Course Setup

Create the Codespace

The course environment runs in a GitHub Codespace, a cloud development environment that opens in your browser with everything preinstalled.

✏️ Click the button below to create a Codespace:

✏️ Confirm these options, then click Create codespace:

✏️ Once the Codespace finishes loading, start the API by running this in its terminal:

cd services/policies && npm run dev

You should see:

🚀 Policies service ready at http://0.0.0.0:4001/

Codespaces opens port 4001 in a new browser tab, showing Apollo Sandbox, an in-browser editor for writing and running GraphQL queries. If the tab doesn’t open, open the Ports tab in the Codespace and click the globe icon next to port 4001.

Leave the server running while you work through the course. It restarts on its own when you save a change.

When you take a break

GitHub charges Codespaces use by the hour while a Codespace is running, and personal accounts get a free amount each month. A Codespace stops on its own after 30 minutes without activity, unless you’ve changed that setting. To stop it sooner, see Stopping and starting a codespace. Your changes are kept, and you can start it again from the same page.

A stopped Codespace still counts toward your Codespaces storage, which GitHub also bills. When you finish the course, delete the Codespace from github.com/codespaces.

Next steps

Next, we’ll learn what GraphQL is, and run our first query.