Your First Day: Accounts, Access & Setup

1 Step 1: Set Up Your GitHub Account

1. Sign in or sign up at GitHub (opens in a new tab). Your lead will tell you whether to use an existing personal account or create one just for work.
2. Add and verify your studio email under Settings > Emails. Commits are linked to your account by email address, so this is how your work shows up as yours.
3. Fill in your profile with your real name and a photo, so teammates recognize you in reviews.
4. Send your GitHub username to your lead so they can invite you to the organization.

2 Step 2: Turn On Two-Factor Authentication

Two-factor authentication (2FA) is required for every member of the organization. Set it up before accepting the invitation: under Settings > Password and authentication, enable 2FA with an authenticator app, and add a passkey or hardware security key as well if you have one.

Save the recovery codes in your password manager straight away. Losing both your phone and your recovery codes can lock you out of your account permanently.

3 Step 3: Join the Organization

Accept the invitation from the email GitHub sends you, or from your GitHub notifications. You'll be added to one or more teams, which control the repositories you can see. If a repository you need is missing, ask your lead to add you to the right team; don't ask a teammate to share their access.

4 Step 4: Install Your Tools

5 Step 5: Connect to GitHub with an SSH Key

An SSH key lets Git talk to GitHub securely without typing a password. If you only use one GitHub account on this machine, these commands are all you need. If you use more than one, follow Managing Multiple SSH Keys instead.

ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -C "you@shatteredvales.studio"
gh ssh-key add ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub --title "Studio laptop"
ssh -T git@github.com

ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -C "you@shatteredvales.studio"
gh ssh-key add ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub --title "Studio laptop"
ssh -T git@github.com

ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -C "you@shatteredvales.studio"
gh ssh-key add "$env:USERPROFILE\.ssh\id_ed25519.pub" --title "Studio laptop"
ssh -T git@github.com

Press Enter to accept the default file location, and set a passphrase. gh ssh-key add needs the GitHub CLI signed in first. The last command should greet you by username.

6 Step 6: Clone and Run Your First Project

Keep all repositories in one folder (the studio convention is ~/Source) so they're easy to find:

mkdir -p ~/Source && cd ~/Source
gh repo list Shattered-Vales-Studio --limit 50         # repositories you can access
gh repo clone Shattered-Vales-Studio/<repo>
cd <repo>

1. Read the README.md from top to bottom, then ARCHITECTURE.md if there is one.
2. Follow the README's Getting Started steps until the project runs and its tests pass.
3. Anywhere the README was wrong, unclear, or missing a step, write it down. Fixing it is a perfect first pull request.

7 Step 7: Stay on Top of Notifications

GitHub notifies you about reviews requested from you, mentions, and activity on issues you're part of. Choose web or email delivery under Settings > Notifications, and use Watch on your team's main repositories. From the terminal, one command summarizes everything waiting on you:

gh status

8 Step 8: Read the Guides in This Order

You don't need everything on day one. This order matches when you'll need each guide: