Lesson 00 — Start Here 👋

Welcome! You are about to learn how to build things with code. Take a breath. You do not need to be smart, fast, or “a computer person.” You just need to be curious. That is it.

Meet your teacher: MILO (Modular Intelligent Learning Orchestrator), your AI tutor. MILO will guide you through every lesson — greeting you, explaining things kindly, reading errors with you, and celebrating your wins. Here’s the model: MILO is the brain, and GetAdvice is its friendly face — a real public app. You’ll meet MILO inside your coding assistant, and near the end you’ll practice writing clear feedback about GetAdvice.

This first lesson has no code at all. Our only goal is to get comfortable and shrink the fear. Read slowly. There is no rush.

What is programming?

Programming is just giving a computer step-by-step instructions.

Think of a recipe for cookies. A recipe says: get the flour, add sugar, mix, bake for 10 minutes. If you follow the steps in order, you get cookies. A computer is the same. You write the steps, and the computer follows them exactly, in order, every time.

A computer is not clever. It does not guess what you mean. It does exactly what you say. That is actually good news: if something goes wrong, it is almost never you being “bad at this.” It is usually just one step that needs fixing. We fix steps all the time. That is normal.

What is Claude Code?

Claude Code is the app you open on your computer — the window where MILO lives. When you open this repo in Claude Code, you’re talking to MILO.

Think of MILO as a friendly co-pilot who sits next to you while you fly the plane. You are still the pilot. You decide where to go. The co-pilot helps you read the controls, points things out, and does the boring parts when you ask.

Here is the special part: this project has a file called MILO.md. Think of MILO.md as a note you leave on the fridge for a helper before they arrive. When Claude Code starts, it reads that note (through CLAUDE.md). The note tells MILO: “This person is a complete beginner. Go slow. Explain things kindly.” So the help you get here is made for you.

Tool note — this is a Claude Code feature. Claude Code loads CLAUDE.md and MILO.md by itself. Another assistant often does not. Paste “Please read MILO.md and be my tutor” at the start of the session. A free chat that cannot see this folder needs you to paste MILO.md (or the lesson you are on) into the conversation. The full fallback is at the top of README.md.

What is a repository?

A repository (people say “repo” for short) is a folder with a memory that never loses your work.

Imagine a magic notebook. Every time you make a change, the notebook quietly remembers the old version too. So if you ever mess something up, you can flip back to how it was before. Nothing is truly lost. That safety net is why coders are brave enough to experiment.

The folder you are in right now is that repo. All your lessons live inside it. As you learn, your own creations will live here too.

Your one tiny task

Let’s meet the repo. You are going to ask MILO to give you a tour.

First, if you haven’t already, open this repo in Claude Code — that’s the window where MILO lives. Then copy the prompt below and paste it to MILO:

Hi MILO! I'm new to coding. Please read MILO.md and be my tutor.
Please list the files and folders in this repository, and explain in
one simple sentence what each one is for. I am a complete beginner,
so keep it very short and use plain words.

That’s it. Read what comes back. You do not need to understand every word. You are just looking around, like walking into a new room and noticing where the doors are.

Tip: If any answer feels confusing, you are allowed to ask MILO “Can you explain that more simply?” You can ask that as many times as you want. Good learners ask a lot of questions.

🎉 Milestone: your very first coding step

You just learned three big ideas: what programming is, what Claude Code is, and what a repository is. You also met MILO, ran your very first prompt, and toured a real repo. That is a genuine first step, and most people never take it.

Nothing broke. Nothing was scary. Good.

Next up: open lessons/01-how-the-web-works.md to see what a web page is actually made of.