Introductions
Cherubala Gauthier

Gauthier has completed 6 of the 7 tasks in the introductory course and is working on the largest task which is building a GitHub project of his choosing. You can see it yourself on GitHub. One thing I like about his project is that it has an immediate application of organizing the efforts of other volunteers in the media group at his church. The visual style of his page is very cool and well layed out. It has a pleasant but subdued graphic in the background with a clear and well balanced form in the center. He has used some simple text entry fields, a multiple choice button group, a pulldown selector, a sequence of checkboxes and a larger text box for comments and suggestions. He has coded value validation.
The primary purpose of this exercise is the use of GitHub projects. His README.md file is thorough. It has a small table of contents up front. It describes the purpose of the project he is building, and a description of the process he is using to build the project. He describes the tools and techniques he is using, and has a start of a list of the lessons he has learned so far in the project.
He is using the Issues list feature of the project to list the 13 major steps in his process so far. Each issue has a short description, and he is including the issue number and a short description of each of the 18 commits. This helps me as a reviewer to quickly understand the intent, design, and process as well as what each commit contained. Well done Gauthier!
Samuel Bulangalizi

Samuel’s project for Task 7 has a nice README.md file. He describes his objectives, the features of the page, the technology he will use to achieve it. He describes the process he will follow with a rough schedule. In his list of requirements the first is to learn basic Javascript. This was a problem in his plan to build this page because Javascript is a lot to learn. This is a worthwhile endeavor but it will delay the completion of his project. He has done well in using the Issues feature of GitHub. There are 6 closed issues, four of which he created and two of which I added. These 6 he has completed and closed them. There are 3 issues remaining, one of which is learning Javascript. When I review the 11 commits he has made to his code I notice that he has entered good descriptions which allows me as a reviewer to know what the commit was for without having to open each to understand. The main point of this task was to learn how to use the features of a GitHub project to complete a project and I think Samuel has done a fine job of demonstrating that knowledge. From what he has coded already I can see that he knows how to design and layout a page well. Well done Samuel, you have learned this lesson and I’m confident that you will complete your project when you have learned the required Javascript.
Salomon Mwilo

Salomon’s project for Task 7 shows good progress already. He has created an array of floating cards in a grid-template container. He has created some nice stylings that make the cards pop and use a variety of colors that allows the eye to clearly distinguish the individual cards. The grid adapts nicely to changes in size of display and orientation.
Achiza Masirika Théophile

You are not alone in this.
You will be engaging not only the material, but you will have a mentor who has been through the course.
For this course, we anticipate this pairing:
- Efatha will mentor Salomon
- Philemon will mentor Gauthier
- Ashuza will mentor Samuel
- And Michael will mentor Theophile.
Starting Course
The starting course is designed to familiarize the student with the training website and the people and processes involved. By the end of this course you will know what is on the site and where to find what you are looking for. You will gain a high level overview of the training you can expect from this site. You will also know how to interact with the material, track your progress and get the help you need on your training journey.
Each course is composed of a series of tasks. These are like lessons in most learning sites but here we call them tasks because they prepare you to:
- Know some new technology and skill
- Find the tools and environment to try it out for yourself
- Demonstrate your new skill
- And finally to get some feedback about it which will guide your future learning.
The coordination of doing these tasks while using Upwork time tracker, taking surveys, and tracking hours for these steps is pretty tricky.I’m sorry about that, but these things need to be done. While our process includes lots of communication tools, we must continue to be consistent with the Upwork process which is important for accountability for both the client and the talent. You need to learn this skill well if you want to engage other clients, which is the purpose of this training.
If you get confused or can’t follow a specific step, please use the Upwork message system to let me know so I, or your mentor, can walk you through it. If you get stuck where you can’t make progress, then include the word ‘STUCK!’ In your message. This administrative detail will get easer as you go along.
Task 1: Access the training site and this course.
- Goto Upwork and find the contract for this job. Start your time tracker to indicate what task you are starting.
- Goto https://MichaelKentBurns.com site. Find the Subscribe field in the menu and subscribe yourself.
- Use the search field to find your name. That should lead you to this page (and possibly others).
- Leave a comment on this page so we know you were here.
- Update time tracker to say you are done with task 1.
Task 2: Read the main ‘Home’ page to see your journey.
- Note the time and update Upwork time tracker to say you are starting task 2.
- Read the ‘Home’ page carefully down to and including ‘Working globally’ section keeping some notes along the way. (There will be a quiz)
- Feel free always to leave comments on any pages and posts. It will make it easier for you and I to know you have read that page.
- Goto https://demo.michaelkentburns.com/dashboard/MKB/cohort1/MKB-cohort-1-Demo, select the ‘Visit the Demo-json’ button and take the ‘read-home-part1’ survey and press the ‘submission’ button. Your answers will be captured in a json file which will appear below the ‘Submission’ button. Finally, press the ‘Save Survey Results (JSON)’ link at the bottom. You should then see a dialog indicating ‘Survey results saved successfully!’ Select ‘Close’. You may also notice that the JSON file was downloaded to your downloads directory. Save that for future reference. NOTE: If you have problems with the survey app, take notes, do a screen capture, or whatever. Then communicate that with your mentor. They may need to help you, or you might have uncovered a bug or a possible enhancement. Your mentor will make that decision and enter an issue in their project to make sure it is dealt with. By the end of this starter course, you will know how to enter an issue yourself. One step at a time.
- Note the time and calculate how much time you have used for task 2. Then go to the time tracker and indicate you are done with task 2 and going on to task 3.
Task 3: Read the ‘About’ page.
- Update time tracker that you are starting Task 3.
- Read the ‘About’ page including the Cohort-1 section and the ‘See full details.’ page. When you read about Philémon, Ashuza, and Efatha, follow the links to their Github and Upwork profiles.
* Take some time to study their Upwork profiles.
* On Philèmon’s profile, under his picture and ‘View profile’ notice that he has two specialized profiles. Make a note of them and take a moment to notice how they are different than the main view of the profile.
* You will soon create your own specialized profile.
* The next section is ‘Work history’. Take note of the various jobs he has done and the rating and comments for those.
* Notice the ‘Portfolio’ section near the bottom of the profile.
* Ashuza also has two specialized profiles: Full Stack and Mobile App.
* Finally, notice their Certifications section. You will also get one or more certifications along the way.
* Ashuza’s GitHub profile shows that he has 40+ repositories! Many of them were created as he took online tutorials. Though some of those are fairly trivial, that is expected starting out. You have to start somewhere, and now is that time.
* What is important is that they demonstrate that he not only has badges claiming knowledge of languages, frameworks, and tools, he also has done a lot of visible work that shows that he spent considerable time learning and doing.
You should remember that and make a practice of capturing all of your learning projects in your GitHub.
* We will talk more about that later.
* When you look at Efatha’s GitHub profile notice the section labeled ‘Contribution activity’. It indicates that he has recently worked on two repositories of his own, but also the ‘MKB-cohort-1-Demo’. If you click ‘Show more activity’ a few times, you will see his contributions to this training site. As you go through this training you will be demonstrating your active work on a real world project. That is what prospective clients will be looking for to know you are not just book learners.
Under the ‘Their work together’ section, you will read about the survey app you will be using. That is the result of their demo project. There is a direct link to that survey app and also a link to the GitHub repository they worked on.
Next, return to finish the ‘About’ page. Find yourself in Cohort-2 section, and read that section and this Cohort-2 page as well very carefully. Take notes of any questions you have.
3. The final section of the ‘About‘ page: Read the contributors section and the pages it links to.
When you get to the individual contributions pages notice that they have both edited and/or written several pages for this site.
4. Go to the survey app (see Task 2, step 4) and take the ‘read-about’ survey.
5. Update time tracker that you have finished task 3.
Task 4: Read the Front end web page.
1. Update time tracker as usual starting task 4.
2. Using the table of contents on the site, go read the ‘Front end web’ page. Read it carefully.
3. As you read, make note for each section, whether you already know that information well, what you know a little bit, and what sections are new to you.
4. In the areas you don’t know well, take some time to follow some of the many links provided. Don’t study them in detail, but read enough to see what is discussed and what you may want to revisit at a later date.
5. In the section about HTML and the Hello World page, take the time to actually try that for yourself. In the browser notice the address bar of your browser that the url uses the ‘file://’protocol.
6. When you get to the HTTP section, read that closely to understand how visiting a we page via http:// is different from file://
7 When you are done with task 4, take the survey ‘read-front-end-web -page’. You will be asked there to relate some of the notes you talk when reading this page.
8. Leave a comment at the bottom of the page and indicate something you learned on that page.
9. Update time tracker to indicate you are done with task 4.
Task 5: Read ‘Back end web’ page.
1. Start your timekeeping as usual.
2. In the introduction paragraphs make note of the two key differences between the Front end, and the Back end. The differences have to do with the programs involved and where those programs run. Make sure you can briefly explain those differences.
3. Read the wikipedia page on ‘Frontend and backend’. See if you can learn what ‘client side’ and ‘server side’ mean and which programs run in each.
4. Read the wikipedia page on LAMP. See if you can find the ‘Stack’ concept in the illustrations and make a list of what is in the stack.
5. In the ‘Key Components’ section notice some of the programming languages that can be used and identify which languages you already know something about.
6. Pay attention to the section on ‘Frameworks’ and research one of those frameworks enough to know why it would be used.
7. In the ‘Essential Skills…’ section, note which of those skills you think you should begin learning, and why?
8. In the ‘Common Tools and Technologies’ section, are there any tools you already know something about.
9. In the ‘Best Practices’ section, follow the link on ‘Code Reviews’ and note two of the benefits of code reviews that would help you most at this time. You will be doing some code reviews with your mentor very soon.
10. Take the survey named Read-backend, and finish your time accounting.
Task 6: Read ‘Full stack’ page.
1. Start your timekeeping as usual.
2. The Full stack page covers the concepts of front end and back end, but at a higher level. This page emphasizes the expert level of knowledge needed to bring all of the front end and back end skills together to make a full web based application. At your level of learning, you are not expected to gain this knowledge, but it is important that you are aware that someone has to put it all together.
3. What the Full stack page does not yet tell you is the importance of security. We are just now starting to explore security issues in the Security page and some blog posts discussed there.
4. Although this page leads to many other technologies to create full stack solutions, it also points out that for many purposes WordPress is a full stack solution that is open source and contains more advanced technologies that are available. This is why I (Michael) chose WordPress to build this training site.
5. Spend some time on this page just to be familiar with it, and return to it later when you have advanced in both front end and back end development and are ready to take on more.
6. Take the ‘read-full-stack‘ survey, then finish up your time keeping.
Task 7: Read ‘Work globally’ page and take the two challenges it mentions.
You should now have taken challenges 1 through 4. If not, then do so now.
thank you very much for these courses and tasks which will equip us in our walk as web developers.
I’am happy to learn with good mentors and friends during this journey. This will help my understanding of code growing in a good way while i’am also practicing on upwork in the same time for my first time and Job.
Good content here!
Hope we are going to do our best for improuv those lessons and to go up our knowledge about the web development…
I’m so glad to work on Upwork!
Thank you for this opportunity who are given to us to know that we are not alone in this journey and that we will learn and prepare a career in web development.
Be blessed a lot