Getting Started with CPEN 221

Software Tools and Java

This repository contains two self-paced preparation tracks for the start of CPEN 221. Five guides establish the development environment and workflow:

1. Software to Install
2. Using the Command Line Interface
3. Installing and Using Visual Studio Code
4. The Build Process and Tools
5. Git and GitHub

Three Java readings then teach or refresh the required language material:

1. Running Java Programs
2. Objects, State, and References
3. Iteration, Collections, and Interfaces

The segments and activities are deliberately separate from the core course notes and from PrairieLearn. The activities provide immediate browser feedback but have no accounts, grades, analytics, or network requests. A later readiness assessment can be offered separately in PrairieLearn without changing this material.

Repository layout

Path	Contents
notes/	Authoritative Markdown guides and Java readings
examples/	Complete Java 25 source files and deliberate failure fixtures
assets/	Editable figure sources and figure metadata
site/	Generated static site committed for review and deployed by Pages
site/assets/fonts/	Self-hosted reading and code fonts with SIL OFL notices
site/assets/figures/	Generated SVG figures copied from the editable sources
scripts/	Site build, publication checks, and Java example validation
PLAN.md	Design decisions and crosswalk from the inherited material
STATUS.md	Completed work and observed validation results

Preview the site

Install Pandoc 3.10 and a Java 25 JDK. From the repository root:

python3 scripts/build_site.py
python3 scripts/check_site.py
python3 scripts/validate_examples.py
python3 scripts/validate_guides.py
python3 -m http.server 8000 --directory site

Then open http://localhost:8000/. The generated HTML includes source hashes, and the checker refuses stale pages, missing local links, invalid fragments, or a mismatch between the declared and published guides, readings, or figures.

Publish with GitHub Pages

The workflow in .github/workflows/pages.yml rebuilds the committed pages, checks that the build creates no diff, validates the site, tests every Java example under Java 25, exercises the Gradle and Git guide workflows, and deploys site/. After pushing the repository to GitHub, select GitHub Actions as the Pages source in the repository settings.