content/blog/2024-02-29-install-instructions: Blog on install instruc…

…tions

- Asking for help in finding good config

content/blog/2024-02-29-install-instructions.md

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+title = 'TITLE'
+slug = "2024/02/29/install-instructions"
+description = "1-2 sentence description for social media previews"
+
+[extra]
+authors = "Richard Darst"
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+
+At the current CodeRefinery meeting, we had a session on installation
+instructions. It was clear that the instructions, and really
+everything we teach, needs to be tied to what is easy to install and
+set up these days (not just because it's easy to teach, but because if
+it's easy to install that's what most people use).  **Help us to
+figure out what current best practices are.**
+
+We've mostly taught git from the command line so far.  That's going to
+change when we go web-first (to explain concepts).  But, as one
+example, when looking at ways to simply command line linking, there
+are lots of modern tools such as the "git credential manager", which
+make linking remotes more automatic than SSH keys.  IDEs make it easy
+to clone, commit, and push.  We should use all the modern work - but
+what to recommend?  There are so many operating systems and IDEs, we
+can't know them all.
+
+
+## Our question to the world
+
+Imagine someone new to scientific computing, using your operating
+system.  They aren't a developer, they are a scientist (broadly
+defined) or similar, trying to get some other stuff done.  What do you
+recommend to them to install and use?  Are there special instructions
+on configuring it?
+
+Usability is more important than perfection here.  You want them to
+get started without major problems, so that they can be happy now and
+be motivated to learn more later.  You aren't there to teach them
+every step of the way.  They should have some editor to use, *git*,
+*git authentication to Github*, be able to edit files, add them,
+commit them, and get them to appear on Github?  They should be able to
+access the shell some way, but it doesn't have to be the main feature
+(an editor's terminal is OK, as long as it probably works with Git,
+including whatever config and auth is needed).
+
+We want some *common* solutions, even if not perfectly free/open
+source (though of course that is preferable).  We will likely
+recommend VSCode/VSCodium since it's most used by our communities, but
+would like to provide instructions for other IDSs as well.
+
+
+## How to respond
+
+We recommend to respond to one our social medias on Github repos:
+
+* [Mastodon](https://fosstodon.org/@coderefinery)
+* [Twitter](https://twitter.com/coderefine)
+* [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/coderefinery-research-software-development/?viewAsMember=true)
+* [Github issues in coderefinery/installation](https://github.com/coderefinery/installation/)
+
+## See also
+* [Our current installation instructions](https://coderefinery.github.io/installation/)