Applied Software Engineering Fundamentals Specialization

If you are curious to learn more about the field of software engineering, this course is for you. No prior knowledge or qualification in programming or software development is necessary. Software Engineers are in great demand and now is a great time to learn more about this exciting career path.

The field of software engineering is growing at an estimated rate of 22% according to the US Bureau of Labor and Statistics. In addition to aspiring software engineers, this course is also suitable for those in related careers such as Product and Project Managers, IT Managers, Information Developers and others who communicate and interact with software engineers. This course teaches you about the power of the Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC) and software development methodologies like Agile. Explore fundamental programming principles and foundations of design, architecture, and deployment. Investigate skills a software engineer needs and identify job opportunities with hands-on projects. You will also learn about programming basics and software development tools and stacks. Throughout this course, you’ll hear from expert and novice software engineers to get a feel for what the job is like from their perspective. After completing this introductory course you will be conversant in the tools, technologies, terminology, processes, and practices in software engineering.

This course provides a practical introduction to Linux and commonly used Linux / UNIX shell commands. It teaches you the basics of Bash shell scripting to automate a variety of tasks. The course includes both video-based lectures as well as hands-on labs to practice and apply what you learn. You will have no-charge access to a virtual Linux server that you can access through your web browser, so you don't need to download and install anything to perform the labs.

You will learn how to interact with the Linux Terminal, execute commands, navigate directories, edit files, as well as install and update software. You will work with general purpose commands like id, date, uname, ps, top, echo, man; directory management commands such as pwd, cd, mkdir, rmdir, find, df; file management commands like cat, wget, more, head, tail, cp, mv, touch, tar, zip, unzip; access control command chmod; text processing commands - wc, grep, tr; as well as networking commands - hostname, ping, ifconfig and curl. You will create simple to more advanced shell scripts that involve Metacharacters, Quoting, Variables, Command substitution, I/O Redirection, Pipes & Filters, and Command line arguments. You will also schedule cron jobs using crontab. This course is ideal for data engineers, data scientists, software developers, DevOps professionals, and cloud practitioners who want to get familiar with frequently used commands on Linux, MacOS and other Unix-like operating systems as well as get started with creating shell scripts.

Collaboration and social coding are crucial parts of contemporary Software Engineering practices and the DevOps culture. In this course, you’ll be introduced to collaborative version control and popular Git platforms.

You will explore key Git concepts such as branching and repositories, as well as the use of Git commands. You will also learn and practice various Git concepts such as forking, cloning and merging workflows. You will learn to use GitHub to work effectively as a team, and perform common Git operations, such as Pull Requests, from both the Web UI and command line. Developed and taught by experienced IBM practitioners, in this course you’ll gain vital skills and hands-on experience using Git and GitHub. Each module contains hands-on labs for you to apply and practice what you learn. The course wraps up with a final project where you will start building your portfolio by creating and sharing a public/open-source GitHub project. All hands-on activities in this course can be performed using web-browser based tools and interfaces. Installation of any specialized software is NOT required on your own computer in order to complete the course.

Kickstart your learning of Python with this beginner-friendly self-paced course taught by an expert. Python is one of the most popular languages in the programming and data science world and demand for individuals who have the ability to apply Python has never been higher.

This introduction to Python course will take you from zero to programming in Python in a matter of hours—no prior programming experience necessary! You will learn about Python basics and the different data types. You will familiarize yourself with Python Data structures like List and Tuples, as well as logic concepts like conditions and branching. You will use Python libraries such as Pandas, Numpy & Beautiful Soup. You’ll also use Python to perform tasks such as data collection and web scraping with APIs. You will practice and apply what you learn through hands-on labs using Jupyter Notebooks. By the end of this course, you’ll feel comfortable creating basic programs, working with data, and automating real-world tasks using Python. This course is suitable for anyone who wants to learn Data Science, Data Analytics, Software Development, Data Engineering, AI, and DevOps as well as a number of other job roles.