Artifact · last verified June 18, 2026
The Setup Clinic
Get Claude Code, Codex, or Cursor running on your machine. Every step ends with a checkpoint so you always know it worked, and the common stalls have fixes at the bottom.
Before any install: ship something in the browser
If the terminal has ever stopped you, do this first. It takes twenty minutes, installs nothing, and ends with a link you made. Momentum beats tooling.
Go to claude.ai and sign in (a free account works).
You are done when You see the chat box.
Ask for something small and interactive, in one sentence. For example: “Build me a single-page packing checklist for a weekend trip, with checkboxes I can tick and a progress bar.”
You are done when A working little app renders next to the chat, and you can click it.
Change it with plain words: “Make the progress bar green and add a reset button.”
You are done when The change appears. That cycle, describe, look, correct, is the core skill of this whole level.
Publish it from the share menu.
You are done when You have a link you could text to a friend. You have shipped software today.
The terminal, demystified
The terminal is a text box that runs commands in a folder. On a Mac, press Cmd+Space, type “Terminal”, press return. On Windows, open the Start menu and type “PowerShell”. You will type a handful of things, ever, and you can always ask the tool itself what a command does before running it.
| cd my-builds | go into a folder (cd is “change directory”) |
| ls | list what is in the current folder (dir on Windows) |
| pwd | show which folder you are standing in |
| npm run dev | start a project's local dev server, usually at localhost:3000 |
| claude | start Claude Code in the current folder (codex starts Codex) |
Pick your builder and install it
The drills across the level use Claude Code as the canonical walkthrough, and every move has a one-line Codex or Cursor equivalent, so any of the three carries you through the course.
Claude Code
A terminal agent that plans, edits files, and runs commands while you watch.
- You need
- A Claude account (a paid plan, or API billing through the developer console).
- Pick this when
- Pick this for real multi-file builds. It is the tool the drills in this level use as the canonical walkthrough.
Open your terminal and paste the installer.
curl -fsSL https://claude.ai/install.sh | bashmacOS or Linux. On Windows, open PowerShell and run: irm https://claude.ai/install.ps1 | iex
You are done when The installer finishes without red error text.
Close the terminal window and open a fresh one, then check the install.
claude --versionYou are done when A version number prints. If you see “command not found”, see the stalls list below; a fresh window fixes most of them.
Make a folder for your builds, go into it, and start the tool.
mkdir my-builds && cd my-builds && claudeYou are done when Claude Code starts and walks you through signing in with your Claude account in the browser.
Give it a tiny first task to see the rhythm.
Try: “Create a file called hello.html that shows a centered greeting, then tell me how to open it.”
You are done when It asks permission before creating the file (that is a feature), the file appears, and it opens in your browser.
Where people stall, and the way out
“command not found” right after a successful install
Close the terminal window and open a fresh one; the new command is registered when a window starts. If it persists, paste the exact error into any AI chat and say which tool and operating system; fixing this is a two-minute, well-trodden path.
npm is not recognized
Node.js is missing. Install the LTS version from nodejs.org, open a fresh terminal, and run the command again.
The browser sign-in finishes but the terminal never notices
Go back to the same terminal window and give it a few seconds. If it is still waiting, press Ctrl+C and run the tool again; the second attempt almost always lands. Corporate browsers with strict SSO sometimes eat the redirect, so set your personal browser as default for the sign-in.
It keeps asking permission for every little thing
That is the tool being trustworthy, not broken. Approve actions one by one until you trust the folder; every tool has a setting to widen permissions later, and the chapter on guardrails explains when you should.
A locked-down work laptop will not let you install anything
Use the browser path above (no install at all), or Cursor, which installs like a normal app. For terminal tools, ask IT about their developer-tools policy before fighting it.
You are lost about which folder you are in
Type pwd (print working directory) and the terminal tells you. Keep all builds inside one my-builds folder and the question mostly disappears.
Tools verified. Now what?
Head back to the course. If you are new, start with decoding the technical questions that stop you; if you are here mid-course, the chapter on working with AI as a builder is where your new tools earn their keep. Every chapter's drill also has a no-setup path, so nothing in the course ever waits on this page.