week’s specific files and questions; this recipe does not change week to week.

Agentic coding

An agent can propose an edit, run a command, and show you the result. That does not make the report its work. You choose the question, you keep the files, you read the output, and you decide what stays.