exercise-development

name	exercise-development
description	Guidelines for creating and modifying Git-Mastery exercises. Use when developing new exercises, understanding exercise types, or following exercise patterns. Use when this capability is needed.
metadata	{"author":"git-mastery"}

Exercise Development

Quick Guide

Two Types of Content

Standard Exercises: Structured learning with validation (1-2 hours to create)

• Complete directory with download, verify, test, README
• Automated validation using git-autograder
• Comprehensive testing required

Hands-On Scripts: Quick demonstrations without validation (5-10 min to create)

• Single Python file in hands_on/
• No validation, tests, or README
• Focus on demonstration

When to Use Each Type

Use Standard Exercise When...	Use Hands-On Script When...
Need to assess understanding	Just demonstrating a concept
Have specific success criteria	Exploring open-ended scenarios
Want automated grading	Showing command effects
Building structured curriculum	Quick experimentation

Detailed Guides

Standard Exercises

standard-exercises.md - Complete guide to creating exercises with validation

• Proposal and approval process
• Scaffolding with ./new.sh
• Implementing download.py, verify.py, test_verify.py, README.md
• Testing and troubleshooting

Hands-On Scripts

hands-on-scripts.md - Quick guide to creating demonstration scripts

• When and why to create
• Implementation steps
• Common patterns
• Examples

Quick Start

Create Standard Exercise

# 1. Get approval (create GitHub issue)
# 2. Generate scaffolding
./new.sh

# 3. Implement required files:
#    - download.py
#    - verify.py
#    - test_verify.py
#    - README.md

# 4. Test
./test.sh <exercise-name>

# 5. Quality check
ruff format . && ruff check . && mypy <exercise-name>/

Create Hands-On Script

# Use scaffolding
./new.sh
# Choose "hands-on"

# Implement download(verbose: bool) function
# Test manually
python hands_on/<script_name>.py

Exercise Conventions

Naming

• Directories: kebab-case (branch-forward, conflict-mediator)
• Files: snake_case (download.py, test_verify.py)
• Constants: UPPER_SNAKE_CASE (QUESTION_ONE, REPOSITORY_NAME)

Required Elements (Standard Exercises)

• __init__.py - Package marker
• .gitmastery-exercise.json - Configuration
• download.py - setup(verbose: bool = False)
• verify.py - With verify() function
• test_verify.py - With REPOSITORY_NAME and test functions
• README.md - With scenario, task, hints

Required Elements (Hands-On)

• __requires_git__ and __requires_github__ variables
• download(verbose: bool) function

Examples

Standard Exercise Examples

• Simple: amateur_detective/ - Answer validation
• Branching: branch_bender/ - Branch operations
• Remote: remote_control/ - GitHub integration
• Complex: conflict_mediator/ - Merge conflicts

Hands-On Examples

• hands_on/add_files.py - Staging demonstration
• hands_on/branch_delete.py - Branch deletion
• hands_on/remote_branch_pull.py - Remote operations

Related Skills

• exercise-utils - Utility functions reference

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