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Install & set up

By the end of this lesson you'll have an Ubuntu terminal with Git installed and connected to your GitHub account.

Do this before the workshop

Installing Ubuntu can take 20–30 minutes and, on Windows, a restart.

1. Get an Ubuntu terminal

TODO: pick the club's Ubuntu version

These steps install the current Ubuntu LTS. Use the same version as the ROS 2 workshop so people only install it once.

Use WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux), which runs Ubuntu inside Windows.

  1. Right-click Start → Terminal (Admin) or PowerShell (Admin).

  2. Run:

    wsl --install

    This installs WSL with Ubuntu.

  3. Restart your computer when asked.

  4. Open Ubuntu from the Start menu. The first launch asks you to create a Linux username and password. The password doesn't show while you type; that's normal.

Use Multipass, which runs a lightweight Ubuntu virtual machine.

  1. Download and install Multipass.

  2. Open Terminal and run:

    multipass launch --name ubuntu
multipass shell ubuntu

  3. Your prompt changes to ubuntu@ubuntu:~$. You're now inside Ubuntu. Next time, open Terminal and run multipass shell ubuntu to get back.

You're all set. Open Terminal with Ctrl+Alt+T.

From here on, every command goes in your Ubuntu terminal.

2. Install Git and the GitHub CLI

sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y git gh

sudo runs a command as administrator, so it asks for your Ubuntu password. gh is the GitHub command-line tool, which handles logging in to GitHub.

Check that both installed:

git --version
gh --version

3. Tell Git who you are

Every commit is labelled with a name and email. Use the email address on your GitHub account.

git config --global user.name "Your Name"
git config --global user.email "you@example.com"

Set a few sensible defaults:

git config --global init.defaultBranch main
git config --global pull.rebase false
git config --global core.editor nano
Setting What it does
init.defaultBranch main New repos start on a branch called main, matching GitHub
pull.rebase false git pull merges changes in (we'll cover this in lesson 8)
core.editor nano Git opens the simple nano editor when it needs you to type a message

4. Log in to GitHub

gh auth login

Answer the prompts:

  1. Where do you use GitHub? → GitHub.com
  2. Preferred protocol? → HTTPS
  3. Authenticate Git with your GitHub credentials? → Yes
  4. How would you like to authenticate? → Login with a web browser

Copy the one-time code it shows, press Enter, and paste the code into the browser page. On WSL or Multipass the browser may not open by itself; go to https://github.com/login/device yourself.

Check that it worked:

gh auth status

Why not just use my GitHub password?

GitHub doesn't accept account passwords for git push. gh auth login sets up a secure token for Git so you never have to deal with one.

Checklist

  • git --version prints a version
  • git config --global user.email prints your GitHub email
  • gh auth status says you're logged in